Faculty Bibliography

In a surprising finding that is likely to intensify the hunt for viruses as causes of cancer, scientists have linked an AIDS-associated virus with a common blood cancer. The virus, Kaposi's sarcoma herpes virus, was discovered in 1994 among individuals who had AIDS and Kaposi's, a cancer that affects the skin and internal organs. In the new study, the virus was linked to multiple myeloma, the second most common blood cancer in this country, after non-Hodgkins lymphoma. The Kaposi's virus was found in all 15 myeloma patients tested but not in 16 patients with other cancers and 10 healthy volunteers, the authors said in a report being published today in the journal Science. The virus was also detected in patients with two related, but less common blood disorders, Waldenstrom's and amyloidosis, Dr. James R. Berenson, a co-author, said in an interview. To their surprise, the scientists found the Kaposi virus only in noncancerous cells and not in the malignant myeloma ones. The Los Angeles team suspects that the Kaposi's sarcoma virus may cause myeloma indirectly by the infected cells chemically stimulating other cells to become malignant

Dr. Alfred D. Hershey, who used a household blender to do experiments that made him a Nobel laureate by proving that DNA is the molecule that carries genetic information, died on Thursday at his home in Syosset, N.Y. He was 88. Dr. Hershey, who did much of his work at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island, shared a Nobel Prize in 1969 with Dr. Salvador E. Luria and Dr. Max Delbruck for their work in discoveries concerning the genetic structure of viruses and how they replicate, which provided new insights into viral diseases and inheritance. By the time he was honored by the Swedish Nobel Committee, Dr. Hershey had been engaged in his field of research for decades. Indeed, when he won his prize, other scientific leaders said that without his work, Dr. James D. Watson and Dr. Francis H. C. Crick would not have been able to accomplish their own work for which they had been awarded a Nobel seven years earlier: development of their helix model of DNA, which determined its molecular structure

The findings, published today in the British journal Nature are a result of the first scientific study of sex discrimination in the awarding of a large number of research positions, said the authors, Dr. Christine Wenneras and Dr. Agnes Wold. The authors, from the University of Goteborg, decided to investigate the evaluation system after they lost out in their own pursuit of jobs in 1994. To do the study, they had to go to court to use the Swedish freedom of press act to obtain numerical scores that were developed as scientists, in a confidential peer review system, evaluated grant proposals, job applications and publications of other scientists. The peer review system is a linchpin of science all over the world. To avoid wasting ''a large pool of promising talent,'' the Swedish doctors urged colleagues to do similar studies in other countries. ''Scientists are supposed to be objective,'' Dr. Wenneras said, and ''the credibility of the academic system will be undermined in the eyes of the public if it does not allow a scientific evaluation of its own scientific evaluation system.''

The New York Blood Center, under pressure from the Food and Drug Administration and facing allegations of improper testing procedures, will close its laboratory in Manhattan that screens for a variety of infectious diseases and hire an independent lab to do the testing, center officials said yesterday. The laboratory will close within 60 to 90 days, but the blood center itself will stay open. Another laboratory, which has yet to be selected, will screen donated blood for evidence of the microbes that cause infections like AIDS, syphilis and hepatitis, said Dr. John W. Adamson, the president of the blood center. It collects and distributes about 80 to 85 percent of the blood products used in the greater New York area. ''Everything is being done to make blood used in transfusions as safe as we can possibly make it,'' Dr. Adamson said in an interview. ''There is no evidence at this time that any unit of blood or blood product has led to infection because of mistesting.''

Malignant tumors, particularly Kaposi's sarcoma and certain cancers of the lymph system, have been common among AIDS patients since the disease was first recognized in 1981. But now the array of cancers is broadening in mysterious ways. Once rare cancers are appearing more often. Some kinds of cancer that were expected to increase in frequency have not. And strange geographical patterns of certain cancers are emerging. It is a baffling situation, yet scientists see hope in it. Researchers are looking at the puzzling trends with the aim of identifying and using biological clues to unlock the secrets of the myriad cancers that afflict people who are not infected with H.I.V, the virus that causes AIDS, and to devise new ways to treat them. An emerging theory is that most AIDS-related cancers are somehow linked to viral infections. But doctors do not know if H.I.V. enhances the ability of other viruses to produce certain cancers, scientists said here last week, at the first international meeting devoted to AIDS and cancer. The meeting was sponsored by the National Cancer Institute

A novel vaccine has protected two chimpanzees that were deliberately injected with the AIDS virus, scientists said today. The experiments involved a vaccine made by incorporating weakened genes from H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS. The experimental vaccine, which is based on DNA, is also being tested on humans, but it is too early for any meaningful results, said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. The authors of the chimp study injected large amounts of H.I.V. into the animals. Tests showed that the virus could be detected only once and in very small amounts during a 48-week monitoring period. In comparison, large amounts of H.I.V. were continually detected in another chimpanzee that received a different, weaker vaccine, the team of authors, led by Dr. David B. Weiner of the University of Pennsylvania, report in the journal Nature Medicine