U.S. Army Chemical Corps Research and Development Command

U.S. ARMY BIOLOGICAL WARFARE LABORATORIES
Fort Detrick, Frederick, Maryland

CMIRD~BwW-10-PD 11 February 1960

Dr. Joshua Lederberg

Department of Genetics

Stanford University School of Medicine
Palo Alto, California

Dear Dr. Lederberg:

Dr. Clark Randt was kind enough to send me a copy of the paper on
exobiology which you gave at the COSPAR meeting in Nice. The original
was much more interesting and informative than Time's version of it.

I was particularly interested in your discussion of possible ways to
instrument collecting devices which could be used on drone flights.

I thought you might be interested in a device being developed under
our auspices as a possible BW alarm which has several of the features
you described. A manuscript copy of a paper on this subject is
inclosed. This has been cleared by the Department of Defense, but not
yet sent to a Journal for publication. The paper describes only a
scanner which picks out and counts stained particles. There has also
been developed a device which automatically collects aerosol particles
on a tape, stains and positions them in the scanner. Neither device
could be used as is, but there are principles in both which may be
applicable.

Have you heard anything more as to whether any plans are being made
concerning the relatively simple experiment we discussed in your
office of determining the effect cf the hard vacuum of outer space
on microorganisms? This, I believe, would be quite simple to
instrument. The Army would hardly undertake to sponsor such an
experiment, but I think we could give some help to anyone who might
be willing to undertake it.

-Our work with NASA is somewhat slow getting under way, largely due

to a great need for education on both sides before we can really
start working smoothly together. My people and I have been traveling
trying to learn scmething about how space probes are made. At the
same time we are attempting to tell the astrophysicists in their
laboratories what the biologists are asking them to do and why it is
important.

We will have a little more to say on this subject at the Society of
American Bacteriologists! meeting in Philadelphia on May lth. We

 
-2.

had been invited to participate in a panel meeting on antiseptics and
disinfectants, and thought this might provide an excellent forum in
which we could engage in a technical discussion of how one would proceed
to sterilize a space probe and briefly summarize our experiments to

date along this line. NASA has agreed to such a release of information
on our joint project.

Sincerely,
0 PLLlp-
Chale ie
1 Inel CHARLES R. PHILLIPS

Manuscript Chief, Physical Defense Division