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Vol. LXXXVIII, No. 47 Ann Arbor, Michigan-Tuesday, November 1, 1977 Ten Cents 10 Pages plus Supplements
Medium-risk
DNA
work
Dbegins
DNA techniques were developed no method existed
isolating a single gene.
By PATTY MONTEMURRI
In i sixth-floor laboratory in Medical Science II, two
University Medical School professors will try to isolate a
human gene this week.
After years of debate, 'moderate risk" or P3, recombinant
DNA research will finally begin on campus.
Saturday, the lab was certified to be in compliance with
federal guidelines, lifting the final ban on the controversial
DNA research.
Now University Profs. Roy Schmickel and Golder Wilson
may begin their experiment-the first recombinant DNA
research on campus to use human cells.
The scientists hope to pioneer better methods for predic-
ting diseases such as Down's Syndrome.
Word of the lab's certification was good news to another
researcher, Asst. Prof. of Microbiology David Jackson.
Jackson said he and a graduate assistant will also begin a
"moderate risk" project this week.
Jackson will try to determine how a monkey virus induces
cancer in mice and what genes are responsible for causing
Lab wins fin
cancer.
The DNA lab underwent extensive renovation over the
past year to incorporate special safety features required by
federal guidelines established two years ago.
At that time, there was an active debate on campus over
the merits-and dangers-of recombinant DNA research.
Eventually, the Regents gave it the go-ahead.
DNA is the repository of human, animal and plant genetic
information-the building block material of heredity.
"Everything in the lab is functioning as it should," said
Epidemiology Prof. Francis Payne, who monitored Satur-
day's certification of the equipment by an independent
testing firm.
Payne is chairman of Committee C, the watch-dog group
of faculty scientists and community representatives charged
with certifying the safety of recombinant DNA experiments'
al ap proval
and facilities on campus.
THE LAB'S P3 label is the second most stringent of four
levels of laboratory safety requirements designated by the
National Institutes of Health (NIH). Five other DNA ex-
periments currently being conducted on campus are
classified as P1 or P2 level-"no risk" or "low risk" research
that requires no special laboratoryfacilities.
In their five-year experiment, funded by NIH for $225,000,
Schmickel and Wilson will take strands of DNA from human
fetuses and splice the DNA into a bacteriophage-a very
small virus. The transplanted human DNA will duplicate
along with the DNA of the host chromosomes each time the
bacterial cell divides.
Through a process called hybridization, the scientists will
be able to isolate a single human gene from the DNA strand.
Human DNA has billions of genes, and before recombinant
for
ONCE THE GENE is isolated it can be placed in the simple
DNA bacteriophage where the transplanted human gene will
replicate with the page's 30 genes instead of the billions in the
human cell.
Using this technique, the pair of scientists will be able "to
take something from a very complicated human and put it in
a simple organism where it can be studied," explained Sch-
mickel.
The cross genetic material results in a new biological en-
tity, not known to occur in nature, and allows scientists to ob-
serve a single gene in pure form.
"We aren't creating any monsters," Wilson said. "We're
not tampering or mutilating genes." Instead; the scientific
duo will search for a single gene located on one of the human
cell's 23 pairs of chromosomes.
Student board
reverses ruling
11
A yellow moon rides the iron autumn
sky, and the dry leaves rush across the
ground in whispering crowds. There
are goblins in the hallways, there are
goblins- in the streets . . . Halloween
. .Cookie monsters and concert-
on offie
By DAVID GOODMAN
In the face of a heated controversy.
about its earlier office allocations de-
cision, the Student Organizations
Board (SOB), reversed itself last
night and approved space for virtual-
ly all student groups asking for it.
The board's new office assignment
list goes to the Michigan Student
Assembly (MSA) tonight for ratifica-
tion. If approved, the plan will 'give
offices to all but two of the political
and ethnic groups which had previ-
ously been refused space.
ONE OF THE two is Chicanos at
Michigan, the group which threat-
ened to take MSA to court unless it
changed the office allocations. SOB
members said the Chicano organiza-
tion failed to submit an office
application.
