difficult to provide contact time for students to study 
under him. The experiment stations at Illinois and 
Iowa State have made a concerted effort to provide 
for teaching and research combinations and have been 
quite successful in spite of the difficulties mentioned 
in foregoing paragraphs. 
The present high level of research expenditures is 
primarily due to government-sponsored defense and 
atomic-energy research projects. In addition, some 
projects sponsored by industry are in fact government- 
supported programs that are being subcontracted to 
universities. If we are to continue to derive the benefits 
of engineering research, some means of financing must 
be provided in order to maintain an active research 
program within engineering colleges at such time as 
defense research funds are decreased. The National 
Science Foundation was conceived in order to pro¬ 
vide support for basic research and to encourage the 
training of scientists and engineers. However, the 
funds that have been made available to this organi¬ 
zation are still very small compared with those now 
being expended by the Defense Department and the 
Atomic Energy Commission. It is hoped that in the 
future additional funds will be made available to the 
National Science Foundation for support of research 
grants and graduate fellowships in proportion to the 
reduction of research funds that are now provided 
through other government organizations. 
Industry is now supporting increased amounts of 
basic research. In addition to the specialized research 
program directed toward the direct solution of indus¬ 
trial problems, it is also providing funds for more 
graduate fellowships to support students interested in 
research training. These graduate students are in de¬ 
mand for research work in both industry and gov¬ 
ernment. Thus, by means of research grants and fel¬ 
lowships, industry is making possible the training of 
research personnel as well as receiving the direct 
benefits of the research program. A greater amount 
of support by industry of university research is 
highly desirable; particularly if government support 
decreases. 
News and Notes 
Venezuelan Guayana Expedition 
The New York Botanical Garden has brought to a 
close its 14th botanical expedition to the Guayana 
Highland of Venezuela, adjacent to British Guiana 
and Surinam. This program of exploration, begun in 
1944 with expeditions to the Kaieteur Plateau in 
British Guiana and the Tafelberg in central Surinam 
(Netherlands Guiana), will come to a conclusion dur¬ 
ing the 1954-55 seasons with a second visit, in con¬ 
junction with the Chicago Natural History Museum, 
to Chimanta-tepui in the Gran Sabana of southern 
Venezuela in the state of Bolivar, and a visit to 
Tepequem on the Brazilian side of the Pacaraima 
range, which forms the watershed boundary between 
southern Venezuela and northern Brazil. Support for 
the conduct of this program of explorations as a 
whole has come from many sources, but the current 
expedition was carried out under a grant made to the 
Botanical Garden by the National Science Foundation, 
the terms of which provide also for the forthcoming 
trips to the Cerros Tepequem and Chimanta-tepui. 
The expedition that has just returned was conducted 
by three staff members of the N. Y. Botanical Garden 
—Bassett Maguire, curator; John J. Wurdack, assist¬ 
ant curator; and George S. Bunting, assistant—who 
left New York on Oct. 7, 1953, and returned Mar. 4, 
1954. This group explored mountains near the remote 
Brazilian fountier which had been seen by the previ¬ 
ous expedition. 
The objectives of the trip were two-fold: first, to 
make botanical collections, which might be expected to 
yield plants of the character and high endemism that 
had been previously exhibited by those from the fa¬ 
mous Cerro Duida lying 150 mi north; and second, 
to make inquiry into the geology, determine the pro¬ 
portions, and record the positions of these new 
mountains. 
To facilitate the exploration, the U.S. Ambassador 
placed the Embassy plane at the expedition’s dis¬ 
posal. On Oct. 31, a 7-hr reconnaissance flight of some 
1200 mi was made from Ciudad Bolivar across the 
mountainous and jungled region of southern Vene¬ 
zuela to the Brazilian frontier. This established with¬ 
out question the existence of extensive ranges along 
the Brazilian frontier and, further, the existence of a 
system of lofty sandstone plateaus northward of the 
frontier, well within the limits of Venezuela. 
The expedition then embarked that same day at 
Ciudad Bolivar on the Rio Orinoco. It traveled more 
than 1500 mi by river steamer, outboard motor, and 
dugout up the Orinoco, down the Casiquiare, and into 
its large blackwater affluent, the Pacimoni. On Dec. 
13, the party reached its base camp, which was estab¬ 
lished in guapo forests (flooded lands) in the head¬ 
waters of the Pacimoni. Eighteen days and 5 camps 
later, on Dec. 31, the group arrived at the summit 
camp—altitude, 5500 ft—and there it remained until 
Jan. 23. The base camp was broken on Jan. 30, Ciudad 
Bolivar reached on Feb. 24, and finally New York 
again on Mar. 4. 
The ornithological expedition of Mr. and Mrs. 
William H. Phelps, Jr., of Caracas joined the expe¬ 
dition for a period, reaching the base camp on Jan. 
12. Alexander Wetmore of the Smithsonian Institu¬ 
tion of Washington; James H. Kempton, Agricultural 
Attache of the U.S. Embassy, Caracas; and Charles 
Reynolds, geologist of the Orinoco Mining Company, 
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Science, Vol. 119 
