Alberts, Bruce

▪ 1995

      If the new president of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), Bruce Alberts, had his way, scientific literacy would soon become one of the nation's leading concerns. A strong advocate of improving science education in primary and secondary schools, Alberts arrived (1993) at the prestigious organization in Washington, D.C., eager to promote this message. Only one year into his six-year term as president, he had already made his presence felt with his unpretentious manner and self-deprecating humour.

      Though a life devoted to scientific research could be demanding, Alberts combined a vital career as a research scientist with one as an administrator involved in educational projects. As a professor of biochemistry and biophysics at the University of California at San Francisco, Alberts spent many years investigating the role of certain proteins in chromosomal replication and served as department chairman. He was also coauthor of Molecular Biology of the Cell (1983), a widely used textbook. Alberts channeled his boundless energy and enthusiasm for science into the establishment of a variety of educational endeavours, including City Science, a program to improve science instruction in the San Francisco elementary-school system. He influenced national efforts to address scientific literacy by serving on the advisory board of the National Science Resources Center, a joint project of the NAS and the Smithsonian Institution, as well as on the board of the National Academy of Sciences' National Committee on Science Education Standards and Assessment. In 1988 he became head of the Commission on Life Sciences of the National Research Council (NRC—the operating arm of the NAS and its affiliated institutions, the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine).

      Bruce Michael Alberts was born on April 14, 1938, in Chicago, Ill. He earned an A.B. in biochemical sciences from Harvard College in 1960 and received a doctorate in biophysics from Harvard University in 1965. Alberts taught at Princeton University until 1976, when he moved to the University of California at San Francisco.

      Elected to membership in the NAS in 1981, Alberts became its 20th president, succeeding geophysicist Frank Press. Alberts' major concern was running the NRC, which prepared hundreds of scientific, medical, and technical reports each year under contract from the government and private sources. In the midst of all that the post required, Alberts nonetheless maintained his passion for reforming science education and undertook the groundwork necessary for the NAS/NRC to move ahead toward the establishment of a national science-education program.

      (MARY JANE FRIEDRICH)

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