THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT DALLAS 
BOX 830688 RICHARDSON, TEXAS 75083-0688 ( 214 ) 690-2501 
UTD 
ROYSTON C. CLOWES 
PROFESSOR AND HEAD 
BIOLOGY PROGRAMS 
23 February 1 984 
Dr. William Gartland 
Office of Recombinant DNA 
Activities, NIAID 
National Institutes of Health 
Building 31, Room 3BI0 
Bethesda, Maryland 20205 
Dear Bill: 
I would like to clarify my vote on the O’Brien/Holmes motion that was 
recommended by a small majority at the last meeting, and which consequently 
might not be accepted by the Director. 
I abstained from voting in favor of the motion because I felt it was 
vague in some respects, in that it specified the applicants be permitted to 
clone the structural gene for the Shiga toxin in P2 conditions in pBR322, 
or if this led to difficulties, in any other plasmid. (My recollection is 
not clear about the precise wording, whether the permitted plasmids should 
still be non-con jugative, but the intent was that the applicants should be 
permitted to use plasmids with strong promoter activity to increase the 
yield of toxin, if necessary.) I felt that P2 conditions in pBR322 would 
be adequate, and I doubt that plasmids with improved promoters would be 
necessary, but if this were so, O’Brien & Holmes could resubmit a more 
specific request based on newly generated data which would be more 
appropriate for the RAC to consider at that time. 
However, I am not against cloning in P2 conditions in pBR322, and I 
feel that it was unfortunate the applicants were not given permission for 
this type of experiment at the previous submission. Had I known the vote 
would be as close, I would have voted in favor of the motion at our last 
meeting . 
While in communication with you I should also like to comment on the 
questions posed by Dr. Talbot for the future composition and scope of the 
RAC. 
I agree that overall RAC should continue to act in the future as in 
the past, but with perhaps two modifications: 
(1) I believe that the expertise of the Committee needs extending in 
order to more efficiently consider release of bacterial strains that are 
known to be plant commensals or pathogens. 
AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY/AFFIRMATIVE ACTION UNIVERSITY 
[ 669 ] 
