Bioterrorism
Paula J. Olsiewski, Program Director
Additional Grants in Raising Awareness about Potentially Dangerous Research
Sloan has made a number of grants aimed at raising awareness in the scientific community about issues of dual use research. With Sloan support, the World Health Organization is raising awareness among its member states of the potential for misuse of biotechnology research. In 2005, WHO published a paper, "Life Science Research: Opportunities and Risks for Public Health". With renewed support, WHO conducted a series of activities that included a meeting in Geneva in 2006 and resulted in the publication of a report, "Scientific Workping Group on Life Science Research: Report of the First Meeting". Among the five priority areas identified in the report is developing guidelines for research oversight.
The Foundation, with a trustees grant in 2005 to University of Exeter (U.K), and renewed support in 2006, is supporting the work of Brian Rappert and Malcolm Dando and their deliberative seminars to raise awareness in the US, South Africa, the Netherlands and other countries (http://www.projects.ex.ac.uk/codesofconduct/BiosecuritySeminar/index.htm). In addition, in 2006, the Foundation provided support to the Royal Society UK to raise awareness in the international bioscience community about issues of dual use research in the life sciences at a workshop held in September 2006, http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/document.asp?tip=0&id=5563.
In November 2003, the Foundation supported a symposium: "National Security and Biological Research: What are the Boundaries?" (http://www.nyas.org/ebriefreps/splash.asp?intEbriefID=243).
Other recent grants include:
The Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation: To support a feasibility study to develop a network of globalized bioscientists. (2006)
University of Toronto: Sloan support for a workshop on "Genomics for Development, Bioterrorism, and Human Security” led to the publication of “DNA for Peace: Reconciling Biodevelopment and Biosecurity.” (2005)
Monterey Institute of International Studies: To assess the operation of the World Health Organization's oversight of variola (smallpox) virus research. (2004)