Calling conflicts between religion and science "overstated," National Institutes of Health chief Francis Collins complained Tuesday that vocal atheists are giving the U.S. public a false impression of science.

The former head of the U.S. human genome program and an evangelical Christian, Collins founded the BioLogos Foundation dedicated to "the integration of science and Christian faith," before moving to NIH. His comments came at a USA TODAY editorial board meeting.

Asked about complaints from researchers such as Harvard's Steven Pinker, over an avowed Christian heading a scientific agency, Collins said, "angry atheists are out there using science as a club to to hit believers over the head." He expressed concern that prominent researchers suggesting that one can't believe in evolution and believe in God, may be "causing a lot of people not familiar with science to change their assessments of it."

"A person's private beliefs should not keep him from a public position," Pinker wrote in 2009. "But Collins is an advocate of profoundly anti-scientific beliefs, and it is reasonable for the scientific community to ask him how these beliefs will affect his administration," he added. Collins later support for NIH human embryonic stem cell research later earned him more favorable reviews from scientists such as Alan Leshner of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

A 2009 Pew Research Center poll found that 51% of scientists either believed in God or "a higher power." In contrast, scientists such as Richard Dawkins, author of The Selfish Gene, have become well-known for views critical of religion, seeing evolution as incompatible with religious beliefs. "Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist," Dawkins wrote in a 1996 book.

"There are a lot of scientists, I'm one of them, who believe there is a 'middle ground' between science and faith," Collins said, saying claims that evolution requires disavowal of religious views are erroneous. "I'm quite happy, and comfortable, in my middle ground, " Collins says.