Nature News

Four pages in 648 days. At that rate it would have taken Leo Tolstoy centuries to write War and Peace. But to get to this point, John Holdren, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, may have battled through the bureaucratic equivalent of the Napoleonic Wars.

On 17 December, Holdren finally released a long-promised set of guidelines for scientific integrity in US government departments and agencies. On the White House website Holdren wrote that the document includes "a clear prohibition on political interference in scientific processes and expanded assurances of transparency". He also wrote that department and agency heads would have 120 days to demonstrate progress towards implementing the new rules.