Government & Policy Roundup

The Departments of Energy and Defense have removed 1.77 metric tons of low-enriched uranium and roughly 1,000 radioactive sources from a dismantled Iraq nuclear research center and shipped them to the U.S., DOE reported on July 6. These materials, DOE says, could have been used in radioactive dispersal devices.

Harvard University's John P. Holdren has been named to direct Woods Hole Research Center, in Massachusetts. Holdren holds joint appointments in Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences and will take over from Woods Hole founder George M. Woodwell in June 2005.

USDA and the Department of Homeland Security have opened two centers based at the University of Minnesota and at Texas A&M to study agricultural terrorism and animal diseases. The centers, funded with $33 million over three years from DHS, will address threats to U.S. food and agriculture.