President Obama’s choice as the head of the National Institutes of Health, Francis S. Collins, has been appointed to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. Dr Collins was a leader of the Human Genome Project and directed the NIH’s National Human Genome Research Institute from 1993 to 2008. He openly declares that he is an Evangelical Christian, which has attracted some criticism from other scientists. He defended the compatibility of his faith and his belief in science in the 2006 bestseller The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief.

Edward M. De Robertis, a chemical biology professor at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at UCLA, was also appointed.

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences was founded in 1603 as the world’s first exclusively scientific academy. Not all of its members are Catholic, and some hold views which are contrary to Catholic positions. Collins, for instance, supports human embryonic stem cell research. The Academy acts as an advisory body to the Vatican to ensure that it is up-to-date with the latest scientific advances. ~ CNS, Oct 12