Humberto Fernandez Moran

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(NASA-CR-140052) MEN OF SCIENCE:74-75952HUM5ERTO FERNANDEZ-MORAN (Chicago Univ.)16 p Unclas

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FROM: SCIENCE YEAR 1973 WORLD. BOOK SCIENCE ANNUAL

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_;0--) -ScienceThe scope of scientific endeavor ranges from seekingthe laws of nature to harnessing those laws forman's purposes. This section, which recognizes,outstanding scientists and engineers, features1t,''.whose work represents each end of this resec* cale.

382Hum berto Fernandez-Moran by Richard S' tewisWhile probing the world of inner space to determine thecooperative nature of life at the atomic level, this multidisctphn&yscientist envisions a better role for science in his native Venezuela..

398 Christopher Kraft by W ill iam J. Crom ieAdapting his talents to a newborn era, this space age engineerdirected the manned space flights from their inception throughthe spectacular journeys that transported men to the moon.

414 Aw ards and P rizesA list of the winners of major scientific awards over the past yearand summaries of the work that earned them special recognition.

423 DeathsBrief biographical notes on world-famous scientistswho died between June 1, 1971, and June 1, 1972.

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Humber toFernandez-MoranB y Richard S. LewisPhysician, inventor, and one of the world's greatelectron microscopists, he has developed thetools to search for the ultimate structure of life

O n the campus of the University of Chicago, across Ellis Avenuefrom the famous Henry Moore statue Nuclear Energy, stands an unim-posing complex of buildings called the Research Institutes. In the base-ment, a door curiously marked "Clean Room" opens into a multi-million-dollar laboratory and an international staff of scientists andassistants headed by a man who has been variously called a wizard, apoet, an artist, and one of the great electron microscopists of our age.The man is Humberto Fernandez-Moran, the A. N. Pritzker Professorof Biophysics in the Pritzker School of Medicine.

Physician, biophysicist, and inventor, Fernandez-Moran is knownprincipally for having developed two great tools for scientific research.One is the superconducting electron microscope, through which he cansee many of the structural patterns of matter and life at the molecularlevel. The other is the diamond knife, a "scalpel" with an edge so sharpthat it can literally slice through individual molecules.

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In his superclean laboratory, where visitors must don nylon smocksand plastic overshoes to avoid tracking in dust, Fernandez-Moran'sfar-ranging and energetic mind keeps both visitors and staff dazzled.His laboratory is the only one of its kind in the world. The researchthere ranges from studying three-dimensional laser holography andthe phenomenon of superconductivity to the visualization of the deox-yribonucleic acid (DNA) molecule and the fine structures of moonrocks returned by the crew of Apollo 15 from the Hadley Rille. Butmost of the time Fernandez-Moran pursues his primary interesttheexamination of the fine structure of nerve membranes. Under the su-perconducting electron microscope, he has identified membrane sub-structuresincredibly tiny biological units that form the buildingblocks of the brain and central nervous system. At the age of 48, he be-lieves his greatest work is still ahead of him. It is a search for the funda-mental structure and order of living systems. He regards this search asthe key to understanding life.Fernandez-Moran is a compact man with short dark hair, luminousdark eyes, and a nose that was slightly flattened years ago in a studentboxing bout in Germany. His manner still has the gallantry of theVenezuelan gentry from which he came.

The author:Richard S . Lewisis the editor of theBulletin of the AtomicScientists. He is apast contributor toScience Year and wasscience edi tor of theChicago Sun-Times.

Born in Maracaibo, Venezuela, in 1924, Fernandez-Moran hadearned a B.A. degree from Schulgemeinde Wickersdorf at Sallfeld,Germany, by the time he was 15 and an M.D. from the University ofMunich at 21. He survived the chaos of Nazi Germany because of hisneutral Venezuelan passport. Returning to Venezuela in 1945, he en-tered the University of Caracas to study tropical medicine and receivedhis second medical degree at 22. Fascinated by diseases of the centralnervous system and the brain, he interned in neurology and neuro-pathology at the George Washington University Medical School inWashington, D.C., in 1946.

