Science News

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President Clinton's selection of Dr. Rita Colwell as the next Director of the National Science Foundation is an outstanding choice. Her record of accomplishment speaks for itself. She is an internationally -recognized researcher, an admired educator, and she has consistently stepped forward as a leader in science and technology policy. She is an ideal choice to lead NSF into the 21st Century.

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I welcome the opportunity to help lead the President's science and technology team. This is an exciting and demanding time for science and engineering. America's science agenda has moved rapidly beyond narrow Cold War concerns. Scientists and engineers are now challenged to address a broad range of critical social, economic, environment and health needs.

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Depending on how an attorney describes DNA evidence at a trial, jurors will believe the evidence is either irrefutable or unpersuasive, finds Dr. Jonathan J. Koehler, consultant for the defense in the O.J. Simpson criminal trial, and a professor of behavioral decision making at the University of Texas at Austin.

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Most people think there's little they could learn from a fruit fly. But Dr. Trudy Mackay knows better. In her research laboratory at North Carolina State University, Mackay studies the genetic basis of complex traits in fruit flies, with the aim of applying that knowledge to better understanding human genetics

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Tip Sheet from New Scientist for 2-14-98

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1) Hawaiian undersea volcano turns up the heat, 2) Most states' math and science performance is up, 3) Next timss comparisons look at 12th graders

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Scientists from some 14 institutions are braving the elements on the icy Great Lakes in an intensive field program underway this winter. Researchers on this Lake-Induced Convection Experiment, or Lake-ICE, are trying to better understand midwest meteorology and lake -effect winter storms. Lake-ICE is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

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New advances that will make possible detection of trace gases in airplane cabins, spacecraft and high-rise office buildings with sealed windows are being developed by researchers led by Rice engineer Frank Tittel.

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A tiny pump with no moving parts wear out and a switch that emits no spark when turned off are two creations of LSU's mechanical engineering professor Wanjung Wang.

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Researchers at Rice have created an ultra-porous ceramic filter with pores about 10-50 nanometers in size that may prove useful to industries ranging from hazardous waste treatment to milk sterilization.

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Scientist Peter Fox and colleagues at the National Center for Atmospheric Research are using observations, theoretical physics, and computer modeling to get the best representation so far of the total radiative output of the sun. The research will lead to a better understanding of the sun's influence on earth's climate.

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The sun's 11-year solar cycle may be the driving force behind periodic changes in temperatures and pressure heights of earth's lower stratosphere from pole to pole, according to new research by Harry van Loon of the National Center for Atmospheric Research and Karin Labitzke of the Free University of Berlin.

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Scientists at Boston University have announced the development of a new blue laser that may lead to a new generation of more vivid color video screens and computer displays as well as optical storage disks that can hold four times the amount of information that can be squeezed onto today's new digital video disks.

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The Milky Way is being invaded by another galaxy, but don't worry: we're bigger. On the other hand, new research shows, the intruder is surprisingly sturdy. A large quantity of dark matter is apparently protecting it from being torn apart by the Milky Way's gravity.

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A student at Virginia Tech has used a prestigious veterinary summer fellowship grant from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation to develop a genetically engineered bacterium to serve as an oral contraceptive which may one day help solve a major animal overpopulation problem.

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To combat heart disease and problems that arise after angioplasty, the balloon procedure used to open clogged arteries, Rice bioengineer Jennifer West is developing alternatives like bioengineered arteries--including assisted healing that will stop clotting and allow healthy cells to grow.

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Scientists from the National Center for Atmospheric Research and other colleagues will aim new detectors at the sun's corona during the February 26 solar eclipse, searching for structures they've never observed before. The total eclipse over the Caribbean promises to be one of the most heavily studied in recent history.

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1) ConBio Clearinghouse: An online educational site based at Rice called the Center for Conservation Biology Network (CCBN) offers information ranging from Native Americans' water rights to new species of orchids to university degree programs, 2) Rice researchers are creating an Engineering Design Tutor, a World Wide Web-based automated learning system

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A manufacturable transistor operating under quantum mechanical laws is faster than any commecial transistor in use today. Developed at Sandia National Laboratories, the quantum transistor-jokingly called the Quantristador - has many possible uses.

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Deep inside the earth, two thousand miles beneath its surface, pockets of molten rock can be found in a region where many scientists did not expect to find anything but solid rock. Researchers funded by the National Science Foundation report the finding in this week's issue of the journal Nature.

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A Carnegie Mellon University astrophysics professor is weighing in on the ultimate fate of the universe, with a new analysis that shows the universe may eventually stop expanding.

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Neuroscientists at Brandeis University have found new evidence of how memory is selectively retained by the brain. In a paper published in the Feb. 15 Journal of Neuroscience, John Lisman, Ph.D., and Nonna Otmakhova, Ph.D., show how the chemical dopamine operates in the hippocampus of the brain to retain memories. Dopamine appears "to modify the rules of activity-dependent synaptic plasticity," the authors say.

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A new technique for reducing waste from chemical processes involved in everything from petroleum refining to pharmaceutical manufacturing also may hold the key to cleaning up radioactive remains at eastern Washington's Hanford nuclear site, according to University of Washington researchers studying the new process.

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Overdevelopment and the rise in human population are fast becoming the downfall of coastal regions. The greatest threat to sea life today -- other than overfishing -- arises from human activity on land. In fact, humans affect coastal areas, even if they live hundreds of miles inland. This is a critical, global topic, and the New England Aquarium is one organization tackling it.

