It is my pleasure to welcome our alumni and friends to these pages again and to share with you some of the past year's accomplishments as well as our projections for the future. You will read about some of these in more detail inside this issue, but let me give you a brief state-of-the college report.

We are strong; many different things attest to that strength. For example, we are near the top of Ohio State's 18 colleges in research funding per faculty member. We continue to set the standard in providing research opportunities for our undergraduates. The major recruiting effort now going on will add several new faculty members, further building our strength. Within the next few months, we will break ground for the new Life Sciences Research Laboratory Building. This will be a real boost for faculty, staff and students with laboratories now housed in B&Z.

One of the pleasures of this past year has been to see our energetic alumni group become an official Ohio State Alumni Society! Congratulations and thanks are due to several alumni who have donated generously of their time to get this group going. Later in these pages, they offer a report on the activities of the past year and their plans for the future. We also continue our series of alumni profiles.

I prefer looking forward rather than looking back. As biologists, we have come a long way, but the best is yet to come. The next century promises to belong to biology, with the greatest advances and scientific breakthroughs taking place within its boundaries. Researchers in the biological sciences will continue to provide the keys that solve difficult health and environmental problems, bringing a brighter future for untold millions of people.

The College of Biological Sciences at Ohio State is positioned to be a leader in this new "Age of Biology." In the early 1960s, then-President Novice Fawcett and his administration created this college in response to two things: the discoveries that were revolutionizing biology as we had known it up until then AND the need to prepare undergraduate students for graduate and professional schools.

Today, we must be responsive to the challenges that face us as we move to new and ever-higher levels of discovery. We exist not only to do the basic research upon which so much of medical, pharmaceutical and agricultural progress depends, but also to teach and to train undergraduate and graduate students, without whom the scientific enterprise would wither and die. In fact, our primary mission is education. In our classrooms and laboratories we prepare students for the medical professions, for academic and industrial research careers, and for careers in education at all levels.

Biological sciences is a foundation on which rests much of our well being. Doctors, dentists, veterinarians, and other health professionals are biologists first. It is training in the biological sciences that allows them to be successful with their subsequent careers. Research is an integral part of that training. One of the most important stories you will read in this issue of Synergy is the one on undergraduate student research.

The immediate future is very exciting, including-in 2001-a new research building and our 35th anniversary as a College. Even now, we are planning a party; we hope that you will join us when the time arrives.

Until next time, I invite you to step into the future and "Experience the Excitement of the Biological Sciences."

Sincerely,