Although this meeting '.as .not well publicized, many 
scientists, public interest groups and laymen, were invited to 
2 / 
attend and to comment on the guidelines. Additional input was 
sought from these same individuals during the two-month period 
following this meeting. A considerable body of material was 
received by commentators by the office of the Director of NIH, 
and is summarized, in part, in the Decision of the Director, 
NIH, to Release Guidelines for Research on Recombinant DNA 
Molecules ( see 41 Fed . Reg . No. 131, pp. 27902-27911, July 7, 
1976} . 
Little discussion was devoted to whether or not these experi- 
ments ought to be performed at all , even though the question w as 
raised both by concerned laymen and by prominent scientists. 
That there is an intrinsic and even necessary good in recombinant 
DNA research has been a tacit assumption on the part of the NIH 
advisory committee which drafted the guidelines from the onset 
of its deliberations. We believe that this is, at least in part, 
a reflection of the fact that many of the committee members are 
now doing recombinant DNA research and have a vested interest in 
its future. In the public meeting held on February 9-10, 1976, 
the request was made that such potentially hazardous research 
should at least await the development of a strain of bacteria 
which is not a ubiquitous inhabitant of the human colon. E. coli 
is the current organism of choice simply because a large body of 
genetic information exists concerning this bacterium. This 
2/ A copy of the comments submitted by EDF at that time are 
attached as Appendix 1. 
[ 341 ] 
