Science News Magazine - Sources

Sources

Full Text Available for Selected Articles

News of the Week:

Added Noise Keeps Waves Going

Fluctuations in light intensity can enhance the propagation of chemical waves, suggesting noise as a mechanism for long-range signaling in brain tissue.

Sources:

Frank Moss
Center for Neurodynamics
University of Missouri-St. Louis
St. Louis, MO 63121

Kenneth Showalter
Department of Chemistry
West Virginia University
Morgantown, WV 26506-6045

Icy signs of warming emerge in Arctic

Satellite studies of sea ice provide evidence of Arctic warming.

Sources:

Douglas M. Smith
Meteorological Office
London Road A329
Bracknell
Berkshire RG12 2SZ
United Kingdom

Radar illuminates ancient Cambodian site

Radar maps and archaeological field work provide new insights into an ancient civilization at Angkor.

Sources:

Elizabeth Moore
University of London
Department of Art and Archaeology
London WC1E 7HU
United Kingdom

Male sex hormone, preeclampsia link found

Elevated testosterone in women who once had preeclampsia, a complication of pregnancy, hints that the condition signals heart disease risk later in life.

Sources:

Olavi R. Ylikorkala
Helsinki University Central Hospital
Departments of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Clinical
Chemistry
Finland

Rare regeneration fixes pierced mouse ears

A lab glitch may yield a new—and rare—mammal model suitable for studying tissue regeneration.

Sources:

Ellen Heber-Katz
Wistar Institute
3601 Spruce Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104

Gamma-ray bursts: Farther and brighter?

The mysterious flashes of cosmic light known as gamma-ray bursts may be 20 times more energetic than previously estimated, and some may originate from the first galaxies born in the universe.

Sources:

Jasjeet S. Bagla
University of Cambridge
Institute of Astronomy
Madingley Road
Cambridge CB3 0HA
United Kingdom

Gene cloned for stretchiest spider silk

The extreme elasticity of so-called capture silk comes from long spirals in the protein's configuration.

Sources:

Cheryl Y. Hayashi
University of Wyoming
Department of Molecular Biology
Laramie, WY 82071-3944

Randolph V. Lewis
University of Wyoming
Department of Molecular Biology
Laramie, WY 82071-3944
Web site: http://www.uwyo.edu/ag/molecbio/lewis.html

Electromagnetic fields may trigger enzymes

Magnetic fields can set off a cascade of enzyme-driven cell-signaling events, which could lead to cancer.

Sources:

Steven C. Miller
Stanford Research Institute International
Pharmaceutical Discovery Division
333 Ravenswood Avenue
Menlo Park, CA 94025

Jerry L. Phillips
Veterans Administration Hospital
Research Service (151)
11201 Benton Street
Loma Linda, CA 92357

Fatih M. Uckun
Wayne Hughes Institute
2665 Long Lake Road, Suite 330
St. Paul, MN 55113

Research Notes

Biology
Worms’ hot ends set thermal record

Worms living near hydrothermal vents keep cool heads whereas their rumps are immersed in water too hot for any other multicellular organism to endure.

Sources:

S. Craig Cary
University of Delaware
College of Marine Studies
Lewes, DE 19958

Land hermit crabs spurn leftovers

Hermit crabs avoid eating food that smells like their last meal.

Sources:

Robert W. Thacker
Kewalo Marine Laboratory
Pacific Biomedical Research Center
41 Ahui Street
Honolulu, HI 96813

Biomedicine
Stroke drug reveals a dark side

Studies in mice raise questions about the effectiveness of a clot-dissolving substance used to treat stroke.

Sources:

Stuart A. Lipton
Harvard Medical School
Brigham & Women’s Hospital
221 Longwood Avenue
LMRC First Floor
Boston, MA 02115

Cancer treatment and memory loss

High doses of toxic chemotherapeutic drugs in tandem with tamoxifen may increase the risk of cognitive deficits in women being treated for breast cancer.

Sources:

Frits S.A.M. van Dam
Netherlands Cancer Institute
Plesmanlaan 121
1066 CX Amsterdam
Netherlands

Computers
Calculating a record prime

A college sophomore participating in the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search has discovered the largest known prime number.

Sources:

Roland H. Clarkson
Web site: http://members.aol.com/mersenes/home.html
E-mail: mersenes@aol.com

Scott Kurowski
Web site: http://entropia.com/services
E-mail: kurowski@entropia.com

George Woltman
Web site: http://www.mersenne.org

Overcoming quantum error

Accurate quantum computation is possible provided that the error per operation is below a threshold value.

Sources:

Wojciech H. Zurek
T-6, Mail Stop B288
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Los Alamos, NM 87545

Environment
Forests as pollution filters

Forests are more likely to pull pollutant gases rather than particles out of the air.

Bug sprays seem to really like toys

Pesticide foggers may leave residues that contaminate surfaces, especially plastic toys, for at least 1 week.

Sources:

Paul J. Lioy
Rutgers University
Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences Institute
681 Frelinghuysen Road
P.O. Box 1179
Piscataway, NJ 08855

Articles:
All Fired Up
Perception may dance to the beat of collective neuronal rhythms

Synchronized activity in selected groups of brain cells apparently underlies perception and other cognitive functions.

Sources:

Francis Crick
The Salk Institute
10010 North Torrey Pines Road
La Jolla, CA 92037

Anthony A. Grace
University of Pittsburgh
Department of Neuroscience
458 Crawford Hall
Pittsburgh, PA 15260

Charles M. Gray
University of California, Davis
Center for Neuroscience and Departments of Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior
1544 Newton Court
Davis, CA 95616

Christof Koch
California Institute of Technology
Computation and Neural Systems Program, 139-74
Pasadena, CA 91125

Gilles Laurent
California Institute of Technology
Biology Division
139-74
Pasadena, CA 91125

J. Anthony Movshon
New York University
Center for Neural Sciences
4 Washington Place, Room 809
New York, NY 10003

Alexa Riehle
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Center for Research in Cognitive Neuroscience
31 Chemin Joseph Aiguier
13402 Marseille, Cedex 20
France

Wolf Singer
Max-Planck-Institute for Brain Research
Deutschordenstrasse 46
60528 Frankfurt
Germany

Circles in the Sky
Detecting the shape of the universe

Evidence of a finite, multiply connected universe may show up in microwave data from future spacecraft.

Sources:

Janna Levin
Center for Particle Astrophysics
301 Le Conte Hall
University of California at Berkeley
Berkeley, CA 94720-7304

David N. Spergel
Princeton University Observatory
Princeton, NJ 08544

Glenn D. Starkman
Department of Physics
Case Western Reserve University
Cleveland, OH 44106

Jeffrey R. Weeks
E-mail: weeks@geom.umn.edu

References

Table of Contents - 2/21/98

SEARCH!