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> January 7, 2000:
Hour Two: Leon Lederman: Science in Cuba
| What's the status of science in Cuba? Well, a group of American scientists recently was allowed to travel there. Among them was Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman, who is is no stranger to Science Friday. Cuba and the U.S. have had little contact in the past 40 years -- U.S. policy bars citizens from business and tourism there. So many listeners may be surprised to hear that while some areas of Cuban research have withered under the embargo, Cuban biotechnology is a leader in the developing world. Indeed, several U.S. companies have been petitioning the government to relax the embargo so that they may conduct clinical trials on new vaccines developed in Cuban labs. |  | Dr. Lederman, Director Emeritus of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, won the 1988 Nobel Prize in Physics "for the neutrino beam method and the demonstration of the doublet structure of the leptons through the discovery of the muon neutrino." But he's much more than just a physics guy. In the past, we've spoken to him about science education reform and his efforts to have teachers teach physics first (then chemistry, then biology). We've talked about non-traditional careers for scientists. And we've talked about the history of science.
Today we'll be talking to Dr. Lederman about all those things and more, including his recent trip to Cuba and his assessment of scientific research there. Is there any common ground between the open nature of science and the closed nature of U.S.-Cuban relations? We'll talk about that, and take your calls, on this hour of Science Friday.
Guests:
Leon Lederman
Nobel Laureate, Physics
Director Emeritus
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
Pritzker Professor of Science
Illinois Institute of Technology
Chicago, Illinois
Books/Articles Discussed:
Related Links:
Chemical and Engineering News article on science in Cuba
A Cuban science / technology radio program: Arnie Coro's DXers Unlimited...
Castro Speech Databases
Discovery Online, Science -- Deep Secrets
Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy
- This segment produced by:
Lee Uehara
Web producer:
Charles Bergquist |