Computational model offers insight into mechanisms of drug-
coated balloons. MIT's optical astronomers will soon have a
powerful new tool with which to look deeply into the center of
the Milky Way from one of the world's superior observing sites,
the top of an oceanside mountain in Chile. Dean of Science
Robert J. Birgeneau has announced that MIT has joined three
other universities and the Carnegie Institution of Washington in
a $68 million project to build a pair of 6.5-meter telescopes
near the town of La Serena, 200 miles north of Santiago. MIT has
made a commitment of from 8 to10 percent of the cost of what the
consortium calls the Magellan Project and will have 8 to 10
percent of the observing time. The first of the new telescopes
will be ready to gather what astronomers refer to as "first
light" in 1998. Carnegie, the consortium's lead partner, owns
the Las Campanas Observatory and has maintained other telescopes
there for many years. It is underwriting 50 percent of the cost
of the project. The other sc