March 1999

Virologist Hans Wolf of the University of Regensburg in Germany has been working on the etiology of nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) in areas of China since 1979. Researchers from the U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI), too, have been working with their Chinese colleagues on cancer epidemiology and etiology. The reasons for this cooperative research vary, but as Federico Welsch, associate director for international affairs at NCI, points out, "They have some cancers that are rare in the develop

Eugenics comes in many guises, from the fetal hatcheries of Aldous Huxley's 1931 vision of a brave new world, to films such as Gattaca, where parents pick and choose their future offspring's inherited traits. In the real world, eugenics is associated with the horrors of Nazi Germany, and more subtly with certain medical tests widely used in many nations today. The blurring of the lines between eugenics and genetic research has prompted the American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) to release a

Be prepared. That was essentially the take-home message of a mid-February conference on bioterrorism held in Crystal City, Va., and sponsored by the Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Infectious Diseases Society of America, and the American Society for Microbiology. Conference speakers addressed the following: Could a bioterrorist attack occur in the United States? The answer: absolutely--in fact, the chances are pretty good, given

Graphic: Marlene J. Viola Some say it takes a village to raise a child. Michael V. Sefton proposes that it will take a world to build a heart. Sefton, a University of Toronto chemical engineering professor, leads an international effort called the Living Implants from Engineering (L.I.F.E.) Initiative, whose goal is to create a bioengineered heart in 10 years. To meet that mark, participants must grapple with a host of scientific concerns and more mundane matters. Research questions that must b

The American chestnut, decimated by a fungus that scientists have tried in vain to quell throughout this century, finally may be on its way back to health, thanks largely to genetics. Once a dominant tree throughout the Northeast, prized for the timber from its long, unbranched trunks, the American variety (Castanea dentata) stopped providing those famed chestnuts roasting on an open fire long before Bing Crosby's time. The tree bore sweet nuts, but they were small, and the quest for a meatier n

Particle physicists use massive accelerators to push the theoretical envelope; astronomers use increasingly high-powered telescopes to inch farther into the universe. But scientists specializing in biodiversity have decided that to better understand the planet's known organisms, as well as their habitats and ecosystems, they don't need a mammoth physical structure. Instead, many advocate a vast virtual facility that would compile and catalog detailed data sets on the billions of living things s

I enjoyed reading the article by Barry Palevitz and Ricki Lewis entitled "Short Shrift to Evolution?"1 The functional link between animal and plant proteins is fascinating and refreshing. It also points out the incredible predictive power of evolutionary theory (a trait that is conspicuously absent from creationist "scientific" theories such as the young earth theory and the theory of intelligent design). Regarding the authors' question as to whether the message is getting through or whether p

As one thoroughly trained in evolution at the Johns Hopkins University, New York Medical College, and the University of Michigan Medical Center, I read your article critical of the mainstream press for not relaying the strength of evolution as a scientific principle.1 Actually, the article itself confirmed the press's position by clearly demonstrating that evolution is not a science but a religion. The presence of numerous sauropod eggshells in Patagonia is certainly evidence that sauropods ex

Edited by: Steve Bunk Richard D. Palmiter Jay C. Erickson, Kathy E. Clegg, Richard D. Palmiter, "Sensitivity to leptin and susceptibility to seizures of mice lacking neuropeptide Y," Nature, 381:415-8, 1996. (Cited in more than 205 papers since publication) Comments by Richard D. Palmiter , Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and University of Washington biochemistry professor Ah, for an ideal scientific world. In it, researchers demonstrate that injection of a specific neuropept

Edited by: Steve Bunk A. Goffeau, B.G. Barrell, H. Bussey, R.W. Davis, B. Dujon, H. Feldmann, F. Galibert, J.D. Hoheisel, C. Jacq, M. Johnston, E.J. Louis, H.W. Mewes, Y. Murakami, P. Philippsen, H. Tettelin, S.G. Oliver, "Life with 6000 genes," Science, 274:546-67, 1996. (Cited in more than 250 papers since publication) Comments by Steve Oliver , professor, Department of Biomolecular Sciences, University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, United Kingdom, and Andre Goffeau ,

Date: March 15, 1999Western Detection Kit Table Are you a pipette-totin,' membrane-slingin' Western blotter? Or are you a shotgun cloner who's venturing out West for the first time? Either way, you might want to join us as we take a trip to the frontier to check out pioneering products available to make your life easier and your blots better. In this profile, LabConsumer looks at the latest tools and kits that are available to enhance Western blotting--from blotting equipment that ensures even

Date: March 15, 1999 Phage Display Systems and Vectors Structure of the T7 phage particle. The negative-stained pattern from polyheads showing capsid hexamer and pentamer units has been fitted onto the surface of the icosahedral particle. A single monomer of the capsid protein is shaded in red. Figure provided by Novagen. Back in the early '50s, at a time when Elvis Presley was beginning his undisputed reign as the king of rock 'n' roll, bacteriophage were rearing their ugly heads (so to spe