The several meetings at which the Recombinant Advisory Committee 
developed its proposed guidelines in 1975 were announced in the Federal 
Register and were open to the public. At the first meeting, held 
in San Francisco immediately after the Asilomar conference, it was 
recommended that NIH use the Asilomar guidelines for research until 
the committee had an opportunity to elaborate more specific ones. At 
the second meeting, held on May 12-13 in Bethesda, Maryland, a 
subcommittee chaired by Dr. David Hogness was appointed to draft 
guidelines for research involving recombinant DNA molecules. 
The NIH committee, beginning with the draft prepared by the 
Hogness subcommittee, developed guidelines at its third meeting, held 
in July 1975 in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. The Woods Hole draft 
was circulated. Many critics felt that these guidelines were too lax, 
others that they were too strict. A new subcommittee chaired by 
Dr. Elizabeth Kutter was appointed to revise. 
A fourth meeting of the NIH committee was held on December 
4-5 in La Jolla, California. For this meeting a "variorum edition" 
had been prepared in which the Hogness, Woods Hole, and Kutter 
guidelines were compared in detail. The committee voted item -by-item 
for their preference among the three variations and, in many cases, 
added new material. The result was the "NIH Proposed Guidelines for 
Research Involving Recombinant DNA Molecules, which were referred 
to the NIH Director for final decision. 
The Hogness, Woods Hole, and Kutter versions, the variorum 
edition, and correspondence related to these early drafts are not 
included in the present volume. These documents, however, are 
available on request from the National Institutes of Health. 
In order to permit further public scrutiny and review. 
Dr. Fredrickson scheduled a public hearing, notice of which appeared 
in the Federal Register . He convened for this purpose a special 
meeting of the Advisory Committee to the Director to review the 
proposed guidelines. The meeting, open to the public, was held at 
NIH in Bethesda on February 9-10, 197 6. This committee is charged 
by law to advise the Director, NIH, on matters relating to the broad 
setting of scientific, technological, and socioeconomic policies in the 
biomedical sciences. Members are knowledgeable in the fields of basic 
and clinical biomedical sciences, the social sciences, physical sciences, 
research, education, and communications. In addition to committee 
members, a number of former members and other scientific and public 
representatives were invited to participate in the special February 
session. 
The transcript of that meeting is contained here. It includes a 
roster of all members of the committee, all who testified, and all 
who were invited to attend and present statements. The transcript 
is a record of the entire day -and -a -half proceeding, and appendixes 
are included that amplify the record. Following the meeting. 
ix 
