The events of Sept. 11, 2001, have fundamentally changed Washington's role in society, Marburger told attendees at the symposium, "Energy for the Future: What Can Science & Technology Bring to the Table?" sponsored by the Committee on Science (ComSci). "President Bush is committed to winning the war on terrorism," Marburger said. "It will be a difficult task, not a conventional war. Much of it will be waged on the homeland front. The threat scenario is difficult to pin down. We need an unprecedented partnership between the public and private sectors to do it.

"The challenge of homeland security extends across every walk of life, every government agency," he said. "It is difficult to disentangle the issue of homeland security from other aspects of federal agencies' responsibilities."

Currently, the Office of Science & Technology Policy, which Marburger heads, "is providing advice on science and technology to the Office of Homeland Security," he said. "We've been attempting to organize the science community to meet this challenge," although, he added, "one doesn't easily organize the science community, because it tends to organize itself."

Marburger also addressed research funding priorities, suggesting that the current balance among disciplines may well be about right, but that all areas should receive funding increases. He pointed to the role chemistry will play in probing new frontiers: "Discovery at the traditional frontiers of the very small and very large is not where the most exciting discoveries are being made today," he said. "The frontier of complexity has been opened by advances in chemistry.

"We now have an unprecedented ability to construct new organic and inorganic materials, atom by atom, with entirely new properties," he continued. "This opens extraordinary possibilities. At the very heart of this revolution is the set of fields we traditionally call chemistry, and the most exciting possibilities for new discovery are in the realm of chemistry."

In the area of energy policy, Marburger echoed other speakers at the symposium. "The climate-change issue will be a major driver for energy policy and science policy for a very long time," he said. "Everyone seems to agree that we need to look to a carbon-free energy system, but that is a project that will be measured in centuries." Nuclear power, including fusion power, will have to be part of the energy production mix, he added, because no other carbon-free source of energy is nearly sufficient to meet the nation's energy needs.

In the morning session titled "National Security and the Homeland Defense," also sponsored by ComSci, five speakers outlined the threat of chemical and biological weapons to military personnel and civilian populations and described the contributions chemists need to make toward combating these threats.

	George

Anna Johnson-Winegar of the Department of Defense pointed out the following critical needs: development of noncontact techniques for identifying contamination of surfaces with chemical agents, in vivo toxicity studies of low-level exposure to chemical agents, and real- or near real-time bioterrorism detectors not dependent on wet chemistry.

Elizabeth George, program manager of DOE's Chemical & Biological National Security Program, described the unique challenges of protecting civilian populations against attack by chemical and biological agents. She outlined a number of projects her office is undertaking to address those challenges. And like Johnson-Winegar, she said chemistry has an important role to play in developing detection methodology, understanding the environmental transport and fate of chemical and biological agents, and inventing new decontamination technologies.

CALL TO ARMS Nancy Jackson of Sandia Labs, co-organizer of the symposia; Marburger (center); and ACS President Eli Pearce.

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