Merrill Lynch is sponsoring a worldwide competition for new PhD dissertations, with $50K for the most potentially valuable innovation. There will also be two awards of $20K and three of $10K. Entries are due by Jun98. Michael Schrage of MIT's Media Lab is director of the Innovation Grants Competition, for the Merrill Lynch Forum (a "virtual think tank of experts in technology and economics"). The nine judges will include John Seely Brown (Xerox), Arati Prabhakar (Raychem), and venture capitalist John Doerr (Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers). [Otis Port, BW, 08Dec97, p. 105.] (No contact address given.)

The US National Inst. of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) is challenging AI scientists to discover useful patterns or predictors in its large database of chemicals that have been tested for carcinogenicity in rodents. Chemists are using their own analytic methods, of course, but can AI do better? Details on the Predictive Toxicology Evaluation Challenge can be found at . [Ashwin Srinivasan , comp.ai, 14Dec97. David Joslin.]

NIST is seeking data for a reference error, fault, and failure database in support of software engineering. Participants are needed. NIST researchers have developed the EFFective Manager Tool (EFFTool), a free Web-based tool for collection and analysis of fault and failure data discovered during software development or maintenance. The tool enables a company to track the status of faults and failures and to characterize the data. ; Dolores Wallace , (301) 975-3340, (301) 926-3696 Fax.