42 



Office of the Director of Libraries ^SKKS^l '^^^ 474-7224 



U niversity of Alaska Fairbanks 

 The Elmer E. Rasmuson Library 



Fairbanks. Alaska 99775-1000 

 August 27, 1992 



Honorable Frank Murkowskl 

 United States Senate 

 709 Hart Building 

 Washington, DC 20510 



Dear Senator Murkowski, 



This is just a very brief follow-up on the hearings you held 

 recently in Fairbanks with the Select Committee on Intelligence of 

 the U.S. Senate relating to nuclear pollution in the Arctic. 



While I know there is obviously a great deal of research to be 

 accomplished identifying, profiling, and tracing the effects of 

 nuclear pollution in the Arctic, particularly emanating from the 

 former Soviet Union, I would like to stress two points. 



The great volume of research done in the former Soviet Union is 

 available at the various scientific institutes, but not easily 

 accessible because of language barriers. There should be, as part 

 of this effort and others, an attempt to work with scientists and 

 information scientists in the former Soviet Union to assess the 

 breath, depth, and accuracy of much of the scientific research 

 which is in the form of gray report literature now largely 

 inaccessible to the West. Soviet information scientists are eager 

 to work and colleiborate with others, particularly U.S. librarians 

 and information scientists, who may assist them in translating and 

 making these many scientific studies more readily available to the 

 world scientific cosmunity. 



Also, as much of the scientific work proceeds, there is a need, 

 often identified in the hearings you held, to make sure that the 

 peoples in the North know the results of the various scientific 

 endeavors in a relatively timely fashion, and in a format readily 

 understood by indigenous peoples and local populations who may not 

 necessarily be scientifically sophisticated. Libraries, both at 

 the local level and in higher education, have a role to play in 

 the dissemination of these research results. They should be 

 integral to my effort to make the research results and prospective 

 impacts available to the public. 