He then went to Stockholm, Sweden, to begin his lifelong investiga-tion of the brain. From 1947 to 1949, he was a research fellow at theNobel Institute of Physics. The director, Karl Marine Siegbahn, in-spired Fernandez-Moran to develop the diamond knife, a tool thatwould enable electron microscopists to probe the nature of living mate-rial at the molecular level.

The sharpest and most sophisticated cutting instrument in the worldtoday, the diamond knife is about a tenth of an inch long and has a cut-ting edge from 20 to 50 angstroms thick. (An angstrom [A] is V , 0 0 -millionth of a centimeter, about the diameter of an atom.) The widthof a red blood c ell, by comp arison, is 80,000 A. This instrumen t, w idelyused today in surgery as well as in biological research, is regarded bysome surgeons as the most impor tant advance in surgica l too ls s ince thes tee l sca lpe l. For example , it has been used extens ively and suc cess ful lyin eye cataract operations. It is also an important tool in industry andresearch. It can slice any material, including metal. Fernandez-Moranuses it today not only to slice thin sections of brain and other nerve tis-

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Fernandez-Moran, withMitsuo O htsuki, seated,sue for examination under his superconducting electron microscope, and Ralph Vicario,but also to cut ultrathin sections of moon rocks so scientists can analyze checks the controls oftheir fine, crystalline structure, the superconducting

The diamond knife earned Fernandez-Moran the prestigious John electron microscope.Scott Medal awarded by the city of Philadelphia in 1967, putting him The only instrumentin the company of former medal winners Marie Curie and Jonas Salk. of its kind, it produc es

In Stockholm, the young scientist continued his postgraduate work a highly stable imageand research at the Institute for Cell Research and Genetics of the at very high resolution.Karolinska Institute, where he received an M.S. in cell biology in 1951.The following year, at the age of 28, he received a Ph.D. in biophysicsfrom the University of Stockholm. During his studies in Stockholm, healso was a clinical assistant and resident at the Serafimerlasarettet Hos-pital. In addition, he served as the Venezuelan scientific and culturalattach to Sweden, Norway, and Denmark from 1947 to 1954. Alongthe way, he somehow found time to meet, court, and marry a tall,blonde girl named Anna Browallius, sister of Irya Browallius, one ofSweden 's bes t -known wri te rs .

Fernandez-Moran returned to Venezuela in 1954, planning to fash-ion a career that would combine medicine, biology, and the educationof the scientists that Latin America needed. The government quicklyauthorized him to develop a center for research in neurology and brainphysiologya center that ultimately would cost $50 million and be-come a magnet for researchers from all over the world. The InstitutoVenezolano de Neurologia y Investigaciones Cerebrales (VenezuelanInstitute of Neurological and Brain Research) was chartered on April

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Fernandez-Moraninspects some ofthe compone nts o f a 29, 1954. At the end of 1955, a $3-million medical research buildingnew type of h igh f ie ld was dedicated atop Altos Pipe (Pipe Mountain), near Caracas.superconduct ing lenssystem that he and h is In 1955, Fernandez-Moran headed a Venezuelan delegation to thecol leagues de veloped. first United Nations Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Ener-gy, held in Geneva, Switzerland. In 1957, he led another delegation to

the first Inter-American Symposium on Nuclear Energy at the U.S.Atomic Energy Commission's Brookhaven National Laboratory inUpton, N.Y. Attracted by the fundamental nature of nuclear physics,Fernandez-Moran, on his return, persuaded the Venezuelan govern-ment to invest in an atomic reactor for his institute.

Then, in January, 1958, came a shattering blow. A military juntaousted the regime of Colonel Marcos Perez-Jiminez. For a single dayduring the coup, when all other officials in the deposed governmenthad fled, Fernandez-Moran stayed at his post as minister of educationand then turned over the government, as head of state, to the new re-

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gime. Then he, too, was persuaded by the new re-gime to leave the country with his family. His de-parture, however, was not without grace. He wasgiven a lifetime diplomatic passport in recognitionof his scientific and educational contributions tohis Venezuelan homeland.

