No subject

Here is my shot at a summary statement of points I might allude to in 
an initial few minutes (no more than five) and be prepared to amplify 
on if and when warranted during the discussion.

Major Premise:  What the University is uniquely good at is taking the 
long view, doing the fundamental research that precedes and underlies 
deployment of technology in the "real world."  The university has an 
obligation to contribute the fruits of that research to the world, 
but also not to permit itself to be diverted from its basic mission 
by immediate societal needs.  In that context, perhaps the university 
can contribute to the fight against bioterrorism in four fundamental 
ways, that are consistent with the university’s basic mission to 
train students and produce fundamental new knowledge :

1.	Doing research underlying the development of a new kind of 
antimicrobial drugs, that will target specific gene products in 
specific pathogens.  These drugs are made necessary by the evolution 
of microbial resistance to broad spectrum antibiotics, and the 
corresponding potential ability of terrorists to launch attacks with 
drug-resistant pathogens.  However in the short term specific 
antimicrobial drugs will not be developed by pharmaceutical 
companies, because the size of the market in the near future relative 
to the development costs strongly favors broad spectrum antibiotics. 
So the basic research for specific antimicrobial drugs must take 
place in the public sector, and research universities are an 
excellent place for it.

2.	Doing research underlying the development of specific, rapid, 
and scalable diagnostic techniques for microbial infection.  Specific 
drugs will be useless without specific diagnosis, so this item is a 
necessary corollary to item #1.  Like item #1, this will not happen 
in the private sector, as long as the pharmaceutical companies are 
tied to an antimicrobial strategy utilizing broad-spectrum 
antibiotics.

3.	Doing research underlying the development of easily 
deployable environmental sensors for microbes.

4.	Bridging the gap between the university culture and the 
law-enforcement culture in a way that assists in combating terrorism 
without compromising university values in generating and 
disseminating knowledge.  Both law-enforcement officials and 
university and university researchers need to be on the same page as 
to what information should not be disseminated (for example, cookbook 
recipes for weaponizing microbes) and what should be freely 
disseminated (for example, knowledge about the molecular biology and 
physiology of pathogens, which provides a critical foundation for 
biomedical research).

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