Dear Julian
missile gap.
[stamped, JUL 28 1985]
Julian Nall
In re Soviet Biotech.
I would guess Ovchimikov's Institute is half the Soviet effort in DNA-juggling. It probably fends [?] a much larger industrial exploitation.
He is not constrained by dollars or equipment. His budget is 100MM roubles [sic] about 200MM dollars.
US comparable must be 10 to 20 times larger.
So what there is will be qual. competitive, and probably enough to allow effective exploitation of this generation's technology.
As I told them face to face, the sh[ . . . ]ertion of that institute will not be able to innovate rapidly to initiate next generation.
J