The Venezuelan scientist was cut off from his in-stitute just four years after he had founded it. After-wards, the institute's academic nature was alteredfrom specializing in brain research to become abroader research and training center in science andapplied technology. That was not the kind of insti-tution the "Wizard of Altos Pipe," as Fernandez-Moran has been called, had in mind when he pains-takingly planned it. He wanted to build a greatworld center of neuromental physiology on theAltos Pipe. But that was not to be, and that is hispersonal tragedy.

Fernandez-Moran became, in effect, a politicalexile. He went to the Massachusetts General Hospi-tal in Boston, where he organized the MixterLaboratories for Electronic Microscopy. He servedfor four years as an associate in neurosurgery andwas also a visiting lecturer in biology at the Massa-chusetts Institute of Technology and a research as-sociate in neuropathology at Harvard University.In Boston, Fernandez-Moran began to focus hiscreative energy on improving the resolving power ofthe electron microscope. But it was not until hecame to the University of Chicago in 1962 that hemade a dramatic improvement.The electron microscope uses a beam of electronsto illuminate an object instead of the conventionalbeam of light of optical microscopes. Magneticfields focus the electron beam instead of the opticalinstrument's glass lenses.Optical microscopes are limited in their ability tomagnify an object by the size, or wave length, oflight waves. Even the shortest of light waves ishundreds or thousands of times larger than some ofthe objects researchers want to look at. The mostpowerful light microscopes can magnify an objectonly 2,000 times, and can resolve objects no smallerthan 2,000 A w ide.The electron microscope, invented about 40 yearsago, pierced the light wave "curtain," and made ittheoretically possible to see atoms. Electrons havewave characteristics similar to those of light, buttheir wave lengths are several hundred thousand

In the ultrahigh-vacuum bell jar, a thinfilm of metal is evaporated onto a glassslide. The film is used to convert blackand white electron micrographs to color.

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In his early 20s, Fernandez-M oraninvented the diam ond-knifeultramicrotome, above. A modernversion, right, prepares ultrathinslices of brain tissue for viewingunder the electron microscope.

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t imes shorter. A b eam of electrons, generated outside the microscope , isinjected into the instrument from the top and directed by an electro-magnetic lens onto a thin specimen. As the particles of the beam passthrough the specimen (which is the reason it has to be sliced very thin),they are scattered, but they are then focused by other magnetic lensesto produce an image of the specimen. Near the bottom of the micro-scope, the focused beam strikes a fluorescent screen, which transformsthe electronic image into a visual one, seen through a small window.

A major problem in all electron microscopes has been the "thermalnoise," or heat, generated by the electric current in the electromagnetsthat focus the image. Heat tends to jiggle the lenses and distort theimage. Fernandez-Moran virtually eliminated this problem by im-mersing the windings of the electromagnetic lenses in liquid helium attemperatures of 4.2 Kelvin, just above absolute zero. At this low tem-perature, a phenomenon called superconductivity appears in the wind-ings. All resistance to the flow of electricity through them vanishes.


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A section of the electronmicroscope laboratorycan be seen throughthe lenses of the laseroptical bench. Thebench is used to reconstruct3-dimensional imagesfrom holograms takenby electron microscopy.

Thus, no heat is produced and current continues to flow indefinitely,even after the power is turned off. The heatless flow of electricity sus-tains a constant magnetic field and produces an undistorted image.

The superconducting electron microscope magnets at the Universityof Chicago are cooled by a huge refrigerator that occupies five stories ofthe Research Institutes. Liquid helium is a superfluid; it travels virtual-ly without resistance through the more than 40 feet of chilled pipe. Be-cause of this, the superconducting, superfluid microscope system willcontinue to produce undistorted images for nearly 30 minutes after theelectricity to the helium pumps and magnetic lenses is turned off.

