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Science 23 February 2007:
Vol. 315. no. 5815, p. 1061
DOI: 10.1126/science.315.5815.1061a
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Newsmakers

Figure 1
INSIDE KNOWLEDGE. For more than a decade, Dutch molecular biologist Ronald Plasterk has told others how to run science policy. Now, he'll be in the driver's seat himself. Plasterk, who heads the Hubrecht Laboratory in Utrecht and moonlights as a sharp-tongued newspaper and TV columnist (Science, 5 September 2003, p. 1311), is the minister of science, education, and culture in the new Dutch government. "I'm sad. He's a great scientist," says Stanford University researcher and Nobelist Andrew Fire. "But it's wonderful for Holland."

Plasterk helped pen the Labor Party's election platform last fall, and longtime colleague Piet Borst of the Netherlands Cancer Institute expects him to make some "radical changes." One likely move is to boost merit-based project funding through the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research.

Borst says Plasterk's presence in the new Cabinet, which includes two Christian parties, is also "a huge relief for atheist intellectuals." Two years ago, Plasterk blasted his Christian-Democratic predecessor, Maria van der Hoeven, for supporting intelligent design.




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