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.y~v MR r z e ~ ~ o~ Roc(cefe[rer z THE ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY LJYt1Ve1'Sltl, ~ 1230 YORK AVENUE • NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10021 O I9pI ~ ~r~ ~}r 5ti November 18, 1980 Mr. H. C. Roemer Vice President and General Counsel R. J. Reynolds Industries, Inc. Winston-Salem, North Carolina 27102 Dear Jack: We had a very stimulating trip to the West Coast to visit the Medical School of the University of California at San Francisco and that at the University of California at San Diego. The weather was not particularly hospitable but I had the wisdom to bring an eastern winter topcoat so all went well. I spent the morning of Saturday, November 8th, with Drs. Krevans and Prusiner. In addition to discussing the general state of the world of biomedical science which is of much concern to that community these days, I had the opportunity to go over the details of Dr. Prusiner's ex- periments. He and his colleagues have made enormous pro- gress since we saw them last. They are now able to produce quantities of the scrapie agent with the use of hampsters with an incubation period of about sixty days. It now seems almost certain that the agent is not a simple strand of genetic material or its immediate derivative but is a pro- tein. In other words, it seems to be something distinctly new in infectious agents. Moreover, the size of the molecule is way below that of the smallest virus so it does look as though a new chapter in the saga of infectious diseases is being opened up. At some time we may be asked to supply some special funds to help consolidate the laboratory facilities. Perhaps the best thing to do is to wait and let that matter develop. Dr. Moser's team in San Diego is also proceeding in a very impressive way but on a somewhat different scale since the group is substantially larger. They are approaching the prob- lems of pulmonary disease from at least four major frontiers, all of which have their own exciting facets. First, they are investigating the factors associated with the normal defensive

Mr. H. C. Roemer November 18, 1980 Page 2 mechanisms of the organism which greatly amplifies the damage resulting from a relatively simple and otherwise innocuous form of chemical or physical stress. In this sense their work is somewhat parallel to that of Dr. Repine's work at the Webb- Waring Lung Institute. ------- --On another front, they are carrying out-in-depth studies of the behavior of the right side of the heart in the case of individuals who suffer from obstructive lung or arterial dis- ease. The right side of the heart receives veinous blood and pumps it into the lung. Unsing catheters in a very ingenious way, they find that there is a correlation between the condition of the right side of the heart and lung damage so that it may prove to be a good measure of early stages of obstructive diseases. Third, they have succeeded in tagging the various white blood cells, including platelets, with radioactive indium. This permits them to make radiograms of the distribution of such cells in various parts of the arterial and veinous systems before, during and after damage occurs. Among other.things".it ~ a allows-them to apot newly formed blood clots where'platele'ts =congregate. -Most -of the'work to date has been ori animals 'bee they look forward to the time when they can begin to work with human patients. Finally, they are experimenting with different patterns of lung ventilation when animals in different states of health are subject to a range of stressful exercise. Among other things, they have discovered that breathing can be supplemented in a way that causes minimal discomfort by pumping small quantities of air in and out of the lung at a very rapid rate such as ten times per second. Under certain circumstances this allows the diaphram to undergo complete rest. There is little doubt that both of these groups are making excellent use of the Reynolds funds. Dr. Moser raised the ques- tion of inflation once again. We emphasized that your Board was cognizant of the problem but also stressed that fact that it probably would be necessary to find a diversity of funds for support of the work. Sincerely, Fr derick Seitz 4 cc: Mr. Colin Stokes Mr. John L. Bacon