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Science 20 January 2006:
Vol. 311. no. 5759, p. 317
DOI: 10.1126/science.311.5759.317c
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ScienceScope

Research patrons bailed out a particle collider at the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) after Congress slashed its budget. A group led by mathematician and hedge-fund billionaire James Simons is donating $13 million to the Department of Energy laboratory in Upton, New York, to run the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider a full 20 weeks in 2006 instead of, at most, 6 weeks (Science, 18 November 2005, p. 1105). BNL director Praveen Chaudhari says he was "stunned" when Simons made the offer last month.

As long as donors work with funding agencies, such philanthropy is welcome, says presidential science adviser and former Brookhaven director John Marburger. "It will help us get more out of our facilities," he says. But American Physical Society public affairs director Michael Lubell fears that the donation could set a troubling precedent if the federal government uses it as an excuse to further shrink public funding of basic research.




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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)