November 29,
1997
News of the Week:
Gene Creates Malaria Drug
Resistance
Alterations in a gene called cg2 underlie malaria-causing parasites' resistance to the drug chloroquine.
Sources:
Thomas E. Wellems
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
National Institutes of Health
Bethesda, MD 20892-0425
Sulfur: Cool, compact, and conductive
Sulfur, compressed at 1.6 million times atmospheric pressure, becomes a superconductor when cooled to 17 kelvins.
Sources:
Marvin L. Cohen
Department of Physics
University of California, Berkeley
Berkeley, CA 94720
E-mail: mlcohen@jungle.berkeley.edu
Website: http://tiger.berkeley.edu/cohen/index.html
Russell J. Hemley
Geophysical Laboratory
Carnegie Institution of Washington
5251 Broad Branch Road, N.W.
Washington, DC 20015-1305
E-mail: hemley@gl.ciw.edu
Website: http://www.chipr.sunysb.edu
Wretched excess yields
double trouble
A single high-fat meal depresses healthy dilation of blood vessels and boosts clotting proteins in the blood.
Sources:
Lone Frost Larsen
Research Department of Human Nutrition
Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University
Rolighedsvej 30
DK-1958 Frederiksberg C
Denmark
Gary D. Plotnick
Division of Cardiology
Department of Medicine
University of Maryland School of Medicine
22 South Green Street
Baltimore, MD 21201
Continents growing wetter as globe warms
Meteorological records since 1900 show precipitation increasing globally but decreasing in the tropics.
Sources:
Aiguo Dai
National Center for Atmospheric Research
Climate and Global Dynamics Division
Geophysical Statistics Project
P.O. Box 3000
Boulder, CO 80307-3000
Inez Y. Fung
NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies
2880 Broadway
New York, NY 10025
Magnetic fields can
diminish drug action
Electromagnetic fields of an intensity that can be found in some homes blocked the ability of a breast cancer drug to halt cell proliferation.
Sources:
Carl F. Blackman
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Mailstop Code 68
Research Triangle Park, NC 27711-2055
Robert P. Liburdy
Life Sciences Division
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
MS-Building 934
One Cyclotron Road
Berkeley, CA 94720
Richard Stevens
Health Division, K4-28
Battelle Pacific Northwest Laboratory
Richland, WA 99352
Cave finds make point about early humans
A new report describes South African bone tools that may reflect complex technological advances more than 40,000 years ago.
Sources:
Christopher Henshilwood
Department of Archaeology
University of Cape Town
Private Bag
Rondebosch 7700
South Africa
Judith Sealy
Department of Archaeology
University of Cape Town
Private Bag
Rondebosch 7700
South Africa
Pests find new ways around natural toxins
Diamondback moth caterpillars deploy a variety of strategies to defuse the natural pesticide Bt, which is used in integrated pest management.
Sources:
Fred Gould
Department of Entomology
North Carolina State University
Raleigh, NC 27695
Brenda Oppert
U.S. Grain Marketing Research Laboratory
U.S. Department of Agriculture
Agricultural Research Service
Manhattan, KS 66502-2736
Bruce E. Tabashnik
Department of Entomology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
Hubble eyes springtime on Uranus
Using the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have for the first time viewed the northern hemisphere of Uranus with modern detectors.
Sources:
Heidi B. Hammel
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Science
54-416
Cambridge, MA 02139
Erich Karkoschka
Lunar and Planetary Laboratory
Space Sciences Building
University of Arizona
P.O. Box 210092
Tucson, AZ 85721-0092
Research Notes:
Biomedicine
Breast milk: A leading source of PCBs
Breast milk provides large amounts of potentially neurotoxic chemicals to infants.
Sources:
Corine Koopman-Esseboom
Department of Pediatrics
Division of Neonatology
Sophia Children's Hospital
P.O. Box 2060
3000 CB, Rotterdam
The Netherlands
Penile birth defect on the rise
The incidence of a common male birth defect is climbing throughout the United States, and hormone exposures are suspected of playing some role.
Sources:
Leonard J. Paulozzi
Birth Defects and Genetic Diseases Branch
Division of Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities
National Center for Environmental Health
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Mailstop Code F-45
4770 Buford Highway, NE
Atlanta, GA 30341-3724
NIH panel gives acupuncture the nod
A panel convened by the National Institutes of Health has endorsed acupuncture as a treatment for certain conditions.
Two HIV tests prove better than one
A combination of blood and urine tests detects more HIV infections than either test alone.
Sources:
Howard B. Urnovitz
Calypte Biomedical Corp.