Fernandez-Moran has spent 12 years improving this superfluid heli-um system. His reward has been the ability to see crystalline lattices assmall as 2.06 A wide and, in biological specimens, structures 3 A wide.In addition to eliminating thermal noise, he has reduced building vi-bration, another barrier to high-power microscopy, by mounting thenine electron microscopes in his basement laboratory on individualconcrete blocks. The blocks are supported by springs and insulatedfrom floor motion by shock pads.Designing electron microscopes is the work of an electronic engineeror a physicist, rather than of a physician, but Fernandez-Moran's mo-tives arise from his medical training. "I was a practicing physician whowas dep ressed by the utter futility of seeing patients die of brain tumorsdespite all our efforts. I turned to basic research with the desire to learnmore about these tumors," he said. With the electron microscope, Fer-

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I - i tThe componentsof the power plantof the cell," themitochondrion, wereisolated and identifiedusing the electronmicroscope. A modelof a mitochondrionappears to the right ofits textbook illustrations.

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nandez-Moran was able to see the structure of the nerve fiber in thebrain for the first time.Under the microscope, a filigree structure of the nerve's myelin

sheath, which encases the nerve fibers, reveals a grouping of moleculesmuch like that in a crystal. This paracrystalline order suggests to Fer-nandez-Moran that the brain itself is like a liquid crystal. "The discov-ery of the paraci-ystalline character of the myelin sheath was so impor-tant to me," he says, "since it meant that a major constituent of thebrain was invested with exquisite regularity and elaborate, coherent,and meaningful design."

The electron microscope also revealed fibers that Fernandez-Moranpostulates act as wave guides for electromagne tic energy in the infraredor ultrahigh-frequency ranges generated in the crystalline brain tissuestructure. By this mechanism, the brain transmits an orderly beam ofelectromagnetic energy, much like a laser beam. Such laserlike energy,he believes, can be used to retrieve stored information (memory) fromany part of the brain. Remembered images can be seen again andagain in the "mind's eye" much like a hologram, the stored three-dimensional image produced by intersecting laser beams.

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In developing the tools to examine the ultimate structure of lifethediamond knife to pare thin sections of membrane, and an electron mi-croscope chilled by a superfluid helium system to magnify them mil-lions of timesFernandez-Moran has built a new concept of the wayliving systems work. He believes these systems have a moving order, a"momentum order," through which energy flows and in which thechemical components function cooperatively. Possessing momentumorder, the whole cell becomes greater than the sum of its chemical com-ponents. It becomes alive.

On this aspect of the Venezuelan scientist's work, the Austrian-bornbiochemist Hans Selye observed: "It is true that the further you takethings apart optically, as Fernandez-Moran does, or chemically, thebetter you may understand life. But life is a correlation of parts which,in themselves, are not life. As [Albert] Szent-Gyorgyi has said, in thestudy of life you dive from the h ighest levels to the lower until life fadesout and you have atoms and molecules."

Under the microscope, Fernandez-Moran could see how the compo-nents of living systems are arranged in a static orderlife frozen underan electron beam. This shows him how the parts, such as the cell's mito-chondria that energize living systems, are arranged, but not how theycooperate as moving parts. This is somewhat like trying to diagnose anautomobile's mechanical problem without starting the engine. Fernan-dez-Moran wants to see life at the molecular level, in its running state,with its engine turned on.To understand life, he realized, he had to understand momentumorder, which must be the underlying principle of all cooperative phe-nomena in nature. All living things are examples of cooperative phe-nomenacomponents that work together to develop and sustain thewhole being. Such an investigation can take a lifetime or more. He hasdecided to devote the rest of his productive years to it. "The best part ofmy coming years I want to devote to nailing down momentum orderand the nature of cooperativity," he says. "The real thrust of the nextdecade in biology is to explore cooperativity in the biological domain."

Cooperative phenomena, Fernandez-Moran believes, may also beseen in the functioning of human societies. One can visualize mo-mentum order throughout all aspects of life, in factin the reproduc-tion and genetic differentiation of cells, in the functioning of the brainfor the storage (memory) and retrieval (recollection) of information,and in the rhythmic flow of a ballet troupe on the stage. Perhaps thisprinciple divides life from nonlife. The ability to perceive momentumorder in natural systems, in living cells, in nerve fibers, and membranesmay reveal the way to cure the neuromental diseases of mankind.

