The National Science Foundation announced Thursday that eight scientists would receive the National Medal of Science, the nation’s highest award for basic research.
Among them is Robert K. Merton, the first sociologist to win the medal. Merton, of Columbia University, studies scientists and is best known for creating the focus interview for marketing purposes.
“Just as physicists, chemists and botanists explore the world of nature, I am observing scientists at work,” he said at a news conference.
The only woman honored, Elizabeth Neufeld, is a biochemistry geneticist at the University of California at Los Angeles, who has advanced the understanding of lysosomal storage diseases.
Another medalist, Thomas Eisner of Cornell University, pioneered the study of chemical ecology in plants and animals. He said he always has been fascinated by the chemical communication between organisms.
“Being a conservationist, I also became aware of the fact that most species remain to be discovered, let alone studied chemically,” he said.
This year’s awards will be presented in October by President Clinton, who made the final selection from a list presented to him by the President’s Medal of Science Committee. The awards are administered by the National Science Foundation.
The other medalists are:
– Ray Clough, a retired structural engineering professor from the University of California at Berkeley, who designs earthquake-proof structures.
– John Cocke, a computer scientist, retired from IBM, who pioneered the development of reduced instruction set computer (RISC) architecture, which is intended to improve computer performance.
-Frank Press, a geophysicist from the Carnegie Institution of Washington whose research dealt with the nature of the earth’s deepest interior and the mitigation of natural disasters.
– George Hammond, a Bowling Green State University professor who created the field of organic photochemistry.
– Albert Overhauser, a physicist at Purdue University who developed the theory of dynamic nuclear polarization.
