Panels in recent years. IAT carries out its programs and responds effectively, quite often to mandated, short-term deadlines, but there are severe resource deficits. The Institute for Computer Sciences and Technology (ICST) is the newest and smallest of the institutes. It has programs in systems and software, computer engineering, and information technology. The Panels believe that the selection of tasks that ICST undertakes after weighing resources and trade-offs represents a well-considered effort to go as far as possible toward meeting assigned responsibilities under the prevailing circumstances. The expectations of the Congress appear to be much greater than the resources and support supplied to ICST. The current assessments of the Evaluation Panels highlight two points: (1) the technical and managerial talent at NBS is of high quality, and (2) NBS cannot be stretched beyond its resource limits and still deliver on both its fundamental mission and its many new assignments. Let me emphasize that the technical work of the Bureau is of the highest caliber. What the Bureau is able to do with the resources available, it does well. The National Bureau of Standards continues to provide, as it has in the past, the standards, the measurement technology, the critical standard reference data, the Standard Reference Materials, and the information processing standards that are necessary for increased productivity, equity in commerce, continued innovation, and more efficient government operation. Indeed, it appears that new assignments are given to NBS because of the great trust that can be placed in an institution with such a high reputation. To carry out its mission and meet new responsibilities, the Bureau must receive the increased support called for by the Evaluation Panels. The Steering Committee of the Evaluation Panels has reported to the statutory Visiting Committee and the Secretary of Commerce. The Panels support the detailed assessments of the Visiting Committee, which are described by Mr. Peck. The conclusions of the Visiting Committee are consistent with the findings and recommendations of the scientists, engineers, and industrialists who have evaluated the programs at NBS under the auspices of the National Research Council. WILLIAM O. BAKER He Dr. Baker is President, Bell Telephone Laboratories. graduated from Washington College in 1935 (B.S., Visitors and Governors Scholar, Simmons Medal, Alumni Medal, Sc. D. hon. 1957). He continued study at Princeton (Ph. D., 1938 in Physical Chemistry, Harvard Fellow, Procter Fellow). He has received various honorary degrees: D. Eng., 1962, Dr. Baker has served on the President's Science Advisory Committee, as Chairman of the President's Advisory Group on Anticipated Advances in Science and Technology, as Vice Chairman of the President's Committee on Science and Technology, and on other White House boards. He has also served as a member of the National Council on Educational Research (National Institute of Education) and of the Commission on Critical Choices for Americans. Currently he is serving as a member of the National Cancer Advisory Board and of the Board of Higher Education of New Jersey. He is a director of American Bell International Inc.; Annual Reviews, Inc.; Babcock & Wilcox Company; Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc.; the Council on Library Resources; Sandia Corporation; Summit and Elizabeth Trust Company; and Western Electric Company, Inc. He is a trustee of The Fund for New Jersey; The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (Chairman); The Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation; Urban Studies, Inc.; Carnegie-Mellon University; Princeton University; and The Rockefeller University (Vice-Chairman); and is a Special Consultant to the Board of Trustees of the Aerospace Corporation. Dr. Baker is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. He holds the American Institute of Chemists Honor Scroll and its Gold Medal, the American Chemical Society Parsons Award, the Perkin Medal, the Priestley Medal, the Edgar Marburg Award, the American Society for Testing Materials Award to Executives, the Industrial Research Institute Medal, the Frederik Philips Award, the Industrial Research Man-of-the-Year Award, the Procter Prize, the James Madison Medal from Princeton University, the Mellon Institute Award, and the Society of Research Administrators Award for Distinguished Contributions to Research Administration. As research vice president of Bell Laboratories prior to becoming president, Dr. Baker was responsible for programs which have recently produced the laser, superconducting and the strongest permanent magnets, new computer graphics, and millimeter wave communications. In his personal research, he has concentrated on the study of solid state materials and macromolecules, the basic elements of plastics, fibers, natural and synthetic rubbers, and the tissues of growing plants and animals. Such substances are principal insulating and structural parts of communications systems. STATEMENT OF DR. WILLIAM O. BAKER, PRESIDENT Dr. BAKER. Unlike the preceding witnesses, I don't have any statutory or official role here. I represent the segments of the public that are interested in and related to the National Bureau of Standards. Perhaps in that capacity I can reflect for a few minutes on how the Bureau serves the national interests. Mr. Peck summarized some background information supplied to the visiting committee by the Evaluation Panels of the National Academy of Sciences. These Panels are invited by the Department of Commerce and the Bureau of Standards to study their affairs in detail and to report the findings to the visiting committee and the Secretary of Commerce. I think, Mr. Chairman, that your staff has received our