Talent Hunt

doi:10.1126/science.291.5506.963c

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ScienceScope

The new InterAcademy Council (IAC) research organization--an international version of the study-producing U.S. National Research Council (Science, 19 May 2000, p. 1149)--has gotten its first assignment. Science academy presidents meeting in Davos, Switzerland, last week decided that the IAC's inaugural study should focus on developing better ways to promote scientific talent and research capacity, especially in developing countries. The presidents--led by IAC co-chairs Bruce Alberts, president of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and Indian Academy president Goverdhan Mehta--also hired law professor Albert Koers of the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands as the group's executive director.

The study, to be funded by a Sloan Foundation grant and written by an e-mail-linked expert panel nominated by member academies, "will focus on developing young scientific talent worldwide," says Koers. A final product is due later this year. The IAC will have a small "core staff" in Amsterdam to help coordinate such projects, he added, but otherwise will be run as "a virtual organization."