CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (April 30, 2012)—The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) today announced two launch events for its new Center for Science and Democracy. The East Coast and West Coast events will feature interactive panel discussions with leading thinkers on the role science plays in a functioning democracy.

The new center will work to restore the essential role science, evidence-based knowledge and constructive debate play in policymaking. Both launch events will honor Dr. Lewis M. Branscomb, a longtime advocate for rational, science-based policymaking, who is generously supporting the new Center with a $1 million gift.

The East Coast launch will be held on Thursday, May 17 at the American Academy of Arts in Sciences in Somerville, Massachusetts from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. EDT.

National Public Radio’s Steve Curwood will moderate a discussion with Lawrence S. Bacow, president emeritus of Tufts University; Jessica T. Mathews, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace; and Harold Varmus, Nobel laureate and director of the National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health.

The West Coast launch will take place on Wednesday, June 13 at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PDT.

K.C. Cole, a long-time science writer for the Los Angeles Times and professor at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Journalism, will moderate a discussion with David Baltimore, Nobel laureate and President emeritus of the California Institute of Technology; Mary D. Nichols, Chairman of the California Air Resources Board; Naomi Oreskes, Professor of History and Science Studies at the University of California at San Diego; and former Congressman John E. Porter (R-Ill.)., who currently chairs the group Research!America

Both events will be streamed online. Ahead of each event, this page will be updated with instructions for tuning in and submitting questions to panel members.

The Union of Concerned Scientists is the leading U.S. science-based nonprofit organization working for a healthy environment and a safer world. Founded in 1969, UCS is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and also has offices in Berkeley, Chicago and Washington, D.C.