Biologist Rejects Presidency of Salk Institute

The Salk Institute has failed to persuade Dr. James E. Darnell, a prominent East Coast biologist, to become the research institution’s next president. However, Renato Dulbecco, who became president in late 1988, has agreed to remain in the post until it is filled.

The Salk board of directors learned Monday that Darnell, who was strongly endorsed by the institute’s faculty, had opted to remain at Rockefeller University in New York. The Salk board offered the presidency to Darnell in November, after a nationwide search.

Eventually, the institute’s faculty will caucus to determine if another candidate should be nominated for the board’s consideration, Dulbecco said.

Dulbecco, a Nobel Prize-winning researcher, agreed to leave the laboratory and become president in 1988, after Frederic de Hoffman, the longtime Salk president, retired. Dulbecco intended to serve only a short time, then return to research.