Fernandez-Moran is convinced, too, that successful human societiesexhibit a trait similar to the cooperativity that guides the flow of life atthe molecular level in biological systems. Society in the United States,in particular, has exhibited such cooperativity throughout its short his-tory in developing so rapidly, he observed.

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k 4 .r7c ..'(-'After a long day in the laboratory, Fernandez-Moran meets his wife,Anna, for a leisurely stroll across the University of Chicago campus.

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On the w ay to their lakefront apartment,the Fernandez-M orans pass the newlyconstructed Joseph R egenstein Library.

"It may be regarded as the typical and most suc-cessful example of what I might call Homo-Cooper-ativity Phenomena," he said. "It is precisely thisrare quality of being able to elicit the best effortsfrom individuals of all nationalities without distort-ing them in the process that accounts for thephenomenal success of the American team effort,ranging from the economic to the scientific and en-gineering cooperative projects. It explains why theUnited States now controls two-thirds of the world'scapital, using only 5 percent of the world's qualifiedlabor force to do so. Nowhere are conditions morefavorable for attainment of true cooperative phe-nomena at present than between the Americas."

Perhaps Fernandez-Moran applies biologicalprinciples to social organization and functioning inthe hope of unifying the two worlds. In this way, hebecame, as he puts it, "a wanderer between twow orlds." His worlds are those of science in the devel-oped nations and education in the underdeveloped."handicapped" countries. He still lives in bwo rlds, his intel lect at w ork in h is Chicago labor ,iry, his heart on Pipe Mountain.

Emotionally, Fernandez-Moran cannot aban d,)hope that someday he may again play a role in Ven-ezuela's scientific development. Latin America har-bors a virtually untapped source of singularltalented human beings, he told the American-Vene-zuelan Alumni Association in November, 1971, inCaracas and Maracaibo. If he has any politicalambitions, they are tied to "a vital urgency toovercome the present wide discrepancy in the scien-tific and technological levels of development be-tween the Latin American countries and themore developed countries in North America, Eu-rope, and Eurasia."

Not only is he one of the m ost distinguished scien-t ists of a coun try wh ere science and pol i t ics m ix, buthe is also a member of an economic elite in a landthat has been ruled by one elitist group or anothersince it won independence from Spain. His father.Luis, was an official in the Bolivar- Maracaibooildistrict. He is proud, too, of his Basque and Sephar-dic Jewish heritage and its admixture with CaribIndian blood. It represents to him an elite of exilesand suffering. Among his ancestors were two gener-als, Jose Trinidad Moran and Jose Rafael Urdane-ta, who both fought for liberation 150 years agounder Simon Bol(var. Fernandez-Moran is imbued

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At home, above, they are joined by daughtersVeronica, left , and Brigida and the family cat,Bubbles. Left, Fernandez-Moran examinesa rare book from his priceless collection.

with Bolivar's dream of Pan American union. "TheAmericas represent an indivisible entity. It will ei-ther survive as the backbone of this planet in a com-plete and voluntary cooperation between north andsouth, or it will disintegrate piecemeal," he said.

Despite his intense patriotism, Fernandez-Moranis not a political activist, but a dreamer of a Messi-anic deliverance of his people from the handicaps ofpoverty and limited education. Only in science is hean activist. But he is, as he says, "a prisoner of mydreams." Would he re-enter politics to realize them?Selye dismisses the idea. "Nobody as interested inscience as he is could possibly be a politician," saidSelye. "Yet, his patriotism is remarkable. Not manyscientists have it."