Lino Mendiola, spokesman for
Chicanos at Michigan, said he plans
to give Associate Vice-President for
Student Services Tom Easthope a
letter today charging MSA with
discrimination for denying his group
space.
Mendiola said MSA Vice-President
Jasper DiGiuseppe told him no
written application for space was
necessary as long as Chicanos at
Michigan shared an office with the
United Farm Workers Support Com-
mittee.
"What we decided was that we
would give office space to any group
which wanted space for other than a
meeting room," said Phil Merdinger,
the board's director of administra-
tion.
"THERE WERE mistakes on both
sides," said Eric Arnson, assistant
SOB director for services. He said
the board's revised allocations pro-
posal was an attempt "to bridge the
gap and show student groups we are
not the enemy."
"I think we should admit that what
we did was wrong," said ,board
e space
member Jon Banks.
The dispute began in early Octbber
when SOB announced its first space
allocation plan. That proposal denied
space to most foreign student groups
and political organizations which
asked for it. Many student groups
which had occupied offices in the
Union for several years would have
lost that space.
Some two dozen groups which were
denied space protested the board's
action, charging that it discriminat-
See BOARD, Page 7
GEO
protests
lac-k of
con tract
By SUE WARNER
Graduate Employes Organization
(GEO) members formed picket lines
autside the LSA Building yesterday
to call attention to the union's
14-month struggle with the Univer-
3ity over'a new contract settlement.
Lunching on doughnuts and cider
while distributing union leaflets to
passersby, the.GEO supporters said
the protest had not drawn any opposi-
tion from University administrators.
And University chief negotiator Jo-
3eph Katulic said the picketers did
not disrupt routine activity at the
LSA Building yesterday.
GEO HAS BEEN working without
a contract since last fall when the
University refused to sign a contract
See GEO, Page 7
masters show
their true colors,
and
even University bus drivers wear war-
paint . . . Halloween . . . Kids eat so
much junk they can't stand the sight
of a Mars Bar until New Year's-and
even the boldest of us feels a prickling
of the scalp when something makes a
soft, sudden noise off in the dark. The
warm frontiers of our certainty are
rolled terribly back this one cold night
of the year .... Halloween.
Daily Photos by BRAD BENJAMIN
Bikers wanted
in walla Walla
Helms cops plea for
Chil'e coup testimonly
WASHINGTON (AP) - Former CIA Director Richard Helms pleaded no
contest yesterday to two misdemeanor charges of failing to testify fully about the
agency's attempts to prevent the election of Marxist Salvador Allende as presi-
dent of Chile in 1970.
The government decided to accept the plea to avert the accidental disclo-
sure of secrets if Helms went to trial.
APPEARING BEFORE U.S. District Judge Barrington Parker, Helrs said,
"I found myself in a position of conflict," when he testified before the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee in 197
that the CIA made no attempt to influ
ence the Chilean election.
"I had sworn by my oath to preserve
certain secrets," Helms said. "I had
put up my hand and sworn. I didn't
want to lie. I didn't want to mislead the
Senate. I was simply trying to find my
way through a very difficult situation in - t.
which I found myself."
The Department of Justice said it.3,
agreed to the no contest plea, because
"trial of this case would involve tre-
mendous costs to the United States and . .
might jeopardize national secrets."
In law, not contesting a charge has
the same effect as a guilty plea.
WALLA WALLA, Wash. (AP) -
Once the most violent group of in-
mates in the Washington State Pen-
itentiary, members of the prison's
motorcycle club are now regarded by
prison officials as a stabilizing influ-
ence on other inmates.
Most of the 50 club members be-
longed to such motorcycle groups as
the Hells Angels, Banditos and
Satan's Sinners before they were sen-
tenced to prison, their club president,
Mike Abrams, says.
In fact, membership in one of those
Murphy says the club is responsible
for teaching some inmates skills that
have landed them jobs and has
helped stabilize the inmate popula-
tion.
He attributes the group's new
respectability to Abrams, a 38-year-
old inmate convicted of car theft.
ABRAMS has outlawed the club's
traditional swastika and opened
membership to all interested prison-
ers.
when he arrived here 14 months ago,
I I i