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A study led by University of Minnesota molecular biologist David Zarkower has found that a nematode maleness gene is very similar to maleness genes in fruit flies and maybe humans. These are the first examples of sex-determining genes whose structure has been conserved through eons of evolution, in this case the approximately 500 million years since ancestors of the three animal species split from each other.

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A Sandia National Laboratories physicist and his Texas-based colleague have done calculations that may offer additional insight into a decade-old controversy about whether up to 30,000 house-sized snowballs, or icy comets, are striking Earth each day.

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1) "Seismic quiescence" sometimes precede the world's strongest and most damaging earthquakes, 2) Scientists have detected an ongoing seafloor volcanic eruption 300 miles off the Oregon coast, 3) Certain habitat conservation plans that promote timber-cutting accords often are based on few hard scientific results

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Creighton researchers spent three months fishing in Antarctica. A three-year NSF grant funds the study of Antarctic teleost fish's ability to survive in the Antarctic Ocean. Research will focus on the fish's salt regulation, and function and size of their chloride cells.

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A molecular biologist at the University of Georgia has proposed that transposable elements may play a crucial and central role in evolution and could be the "missing link" in our understanding of how multicellular organisms work.

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Two University of Wyoming scientists have discovered a gene that produces the most highly elastic fiber from a spider's silk.

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NIGHT VISION -- Military and beyond ENERGY -- Lighting tomorrow's way COMPUTING -- Passing today's chips

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After several well-publicized meat safety scares in recent years, irradiation was approved late in 1997 for beef, pork and other red meats. What will this mean for food safety? For consumers?

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A University of Arizona geologist and a Yale University colleague have found an unlikely new source of informati9on source of information about prehistoric earthquakes - rock-loving lichens.

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A team of Argentinean and U.S. scientists has found fossils of a duck-billed dinosaur, along with remains of Antarctica's most ancient bird and an array of giant marine reptiles, on Vega Island off the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula.

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A bright but frail member of the silicon family has found new vigor through a process developed at Purdue University, lighting the path to faster, smaller computers and new types of sensing devices. Purdue researcher Jillian Buriak has developed a way to stabilize the surface of porous silicon.

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An insect that serves as a biological control is part of a new program to combat invasive Eurasian water milfoil (EWM), a fresh water weed. The process is commercially available in the United States and Canada from EnviroScience Inc. of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, through a licensing agreement with Middlebury College of Middlebury, Vt.

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Sea Grant Story Idea Tip Sheet Feb. 6, 1998 1) Ruffe Not As Great A Threat As Originally Thought 2) Estuaries, Ocean Current Crucial to Successful Shrimp Fishery 3) Researchers Seek Mass Production of Cancer-Fighting Marine Compounds

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A new interactive World Wide Web site sponsored by Zeneca Pharmaceuticals-Cardio.net (www.cardio.net)-now offers doctors and allied health professionals access to up-to-the-minute information on all aspects of cardiovascular medicine.

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Research Corporation Technologies and Heritage Partners in Tucson, Ariz., have formed Terrapure Systems L.L.C. to develop an innovative process for cleaning contaminated ground water and industrial effluents without the need for off-site disposal of hazardous wastes.

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Tip Sheet from New Scientist for 2-4-98

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White-Sided Dolphin Emergency on Cape Cod: A Stranding Update 71 dolphins dead in and around Wellfleet, Massachusetts

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Vast amounts of dissolved organic matter in the ocean, once thought to be inert, may play a surprising role in mitigating the greenhouse effect, according to bioengineering researchers at the University of Washington, reporting in this week's (Feb. 5) issue of Nature.

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In a steamy underwater hell west of Costa Rica, weird deep-sea worms survive temperatures nearly hot enough to boil water--too hot for any other complex creature on Earth--and they don't care if their `heads' are two-and-a-half times cooler than their `tails,' a University of Delaware researcher reports in the Feb. 5, 1998 issue of Nature.

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A facility used to test the sea-keeping qualities of ships and submarines has been cited for historical significance by ASME International (American Society of Mechanical Engineers).

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Promoting quality assurance in the application of manufacturing standards, ASME International (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) this year will continue the Program for Certification of Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing Professionals (GDTP).

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Baylor geology doctoral candidates Bruce Byars and Steve Clamons and geology undergraduate Scott Cherry recently took over development of an internationally recognized Geographic Information System (GIS) called Geographic Resource Analysis Support System (GRASS).

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The pheromone trail laid down by an Aphaenogaster rudis ant -- to help the ant and its recruited nest mates find their way back to prey they plan to kill -- contains a chemical now undergoing clinical trials as a possible Alzheimer's disease treatment, Cornell University chemists report in the January 1998 issue of the German journal Naturwissenschaften.

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Scientists have advanced standard PCR DNA analysis to enable them to identify different strains of pathogens from tiny, and in some cases many-years-old, tissue samples, providing a new tool for identifying sources of outbreaks.

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Four tips: * An easy "green" path to methanol production * Nuclear rocket for a quick boost to Mars * ACE measures upstream solar flow * Ulysses provides unique look at sun

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WASHINGTON, D.C., January 30, 1998 At midnight tomorrow U.S. DOE will break its legal obligation to manage the used fuel from the nation's commercial nuclear power plants. The defauft will subject United States' taxpayers to as much as $56 billion in liabilities.