ITER. E.U. puts France in play for fusion sweepstakes.

an HIV regulatory protein called Tat, to three other products. IAVI President Seth Berkley agreed to work with AVIP to " strengthen the European effort, " with no special emphasis on Italian research, he says. " We won't do it otherwise, " says Berkley, adding that " anything we do would be subject to our scientific review methods. " Although Ensoli's Tat vaccine is but one part of AVIP, some researchers take strong exception to the appropriation because they have doubts about her preparation, which she has just begun testing in humans both to treat and to prevent HIV infection. Gallo, in whose lab Ensoli once worked, says he was " shocked " by the appropriation. Gallo says NIH had turned down his request to test a different therapeutic Tat vaccine that he believes has a better chance of working. " How do you think we feel when we can't get support , but they can come over, do some politics , and get funding? " asks Gallo. " This is not so nice. " Glenn, Young's spokesperson, insists that Congress has not earmarked funding for the Tat vaccine. " The intent was never to fund a specific project, " he says. Even the central players seem confused about just what will eventually be funded, however. Ensoli believes that Congress wants to " cofinance " AVIP. Glenn says the $10 million explicitly aims to foster collaborations with Italian and American researchers. Stern says if the money does not end up helping Italian researchers, " someone in the State Department will have his head cut off. " Adding another twist, Congress specified that the money be spent " in cooperation with " a new NIH global AIDS vaccine program. NIH's Edmund Tramont, who organized the program, says anything it supports " has to pass a scientific review. " The $10 million earmark has been folded into the massive omnibus appropriations bill (see p. 1636) that the U.S. Congress is expected to pass in January. CAMBRIDGE, U.K.—The race to land one of the biggest prizes in experimental physics is coming into the home stretch. Last week, after much delay, the European Union (E.U.) chose Cadarache, France, as its candidate site to host the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), a $5 billion test bed for harnessing nuclear fusion to generate electricity. ITER will be twice the size of any existing fusion reactor if …