March 23, 1982

''It's increasingly a battle between artists and technology. We have to band together to insure that New York never becomes another Pittsburgh or Seattle or Houston.''

The basic fare rate for medallion taxis - 90 cents a mile, not including the $1 ''drop charge'' imposed at the start of each trip - barely covers expenses for many cabs, according to a city-commissioned report released yesterday. These costs, the study found, range from 83.5 cents a mile for certain mini-fleet taxis to 90.5 cents a mile for driver-owned vehicles. A companion survey based on a reading of ''trip tickets'' for two days in 1981 also disclosed that the typical driver of medallion taxis collects about $4 on each metered fare and altogether records gross income ranging from $90 to $110 per shift before tips. The figures were made public by the Mayor's Committee on Taxi Regulatory Issues, which was formed a year ago. The committee is expected to put forth its recommendations next week on possible changes in the industry that could affect the cost, safety and availability of taxis.

THE growing popularity of a nonsurgical treatment for periodontal disease has touched off a national debate among periodontists, many of whom say that the therapy, which has never been scientifically tested, may be inadequate to control the major cause of tooth loss in adult Americans. The new treatment, aimed at suppressing the infection that is thought to be the underlying cause of periodontal disease, involves thorough professional cleanings and assiduous daily home care using such antibacterial agents as salt, baking soda and hydrogen peroxide. At the heart of the controversy is an issue that has often arisen in medical care in recent years: the pitting of new, simpler, less expensive methods of care against established remedies that are supported by decades of experience, clinical studies and a widely accepted scientific rationale. In the treatment of breast cancer, for example, the once-routine radical mastectomy has recently yielded to more modified surgery or radiation therapy, which are now widely believed to be as effective as the more disfiguring operation. The nonsurgical approach to treating periodontal disease is achieving popularity at a time when surgery of all sorts is being challenged as often unnecessary or unnecessarily extreme, and when health care economists are searching for less expensive ways of delivering effective care.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. WITHIN 40 minutes after the Columbia's launching yesterday, the first data from the scientific instruments on board began flowing back to the earth, signals from the most elaborate payload yet to fly in the space shuttle's cargo bay. Several teams of scientists, from universities and Government agencies, began poring over the data, in part to learn something more about solar radiations and flares and the orbital environment, but also to evaluate the shuttle's performance as a vehicle for scientific observations. The Columbia's cargo of scientific and technological experiments weighs more than 21,000 pounds, four times the load of freight carried on the second flight last November. Of particular interest to scientists is the set of nine instruments known as the O.S.S.-1 payload, for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Office of Space Science.

The Money Market Mutual Funds table in Business Day last Friday misstated the assets of the Alex Brown Cash Reserve and the Value Line Cash Fund. Alex Brown has $559.5 million in assets and Value Line $533.4 million.