Neal F. Lane – Baker Institute Blog

Remembering one of America’s foremost champions of science, engineering, technology and education: Dr. Charles “Chuck” Vest

January 6, 2014admin

A few weeks ago, this nation — indeed, the world — lost a truly great leader in science, engineering, technology, higher education and public policy, Dr. Charles “Chuck” Vest, past president of MIT and the National Academy of Engineering. He died on Dec. 12, 2013, at the young age of 72, following a bout with pancreatic cancer. I was privileged to know Chuck Vest and to work with him over the past 20 years on various issues of federal science and technology policy. Continue Reading →

Fellow Neal Lane receives National Science Board award for leadership in science and technology

April 2, 2013admin

Physicist Neal Lane, senior fellow in science and technology policy at the Baker Institute and Rice’s Malcolm Gillis University Professor, has earned the National Science Board’s 2013 Vannevar Bush Award. The award is presented by the National Science Board (NSB)… Continue Reading →

Science research in America: Avoiding doomsday

December 17, 2012admin

December 21, 2012. This quickly-approaching date in our modern Gregorian calendar is notorious for allegedly having been ordained as a global doomsday in an ancient calendar created by the Maya. But after repeatedly being discredited by scientists at NASA and prominent Mayanists among others, the popular end-of-days prediction has lost some of its cache (not before being milked for its commercial value by Hollywood, of course). Continue Reading →

Why “big science” is worth the cost

July 9, 2012admin

Physicists at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) delivered big news last week when they announced the almost certain discovery of the Higgs boson — the so-called “God particle” thought to be the key to the formation of matter, and life.

“If what they’ve seen is the Higgs boson, it’s an extraordinary achievement. If it is not the Higgs, it is even more exciting, opening the window to a whole domain of new physics,” said Neal Lane, Baker Institute senior fellow in science and technology policy and former science adviser to President Bill Clinton. “One way or the other, this discovery will expand our understanding of how the universe took shape.” Continue Reading →

Making science accessible to non-scientists

April 19, 2012admin

Now in its sixth year, the Civic Scientist Lecture Series seeks to demystify science through talks by distinguished scientists from around the world. Nobel laureate David Baltimore and California Institute of Technology (Caltech) biologist Alice Huang delivered the 2012 Civic… Continue Reading →

Remembering Bush science adviser Jack Marburger

August 5, 2011admin

Dr. John (“Jack”) Marburger, distinguished physicist and President George W. Bush’s science adviser and former director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, died on July 28 at the age of 70. Marburger served as president of the State University of New York at Stony Brook for more than a decade, and as director of the Brookhaven National Laboratory, before Bush tapped him for the White House job in 2001. In every job Marburger took on throughout his remarkable career — and he had some difficult assignments — he stuck it out, whatever the circumstances, and did his very best to get the job done. Continue Reading →