Pandemic blocker. The next job for a public health expert who steered Hong Kong through the 1997 avian influenza epidemic and the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is to prepare for a global flu pandemic. Margaret Chan has been chosen by the World Health Organization (WHO) to help its 192 member countries "mitigate mortality and reduce social and economic disruption" from an anticipated influenza pandemic. Chan, who joined WHO 2 years ago from the Hong Kong Department of Health, plans to use her contacts to strengthen WHO's pandemic preparedness efforts throughout Asia, where the H5N1 avian influenza virus is believed to be endemic. "But I keep reminding myself that [a pandemic] can emerge from any country or any part of the world," she says. SOURCE: WHO

Janelia's first crop. Bio-informatics whizzes, a worm brain mapper, and a scientist who built a flight simulator for fruit flies are among the first seven group leaders recruited by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Farm, a $500 million research campus set to open in mid-2006 in Ashburn, Virginia. The glass-roofed, snake-shaped laboratory will bring up to 300 physical and biological scientists together in 24 groups to figure out how neuronal circuits work and come up with new imaging technologies.

The bent is quantitative: Of the group leaders hired so far, five studied physics or math in college and later moved on to biology. The complete list is neuroscientists Dmitri Chklovskii and Karel Svoboda of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York; bioinformaticists Sean Eddy of Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, and Eugene Myers of the University of California, Berkeley; protein imager Nikolaus Grigorieff of Brandeis University in Massachusetts; neurogeneticist Julie Simpson of the University of Wisconsin, Madison; and neurobiologist Roland Strauss of the University of Würzburg, Germany, who models insect flight.

Still ticking. Handprints from children at the development center he championed, an honorary law degree from the agency's general counsel, and a photograph of a plateau in Antarctica that now bears his name are just three of the many going-away presents that Joseph Bordogna received last week as he ended 14 years at the National Science Foundation (NSF), the last nine as the agency's longest-serving deputy director. Serving under four NSF directors, Bordogna was known for both his attention to detail and his labors on the agency's evolving strategic vision. NSF Director Arden Bement presented the 72-year-old electrical engineer with a clock, then quickly noted that "Joe isn't a clock watcher. He comes to work when the sun rises and leaves when it sets." Bordogna plans to continue that pace at the University of Pennsylvania, where he reclaims his endowed chair in engineering. He'll also be working with new president Amy Gutmann on implementing her strategic plan for the university. CREDIT: MARY HANSON/NSF