1440 Fourth Street
Berkeley, CA 94710
Teen chlamydia infections widespread
A survey of teenagers shows 8.6 percent of girls and 5.4 percent of boys in Seattle have chlamydia.
Ecology
Patchy forests and greenhouse gases
Loss of biomass in small remnants of forest left behind after logging may contribute to increases of atmospheric greenhouse gases.
Sources:
William F. Laurance
Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments Project
National Institute for Research in the Amazon (INPA)
Caixa Postal 478
Manaus, AM 69011-970
Brazil
Thomas E. Lovejoy
Biodiversity and Conservation
Smithsonian Institution
Washington, DC 20560
Island plants let down their defenses
Plants on Santa Cruz Island off California have significantly fewer defenses against animal grazers than do their mainland counterparts.
Sources:
Lizabeth Bowen
Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology
University of California, Davis
Davis, CA 95616
Dirk Van Vuren
Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology
University of California, Davis
Davis, CA 95616
Earth Science
Tree rings date Pacific Northwest quake
A large earthquake struck the northwestern coastline during the winter of 1700.
Sources:
Gordon C. Jacoby
Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory
Palisades, NY 10964
David K. Yamaguchi
Department of Environmental Health
University of Washington
P.O. Box 354695
Seattle, WA 98195
Delaying cuts in greenhouse emissions
Countries can stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases even if they don't set emissions limits until 2010.
Sources:
Tom M.L. Wigley
National Center for Atmospheric Research
UCAR, Box 3000
1850 Table Mesa Drive
Suite 259
Boulder, CO 80307-3000
Kilaparti Ramakrishna
Woods Hole Research Center
Woods Hole, MA 02543
Food Science
Teasing out tea's heart benefits
An explanation for tea drinkers' protection from heart attacks turns out to be complicated.
Sources:
Lester A. Mitscher
Department of Medicinal Chemistry
University of Kansas
4010 Malott Hall
Lawrence, KS 66045
Karin H. van het Hof
Unilever Research Laboratorium
P.O. Box 114
3130 AC Vlaardingen
Netherlands
The heart-healthy side of lycopene
The pigment that makes tomatoes red also appears to help tomato-rich diets protect against heart attacks.
Sources:
Christine Gartner
Institute for Physiological Chemistry I
Heinrich-Heine-Universitat
Dusseldorf, P.O. Box 101007
D40001 Dusseldorf
Germany
Lenore Kohlmeier
Departments of Nutrition and Epidemiology
Schools of Public Health and Medicine
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
CB# 7400, McGavran-Greenberg
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7400
Articles:
A New Look at Black Holes
Dim monsters in the spotlight
Even puny, quiescent galaxies may hide a gravitational monster, according to a new theory of black hole dynamics.
Sources:
Andrew C. Fabian
Institute of Astronomy
University of Cambridge
Madingley Road
Cambridge CB3 0HA
England
The artist's depiction of a black hole in the print edition of Science News is the work of Edwin Faughn
Space Science Illustration and Multi-Media Design
3050 Central Avenue
Memphis, TN 38111
(901) 320-6383
Mark Morris
University of California, Los Angeles
Department of Physics and Astronomy
Box 951562
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1562
Ramesh Narayan
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
60 Garden Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
Does a stress hormone play a role in AIDS?
Controversial theories trace immune system debilitation to excess cortisol and an HIV protein's mimicry of similar hormones.
Sources:
Velpandi Ayyavoo
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
University of Pennsylvania
505 Stellar-Chance Laboratories
422 Curie Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19104
George Chrousos
Developmental Endocrinology
National Institutes of Health
Building 10, Room 10
North 262
Bethesda, MD 20892-1682
Carl Dieffenbach
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
National Institutes of Health
6003 Executive Boulevard
Room 2C36A
Bethesda, MD 20892
Roger M. Loria
Virginia Commonwealth University
Medical College of Virginia
Richmond, VA 23298-0678
Roger H. Miller
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
National Institutes of Health
6003 Executive Boulevard
Room 2C36A
Bethesda, MD 20892
Alfred T. Sapse
Steroidogenesis Inhibitors
Magna Executive Center
2001 East Flamingo Road
Suite 100-B
Las Vegas, NV 89119
Esther Sternberg
National Institute of Mental Health
National Institutes of Health
Building 10, Room 2D46
10 Center Drive
Bethesda, MD 20892-1284
David B. Weiner
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
University of Pennsylvania
505 Stellar-Chance Laboratories
422 Curie Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Table of Contents - 11/29/97
