data relating to safety and health. The decision also says that manufacturers have sufficient avenues for obtaining compensation from other firms that use their research data. Monsanto says it has never objected to the regulation of pesticides but fears the present law doesn't protect trade secrets. "We view this [decision] as a vindication of the company's decision regarding trade secrets as property," said W. Wayne Withers, assistant general counsel for Monsanto. "The court did make clear that a substantial portion of the data which [have] been submitted to EPA . . . cannot be taken without recognition of the owner's rights." Still, the company lost its bid to keep all of its data confidential. The court's decision, written by Associate Justice Harry A. Blackmun, says that because of changes in the pesticide law over the years, the consideration of how data can be used is divided into three parts. Before 1972 and since the 1978 amendments, firms that submitted data to EPA allegedly knew what uses the data would be put to and what restrictions EPA had put on the release of information. Because manufacturers submitted their data knowing that some of them might be made public, particularly data relating to health and safety, they should expect no compensation for them. Compensation for data used by other firms was to be accomplished by negotiation or arbitration. However, in between those years, the law was silent with respect to EPA's authority, and the Supreme Court found that under some conditions, any release of data by the agency could constitute an illegal "taking" of property. But the decision says that such releases are covered by the so-called Tucker Act, which allows private parties to receive compensation from the federal government for damages caused by acts of Congress. In another case bearing on this issue, Union Carbide has challenged the constitutionality of the use of arbitration to determine compensation. This case is expected to be heard next year and the Monsanto decision undoubtedly will have some impact as a precedent. •
Low-cost way to make printed circuits developed Technology to produce electronic printed circuit boards at a tenth the processing cost of conventional methods has been developed by General Electric. The process uses traditional screen printing, which means that users will be able to print circuits at resolutions of 0.01inch lines and spaces. Such resolution is sufficient for consumer uses such as appliances, autos, and television sets. Circuit board makers use alternative photolithography techniques for the finer resolutions needed for computers and telecommunications devices. The three processes of printing circuits, resistors, and insulating layers that comprise the new GE technology were invented by electronics engineer Charles W. Eichelberger and physicist Robert J. Wojnarowski at General Electric Research & Development Center in Schenectady, N.Y. The process involves screening circuit patterns with inks based on epoxy or polyimide resins containing iron and nickel powder. Curing of the inks takes 20 minutes in heat ovens or one minute in infrared ovens. Immersion in copper sulfate dissolves away the particles and replaces them with continuous copper strips. This copper plating takes five minutes, compared with up to eight hours for conventional electroless plating. Iron powder is used because of its low cost, and nickel is used to promote better adhesion. The new technology also makes use of two-component resins based on epoxies or polyimides to print resistors on circuit boards. Ratios of the two components can be changed to produce different resistance values as desired. This step lays down hundreds of resistors in one pass of a screen printer and avoids the need to drill holes in boards and to solder resistors in place. Resistor inks are heat cured. The GE team uses epoxy resins for usual applications and polyimides for high-temperature service. The insulating resins are also epoxies or polyimides, used to coat the substrate initially or to cover one printed circuit before overlaying with a second in fabrication of
Using new process, GE's Wojnarowski, Eichelberger dip printed circuit board into copper-plating solution multilayer boards. Initial coating of a substrate with insulating resin makes it possible to use many types of substrates, including steel. The GE researchers point out that steel would make a good heat sink in devices that produce a lot of heat in operation. Steel also would be flexible, allowing boards to be bent to fit shape requirements. Epoxy or polyimide would be used according to use temperatures and formulations varied according to flexibility needed. The resins undergo threesecond cures with ultraviolet lamps. UV light photolyzes a triphenylsulfonium salt in the compound, liberating an acid that cures the resin. •
Genes cloned for blood pressure regulators In addition to its role as a pump, the heart appears to produce substances that play a key role in controlling blood pressure. Earlier this year, several of these heart-derived peptides were isolated and characterized by several research groups. The peptides can affect water and sodium excretion by the kidneys, July 2, 1984 C&EN