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F " W - W IAmong Fernandez-Moran's prized possessions are documentsand awards from his diplomatic and scientific careers, above,and a German telescope, be/ow, made more than 100 years ago


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Looking t o t h e f u t u r e o fh i s s c i e n t i f i c w o r k a t t h eUn ive rs i t y o f Ch icago Fe r n a n d e z -M o r a n a d m i ts t h a t h i s h o p e o f e s t a b l ish in g a g r e a t b r a inF e r n a n d e z - M o r a nstands in f ron t o f a r e s e a r c h c e n t e r f o r V e n e z u e l a m a y h a v e b e e n q u i xo t ic . H e t e n d s t oreminder o f h i s pas t - v i e w h i m s e l f a s fa t e d t o c h a l le n g e t h e u n k n o w a b l e a n d s e e k t h e i m p o s -an an t ique map o f h is s ib le . On m a n y o cca s io n s , h e h a s m e t w i th r e ve r se s . Bu t th i s q u a li ty o fV e n e z u e la n h o m e la n d . a c c e p t in g r e v e r s e s w i th g r a c e a n d p e r s is t e n c e i s w h a t S e l y e s a y s h e a d -m i res mos t in t he Vene zu e lan .I t m ig h t a p p e a r t h a t t h e l if e s t y l e o f Fe r n a n d e z -M o r a n i s co n f u s in g l yva r i e d , a lm o s t ch a o t ic . Bu t h e h a s b e e n " i n o cu la t e d a g a in s t ch a o s , " h ee x p la i n s , in t h e m a n n e r t h a t c h i ld r e n o f th e v e r y p o o r i n h i s n a t i v eV e n e z u e la w e r e i m m u n i ze d a s i n fa n t s a g a i n s t p o li o m y e li ti s b y e x p o -su r e t o i t in t h e sq u a lo r in t o w h i ch t h e y w e r e b o r n . H i s va r i e d i n t e r e s t sa r e , i n f a c t , r e la t e d q u it e l o g i c a l ly i n h i s f a r - r a n g i n g i n v e s t i g a t io n s .To t h e V e n e z u e la n s c ie n t i s t , t h e m ic r o s co p i c w o r ld " is t h e ke y t o t h ef u tu re ." If , f o r ex am p le , t he e l ec t ron m ic ros c ope c ou ld be u s ed t o m ak es m a l l o b j e c t s a p p e a r la r g e r , it c o u ld a l s o b e a p p l ie d t o m a k e la r g eo b j e c ts l o o k s m a l le r . It c o u ld d e m a g n i fy r e d u c e s h e e t s o f d a t a t o m i -c r o sc o p i c s i z e , fo r s t o r a g e o n m ic r o f ilm . Pe r h a p s t h i s i s w h a t t h e b r a ind o e s w it h d a t a p e r c e iv e d b y t h e s e n s e s f r o m t h e e n v i ro n m e n t . T h eb r a i n m a y e n c o d e c e r ta i n e l e c t ro m a g n e t i c ra d i a t io n s i n t h e s p e c t ru m

o f v i s i b le l ig h t , c e r t a i n o s c i lla t i o n s i n t h e a t m o s p h e r e i t in t e r p r e t s a ssound, ce r ta in mo lecu les o f ga s i t sen ses a s odors , and ce r ta in tac t i le im-p r e s s io n s p r o d u c e d b y t h e s e n s e o f to u c h . T h e s e a r e s t o r e d s o m e w h e r ei n t h e b i l li o n s o f b r a in ce l ls , r e t r ie va b le o n d e m a n d . I n t h e b r a in , w h i chi s m i lli o n s o f t i m e s m o r e e f f ic i e n t in s t o r in g i n fo r m a t io n t h a n a c o m -p u t e r , a s t a g g e r i n g a m o u n t o f i n fo r m a t io n i s r e d u c e d t o a s u b m o l e c u -la r i m p r i n t in g a n d s t o r e d .U s i n g h i s s u pe r c o n d u c t i n g e le c t r o n m i c r o s c o p e , F e r n a n d e z -M o r a nc o u l d m a k e a s t a r t to w a r d r e a l iz in g , i n a s y n t h e t i c i n f o r m a t io n s t o r a g es y s t e m , th e s t o r a g e p o t e n t ia l o f t h e b r a i n . H e a n d h i s l a b o r a t o r y t e a m

c o u l d re d u c e t h e p r in t e d p a g e o f a b o o k 1 m i lli o n t im e s i n a s i n g l e i m -p r in t i n g , m o u n t t h e p r in t o n a n e l e c t ro n m i c r o s c o p e s l id e , a n d s t o r e i tf o r r e t r ie v a l b y r e m a g n i fi c a t io n . A n e n t i re b o o k c o u ld b e r e d u c e d i n396


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this way to the size of a dot, hardly visible to the naked eye. "Suchtechniques" he says, "make it feasible to think of storing the entire Li-brary of Congress miniaturized on a sheet the size of typewriter paper."