reports. I will be glad to respond to any background questions on how that information is derived. I can also discuss the views of the public correlates of the Bureau of Standards on an issue that you've already considered this morningnamely, do we need a Bureau of Standards? Is there a purpose for the agency, since, as Mr. Peck, Dr. Ambler, and Dr. Baruch have pointed out, it seems to be difficult to obtain the resources necessary to carry out its mission? I wish to report that the role of the Bureau appears to be as compelling as ever. The Bureau will be needed to assist future national efforts in science and technology. It's always a privilege to meet with this subcommittee and its parent committee, which I've had the pleasure of doing since the committee was formed. It's heartening to think that this is where many of the links between research and development and this country's socio-political, legislative systems are established. It's also heartening to think of this committee's predecessor, which on May 14, 1900 said: It is therefore the unanimous opinion of our Committee that no more essential aid could be given to manufacturing, commerce, the makers of scientific apparatus, the scientific work of government, schools, colleges, and universities than by the establishment of the institution proposed in this bill. This institution was, of course, the National Bureau of Standards, which was created more than 75 years ago. Manufacturers, makers of scientific apparatus, the educational and research branches of the country, represented by the National Academy of Sciences, the 200 members of the Panels that evaluate the National Bureau of Standards, and the staff of the Academy of Sciences, which is headed by Dr. Gary Clark, conclude that today's needs for the Bureau are even greater than they were when it was created. The opportunities are extensive. One of the basic needs and opportunities is the joining in a common purpose. The Department of Commerce and the Bureau of Standards have worked with industry in this country over much of the century. It is this spirit of cooperation in a common purpose that has overcome the adversary positions too often associated with the activities of private enterprise and government. In Japan, West Germany, and increasingly in other nations as well, governments and industry are already joining more closely than we have learned to do. A special function of the Bureau is to compare, check, validate, and tries in this country have been generated recently by science and technology, making the comparison of results, interpretations, and measurements more important than ever. For example, in the field of electronics and automation, which is a very compelling part of our new technology and, in some ways the most active, the dimensions and hardware in the manufacture of apparatus are quite different from any so far encountered. Thus, the availability of standards, of agreed on metrology, is necessary. We see, for instance, in the field of automation and computers, the construction of such devices as this microprocessor, which is smaller than a postage stamp. It carries out the functions of a major-sized computer processor, the kind that is now still widely sold, but is being rapidly replaced. This microprocessor responds to combinations of over 400 different types of instructions at a rate of over 100,000 per second. Devices like this one have to be calibrated and subject to manufacturing control that are orders of magnitude greater than before. This Nation leads dramatically in applying such controls. But, as Dr. Baruch pointed out, other countries are strong on our heels and are very likely to provide intense competition. A new electron-beam design and tooling facility is providing greater precision is electronics manufacturing. A beam of electrons, instead of light rays, shapes and configures electronic circuitry. Thus measurements on the order of millionths of a centimeter, in fact, ultimately tenmillionths of a centimeter, can now become familiar elements of a manufacturing process, something that was unimaginable a very short time ago. Similarly, controls governing the purity and geometric configuration of electronic circuits are important. We simply cannot have a national capability in electronics unless industries and indeed some universities have access to some central institution responsible for measurements and quality assurance. The Bureau of Standards has performed its role with distinction. It can continue to do so, since it has the elements necessary to meet new needs. But, Mr. Chairman, I must reemphasize that the new needs are quite beyond those with which we have been familiar. One of these needs is a basic insight into the behavior of matter, not just at low temperatures as Congressman Wirth has indicated, but under extremes of environment. Needs like this are a challenge for the Bureau of Standards. They do not admit of extensive diversion into short-term missions of the sorts that have been cited and that have been the cause of Mr. Peck's concerns. We believe there is a bright future for the admirable skills of the Bureau. However, in this time when international economic competition and expansion in trade have become major issues, a world standard for the physical measurements of the units of time, length, and mass have become more important than ever. Thus, to maintain our place in the world markets and our national defenses, the reality and credibility for which the Bureau has long stood have become national essentials. I submit now my prepared statement on our annual assessment of the scientific and technical programs of the Bureau of Standards. In the 6 years since the committee's last oversight hearings on the National Bureau of Standards, we have seen many advances in sci |