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News of the Week and they also relax the smooth muscles of blood vessel walls. Now three research teams independently have worked out the sequence for the DNA that is responsible for making the precursor for these peptides. Knowing the DNA sequence means that substantial amounts of the peptides now can be produced by recombinant DNA techniques to study the workings of the natural regulatory system. It is also a key step in the possible development of much more effective drugs for treating hypertension. At least one of the teams, that of California Biotechnology Inc., already has begun extensive studies in collaboration with researchers at Cornell University's medical school of the biological activity of one of the peptides, which it calls auriculin. California Biotechnology's research team is headed by John Lewicki. Other groups sequencing the DNA are Tadashi Inagami and associates at Vanderbilt University's school of medicine, and one including Shinzo Oikawa and coworkers
at the Suntory Institute for Biomedical Research, Osaka, Japan, and Hisayuki Matsuo and coworkers from Miyazaki Medical College, Miyazaki, Japan [Nature, 309, 666, 717, 719, 722, and 724 (1984)]. U.S. teams cloned the gene from rat heart tissue, the Japanese group from human heart. Although several peptides appear to be involved, they all derive from a common precursor in rats and one in humans, the researchers find. In the rat, the DNA first produces a precursor protein 152 amino acids long that contains in its carboxyterminal region the amino acid sequences for all of the heart regulatory peptides reported so far. It also contains a region in its aminoterminal end rich in hydrophobic amino acids that is likely to be a signal sequence. Such a region is characteristic of precursors of secreted proteins. The human DNA sequence produces a remarkably similar precursor peptide that also contains the apparent signal sequence in its amino-terminal region. •
Consortium to urge women to choose chemistry Encouraging women to take up chemistry as a career and to continue graduate studies toward a Ph.D. is the goal of a new consortium of five college chemistry departments. The consortium includes three women's colleges—Sweet Briar, Mount Holyoke, and the College of St. Catherine—as well as Skidmore, which recently became coeducational, and New Jersey Institute of Technology, a coeducational state college. The mix of colleges is deliberate, according to consortium participants. They believe that it will encourage a stimulating exchange about what kinds of classroom environments work best for women students. Called the Chemistry Consortium, it is funded by the Camille & Henry Dreyfus Foundation and administered by the College & University Resource Institute, Washington, D.C. Consortium participants point out that although the percentage of women receiving chemistry Ph.D.s has more than doubled since 1970, 6
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in 1980 women still represented only 17% or so of those receiving doctorates. Moreover, according to a recent survey of freshman attitudes, the number of women listing chemistry as their probable major field of study was just 1%. The consortium's program, which is beginning this summer, relies heavily on role model interaction with freshman and sophomore students, through a combination of lectures and off-campus visitations, as well as hands-on research opportunities for undergraduates with campus faculty members. So far, the program has lined up 10 lecturers— from Pfizer, Mobil, 3M, and several independent research laboratories and universities—for day-long campus visits. Each lecturer also will receive three to five students during the year at her office or laboratory to share her work experience. Program participants believe the long-term solution to increase the number of women electing to pursue chemistry careers lies with improvement of science instruction
from grade school through college. But, says Mary E. Thompson, project director and professor of chemistry at the College of St. Catherine, "we cannot afford to wait for a new generation of inspired eighth graders to enter college, or for a new generation of inspired teachers." •
Firms match funds for young faculty awards The Council for Chemical Research (CCR) has announced that its member companies will provide about $1 million in matching funds for young chemistry and chemical engineering faculty members who were selected to participate in the first round of the Presidential Young Investigators Awards Program. Of the 200 awards announced last February, 20 went to chemical engineers and 14 to chemists, all faculty members within seven years of their doctorate (C&EN, Feb. 20, page 26). The National Science Foundation is administering the awards and is providing each awardee with $25,000, for up to five years, in research support. Although the awards are designed to help keep young faculty members at their university posts, they also have a second purpose. That is to ensure improved ties between universities and industry and, thus, matching industry funds are required for each award. That second purpose is identical to that of CCR, which was formed three years ago with the objective of enhancing communication and interaction between academic researchers in chemistry and chemical engineering and their industrial counterparts. So when the awards were announced, CCR put together summaries of the 34 awardees' research areas and circulated them to member companies. So far, 15 of CCR's 43 member companies have said they will support the work of 30 of the awardees. Still more companies are expected to participate in the program. CCR is a nonprofit consortium of 43 companies, representing about 75% of the U.S. companies involved in chemical research, and 142 universities. •
