Frank Press, White House science adviser to President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1980 and former president of the National Academy of Sciences, will speak at the University of Colorado at Boulder on Tuesday, April 11.
The free, public talk is the final event in the yearlong lecture series titled "Policy, Politics and Science in the White House: Conversations with Presidential Science Advisers," sponsored by CU-Boulder's Center for Science and Technology Policy Research. Press will discuss the role of scientist as adviser, drawing from his White House experience and tenure at the National Academy of Sciences.
The talk begins at 7 p.m. in room A2B70 of the MCD Biology Building. A question-and-answer session will follow his remarks. Pay parking is available in the Euclid Avenue Autopark, located just east of the University Memorial Center.
Press is internationally recognized for his contributions to geophysics and oceanography, as well as lunar and planetary sciences, including research that helped to discern the structure of Earth's crust and deep interior. He also helped organize the International Geophysical Year in 1957-58, the first coordinated, worldwide attempt to measure and map geophysical phenomena that involved international explorations of Antarctica and the oceans.
He has led research efforts in earthquake prediction in the United States, as well as in Japan, China and the U.S.S.R. Mount Press in Antarctica is named after him.
Press has stressed the need for improved science education in America, calling for changes in the way scientific research is funded to assure that huge projects like the Human Genome Project do not drain funds from smaller projects. He represented the United States at four nuclear test-ban conferences between 1959 and 1963.
Press was president of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and chairman of the National Research Council from 1981 to 1993 and science adviser to Carter and director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy from 1977 to 1980.
Press has been on the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the California Institute of Technology and has been a visiting professor at Cornell, Caltech, Stanford and Indiana universities. He currently is a research and development adviser for industry and academia. He received a bachelor's degree from the City College of New York and a master's degree and doctorate from Columbia University.
The series previously hosted science advisers to Presidents G.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon and Lyndon Johnson. Additional information about the series, as well as webcasts, transcripts, audiotapes, photographs from past talks and a library of background materials are available at sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/scienceadvisors.
CSTPR is part of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences. CIRES is a joint program of CU-Boulder and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.