DISEASE DETECTOR: Satellites capture phytoplankton blooms (blue-green) in the North Atlantic. Similar blooms have been linked to outbreaks of Vibrio infections along European coasts.NASA IMAGE BY JEFF SCHMALTZ, MODIS RAPID RESPONSE TEAM
Pietro Ceccato vividly remembers his trip to a northeastern Tanzanian Maasai village last July. For more than two hours, the bus he caught in the city of Arusha traversed a flat landscape sprinkled with acacia trees; the summer air was dry and heavy with dust. The village itself, populated by a cattle-herding tribal group dressed in bright red and blue robes, was no more than a small cluster of huts fenced in to keep lions and hyenas out. But there were also hints of modern life in the community. The village chief was frequently on his cell phone, for example, touching base with members of his village to keep track of his cattle, recalls Ceccato, an environmental scientist at Columbia University in New York City.
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