microbial drugs is essential for the protection of 

 animals and human health. 



. . . The study (of requirements of pre- 

 teenage girls for specific nutrients) also pro- 

 vided evidence that the present National Re- 

 search Council's recommended daily allow- 

 ances for protein for children are minimal and 

 do not contain a sufficient margin of safety. 



. . . Knowledge of the precise kinds, 

 quantities and balance of nutrients required 

 for human health and productivity is serious- 

 ly lacking. . . . 



• Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health 

 Administration: . . . There is a need to do 

 careful simultaneous studies of the endocrine 

 and bodily changes of puberty, along with 

 concomitant emotional and behavioral 

 changes. The need for such research is point- 

 ed up by the almost absolute lack of reliable 

 information on early adolescent develop- 

 ment. Ages 10-15 are not even included as a 

 separate category in the U.S. vital statistics 

 data; this gap in reported data also contri- 

 butes significantly to the absence of an epide- 

 miology of mental illness in the early adoles- 

 cent phase. 



• Army: . . . More than 65 percent of ad- 

 vanced weapons system failures are materials 

 failures. 



• National Institutes of Health: . . . Another 

 area in which recombinant DNA technology 

 offers hope of important progress is in clon- 

 ing modified cells for the large-scale produc- 

 tion of biological compounds for the treat- 

 ment and control of disease. . . . Other pos- 

 sible applications of recombinant DNA re- 

 search include studies to increase plant food 

 production by enhancing the efficiency of 

 photosynthesis, and studies to decrease the 

 fertilizer requirements of crops by transfer- 

 ring directly to plants the microbia' enzyme 

 systems that perform nitrogen fixation . 



• Housing and Urban Development: . . . Many 

 of the phenomena around which HUD must 

 shape its programs are not yet well under- 

 stood. . .(A)nalysis has begun to show that 

 some community problems may have coun- 

 terintuitive solutions, which ordinary experi- 

 ence and common sense might not have sug- 

 gested. 



• Energy Research and Development Adminis- 

 tration: . . . The industrial firms carrying out 

 ERDA-funded development and demonstra- 

 tion projects typically neither have nor seek 

 funding for basic research tasks. The interac- 

 tions are mostly quite indirect. The mechan- 

 isms for assuring the most fruitful level of 

 interaction need strengthening. 



• National Bureau of Standards: . . . The fun- 

 damental issue regarding basic research in 

 the Government laboratories is the need to 

 maintain a Federal policy that encourages 

 basic research of high quality. 



Examples of Basic Research 



Through their conduct and support of basic re- 

 search, the mission agencies have made significant 

 contributions to the progress of science and to the 

 achievement of national goals. For example, ba- 

 sic research is responsible for significant discover- 

 ies in the amelioration and cure of disease, con- 

 servation of natural resources, support of national 

 defense, promotion of economic growth, and ex- 

 ploration of space. More often than not, years 

 must pass before the full significance of a re- 

 search result is appreciated. Thus, it may be some 

 time until science and society reap the full bene- 

 fits of the research being conducted by the mis- 

 sion agencies today. 



Hundreds of examples of basic research con- 

 ducted and/or supported by the agencies are 

 summarized in Part I of this report. The following 

 examples of recent and current basic research are 

 only illustrative. 2 



• Vaccines for Control of Animal Diseases 

 (Agriculture): . . . Significant breakthroughs 

 include- the development of a vaccine for 

 Marek's disease, a cancer-causing disease in 

 chickens. This has been an outstanding 

 achievement in the field of virus-in-cancer 

 and has reduced large economic losses due to 

 this disease by a dramatic 80 percent. Another 

 ... is the development of a vaccine for 

 foot-and-mouth disease from one of the four 

 proteins that make up the protein coat of the 

 foot-and-mouth virus. This is the first time 

 such a vaccine has been produced from the 

 noninfectious fraction of a virus. As a result 

 of this research, work is in progress to se- 

 quence the amino acids that are involved in 

 producing immunity. Future vaccines may be 

 made from noninfectious fractions of a single 

 virus protein and may even be synthesized. 

 These results are applicable to the control of 

 human virus infections as well as animal vi- 

 rus infections. 



• Laser Ranging Observations of the Moon 

 (Air Force). One part of this analysis, con- 

 ducted by Lt. Robert W. King, has enabled 



^Most of the material in this section is either quoted or 

 summarized from the agency submissions in Part I. 



XVII 



