MI NOTES OF MEETING - December 6-7 
14 
Later, however. Dr. Baltimore said that he was persuaded 
that it is counterproductive to set up a criterion such as 
"demonstrably defective." He preferred Rowe's proposal, with 
a change of one-fourth to two-thirds. 
Dr. Gottesman said that the tissue culture exemption as passed 
by the RAC did not include viruses, as recombinant DNA in the 
absence of a viral vector would not escape from tissue culture. 
She said that in the cases being discussed, the virus is capable 
of rescue. She noted that many of these experiments are presently 
allowed under specified containment conditions. She said she 
felt this proposal to be a big step and not entirely appropriate. 
Dr. Young asked why Dr. Baltimore preferred an exemption rather 
than a requirement for PI containment. Dr. Baltimore said he 
wouldn't want to defend exempt as opposed to PI because tissue 
cultures are normally handled under at least PI conditions. 
Dr. Rcwe said that he would defend an exemption with tissue 
culture cells. He said exemption would eliminate a superstruc- 
ture of administrative control which is unnecessary. 
Dr. Bems asked whether this exemption includes experiments in 
which the recombinant genome will be rescued. He questioned whether 
such an experiment should require a higher level of containment. 
Dr. Bems said that the difference between two-thirds and 
one-fourth of a genome is not meaningful as in both cases the 
virus is an absolute defective requiring rescue with helper 
virus. Dr. Goldstein agreed saying that in some cases less than 
25% of the viral genome can be rescued very readily. 
Dr. Setlow said she would appoint a small working group 
of Drs. Baltimore, Bems, and Setlow to draft a proposal for 
publication in the Federal Register for the March 1980 meeting. 
VI. PROPOSED OONTAINMENT FOR CLONING TOMOR VIRUS GENES 
Dr. Bems introduced the discussion of tabs 774/11 and 784-788. 
This issue was brought to the RAC by Dr. Stuart Newman of New 
York Medical College. Dr. Bems said Dr. Newman raises the 
question of whether insertion of pieces of the polycma genome 
into a recombinant DNA molecule enhances tumoriginicity. 
Dr. Bems said the second question Dr. Newman asks is whether 
El. coli K-12 producing human eukaryotic protein might trigger an 
autoimmune disease. Dr. Bems noted that letters from several 
eminent immunologists suggesting that that would not be the 
case have been presented to the RAC. 
[ 407 ] 