His ultimate goal in information retrieval is to duplicate the finestructure of the nervous system, down to the molecular level. The ulti-mate in the condensation of data is the DNA molecule, which containsthe blueprint for the cell and the whole organism. These spiral struc-tures can be seen with the superconducting electron microscope. Fer-nandez-Moran believes that he can use the diamond knife and the elec-tron microscope to practice a rudimentary form of genetic engineering.The knife makes it possible to slice the DNA molecule and restructureit, thus reshaping the entity that evolves from it. Such microsurgerymay one day free mankind from its burden of hereditary diseases.

He thinks eventually it should be possible to synthesize the compo-nents of nerve cellsto make prosthetic neural circuits that would re-pair or restore nerve, motor (muscle), and sensory damage.

It may also be feasible to hook up the human sensory nervous systemto a computer so that a person could communicate directly with themachine. An airplane or spacecraft pilot might be connected, throughsensory organs, perhaps in the fingertips, to his guidance computer tolearn the relative position and attitude of his vehicle in space.

Tvisions of Fernandez-Moran are far-ranging ones, enhanced byan enormous body of specialized knowledge and uninhibited by fear offailure. He has been described as a "renaissance man" because of thediversity of his interests, because he is som ething of a c lassical scholar aswell as a scientist and linguist. But the W izard of Altos Pipe is essential-ly a modern scientist, working at the molecular pole of biology.

Selye dedicated a book, In Vivo (1967), to Fernandez-Moran, "As atoken of m y great adm iration for his work on the finest particles of life."This is a mark of esteem , indeed, for In V i v o is a defense of supram olecu-lar biology, the biology of the whole human being, as opposed to Fer-nandez-Moran's focus on the microscopic details of cell structure.

"We stand at opposite poles and that is the cause of our mutual at-traction," said Selye. "He is quite prepared to lose perspective to get tothe finest detail, while I am willing to sacrifice detail to reach thebroadest perspective." Between these two great scientists ranges thewhole spectrum of biological research.

One day, Selye relates, he visited Fernandez-Moran's laboratory. "Ibegan to realize the grandeur of his scientific contribution. There wasthe latest model of his famous diamond knife, with which he couldphysically cut glycogen molecules into smaller sugars. Then thereflashed the terrifying thought through my obsolete mind: Imagine thisgreat genius using all his enormous intellect and knowledge to build aninstrument with which to restrict his visual field 2 million times!"

But it is at such resolutions, in his tiny, submolecular, restrictedworld, that Fernandez-Moran believes the tools he has fashioned willmake it possible to perceive the ultimate structure and order of life.

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Chr is topherKraf tBy William J. Cromie

His decision-making skill and coolnessin crises helped to land men on the moon

Chris Kraft was sitting at the management con-sole in the Manned Spacecraft Center near Houstonwhen the message came in saying things had begunto go awry. It was April 20, 1972, and the Apollo 16astronauts had separated their lunar module,Orion, from the command module and were pre-paring to make man's fifth landing on the moon.Suddenly, Thomas K. Mattingly, piloting themother ship, discovered that something was wrongwith the backup control system for the engine thatwould bring the astronauts back to earth. He re-ported the problem to mission control, and ChrisKraft, new director of the Manned Spacecraft Cen-ter and veteran flight director, swung into action.

Kraft knew that it would be dangerous for the as-tronauts to stay in lunar orbit without a backupcontrol system to get home in case the main systemfailed. Should both control systems fail, there

The M anned Sp acecraft Centers director sitsbehind models of Sk ylab and the space shuttle.398

Humberto Fernandez Moran

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