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the first recombinant bST to use in
his studies. He treated four cows
with the recombinant version and
four with the drug extracted and
purified from pituitary glands. In both
cases, he saw about a 15 percent
mastitis in treated herds.
Bauman says he is perplexed
about the public concerns over the
human health risks. Since bST is a
protein, he says, if humans consume
it orally it is digested like any other
ing situation."
Engineering Prof. Lynn Jelinski,
the director of the Cornell Center for
Advanced Technology's biotechnology
program, puts much of the burden
of communication on scientists
"/ think, scientists have done a very bad job of explaining what they
do to the public. .. •. If we as scientists can't explain things so our
mothers can understand, then we're doing something wrong. "
increase in milk production after just
six days. "For the first time we had
identified one of the key controls of
how animals use nutrients," Bauman
remembers.
Until the mid-1980s, there was
some question as to whether the
recombinant protein itself could be
commercialized. Bauman remained
part of a small group of researchers
studying bST as a way to answer
certain questions about the biology
of the dairy cow.
"At national scientific meetings,
my group would be the only one that
really had much information about
this particular aspect of the biology,"
he says. But shortly after the results
of his experiments were published,
the area "expanded exponentially"
and scientists around the world
started to conduct bST research, in
some cases replicating the results of
the Cornell experiment: bST was
demonstrated to improve productivity
dramatically, without, Bauman
says, changing what's in the bottle.
It was around this time that
Bauman became aware of the Foundation
on Economic Trends and its
position on bST. FET petitioned
unsuccessfully to have Cornell release
all of Bauman's research
records, claiming that bST-treated
cows had developed serious health
problems. Since then, he has been
frequently called upon to defend his
research or clarify interpretations of
the work by FET or other consumer
groups, on subjects ranging from
human health to the incidence of
dietary protein. He points out that
research on bST's effect on the human
body goes back at least 40 years,
when medical researchers thought
bST might be useful in the treatment
of pituitary abnormalities, in much
the same way injections of insulin are
used to control diabetes.
Even when injected directly into
the bloodstream, Bauman says, bST
proves to be inactive in humans.
"They not only tested bovine [somatotropin
in humans], they tested
somatotropin from whales, pigs,
sheep and horses, and none of them
worked," he says. That's because
the hormone differs from species to
species. Between humans and cows
the order of amino acids differs by
about 35 percent, making it impossible
for the bovine molecule to be
used by the human body: It is simply
flushed out. He also maintains that
concerns about the health of animals
have been examined and found to
have no scientific basis.
As a researcher in a public institution,
Bauman feels scientists have
a responsibility to participate in the
public discussion of new technologies,
but he has found it a difficult and
frustrating task. "It's amazing to me
how these groups have been able to
get center stage with the media to
make it appear as if knowledgeable
people disagree about the safety," he
says. "I think that doesn't speak well
for our system or for the job those of
us in academe are doing explaining
our results to the public or dealing
with public perceptions. It's an amaz-
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and educators, who have failed to get
through to a public scared by past
errors and ill-equipped to evaluate
the benefits of a technology as well
as the risks.
"I think scientists have done a
very bad job of explaining what they
do to the public," she says. "I think
it's a terrible mistake to have this veil
of secrecy, with scientists saying,
Όh, just trust me.' If we as scientists
can't explain things so our mothers
can understand, then we're doing
something wrong."
Jelinski has made communication
a central part of her responsibilities.
She has given dozens of talks across
the country in the last two years to
thousands of non-scientists. In fielding
"a lot of pointed questions" about
bST from concerned citizens, executives
and farmers, Jelinksi says that
"there's mainly a problem in understanding
what it is. People don't realize
that Mama cow is making bST
all the time, and your best cows make
more of it."
Jelinski is forcing undergraduates
in her "Physics of Life" course—
most of whom are hoping to become
engineers—to explain some of their
research in oral presentations. You
may view this as torture, she tells
the students, but communication
skills will have to become an integral
part of any scientist's training.
Each biotechnology product that
reaches the market will have to be
explained in a way that people without
scientific degrees can understand,
says Jelinski. She points to