August 7, 1956

Dear Bill:

Your letter of July 22 was waiting for my return from a trip
to Woods Hole. I very much appreciate your good offices in connection
with the Ciba Symposium; Pontecorvo was in Ann Arbor, where we discussed
the matter too. Naturally, I will do whatever I can to accept this
cordial invitation; I am glad to note that "drug registance" neednét
be taken seriously: what more is there to say about that (as a genetic
problem)? The schools are pretty firmly fixed now and without some
new kinds of experiments, who's going to change his mind.

Unfortunately, the symposium does not fit in well with our Australian
plans, as we expect to reach Melbourne early June; in fact it may be
a problem to find time for the Ciba trip, but I hope it cam be managed.
Pontecprvo hus set som wheels in motion to see if enough funds can be
raised so that Egther can agcompany me; whether I'd make the trip alone
is undecided.

I'm surprised you were concerned about reprints-— did you suppose
I would neglect to send them to yogx? —- but its my own fault for being
so tardy about shipping them out. Our secretarial help is scanty, and
the distribution of 500 or more units is almost too formidable a job, and
I haven't done it too well.

I didn't understand your "F- which is genetically Hfr". How does it
differ from other F- types; I thought we both agreed that F— was defined
by the compatibility test. I do agree that the terminology is confusing
now, and the compatibility state may have to be expressed independently
of the presence of an "Hfr gene" or an "F agent", and perhaps you have
something along this line in mind. After motility selection, we have
isolated a number of what we call "refractory F-" types from Hfr stocks;
Alan Richter here has been studying them.

Haldane, Pensose & Co, ought tp see your remark "since this is a
medical school we regrettably do not have either Genetics..."; I had
thought the English were leaders &n medical genetics— though gome
to Shink of it the people I have in mind are no more generally assoc ted
with medical schools than they are over here. We've been rather remiss
about this at Wisconsin too, but since the installation of a new medicak
dean (J.Z. Bowers) a program in medical genetics has gotten under way,
with a young fellow Newton Morton. You may hezs more of him; i.a., he's

spending the year in this lab to build up a background in non-statistical
genetics,

Sincerely,

Joshua Lederberg