New Clue to Lou Gehrig's Disease Emerges

Mutations in the genetic instructions used to create a key brain protein may cause the neurodegenerative disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Making antihydrogen atoms at Fermilab

A beam of antiprotons passing through a jet of hydrogen gas produces an occasional antihydrogen atom.

Science and math education: No easy answer

U.S. eighth graders perform less well in science and math than students in many other nations because classroom instruction focuses on routine problem solving instead of on concepts.

Low-dose X rays can sharpen fine details

Phase-contrast X rays reveal details that get lost in conventional X- ray images, potentially making it easier and safer to identify tumors.

Do sea turtles stop and ask for directions?

Sea turtles migrating across the Pacific stick to narrow paths that persist from year to year.

African fossil pushes back human ancestry

A 2.3-million-year-old Homo jaw found near stone tools at an Ethiopian site represents the oldest known fossil in human evolution.

How the brain knows when eating must stop

A novel form of nerve talk may allow the brain to track, from the gut, the consumption of different types of nutrients.

Risky sex breeds neglected epidemic

The United States has failed to respond to an epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases, even though the country's infection rates dwarf those of every other developed country, the Institute of Medicine asserts.

Research Notes:

Science & Society:

Gulf War ills -- No proof found so far

Two new studies have found a conspicuous lack of deaths or hospitalizations resulting from exposures to chemical weapons among veterans of the Persian Gulf War.

Biomedicine:

A heart made of iron --- not!

Some athletes may suffer heart damage after prolonged, extremely arduous exertion.

Is buck fever a heart hazard?

Deer hunting can put men with clogged arteries at risk of a heart attack.

Hunt intensifies for Parkinson's gene

A mutated gene that causes Parkinson's disease exists in a narrow region on the long arm of chromosome 4.

Can a cold virus slay cancer cells?

Because cancer cells often lack a protein called p53, scientists are trying to develop a virus that will kill tumor cells but ignore normal cells, which normally do have p53.

Huntington's disease strikes mice

By adding to mice a small portion of the human gene that causes Huntington's disease, researchers have created animals they hope will reveal how the mutant gene kills brain cells.

Articles:

Protecting Predators

Tracking the Rocky Mountain carnivores

Wildlife biologists are examining the viability and resiliency of large carnivores to determine how best to ensure the animals' long-term survival.

Bullies of the Universe

Massive stars rob their smaller neighbors

Though they make up only a tiny fraction of a galaxy's stellar population, massive stars have a profound, and often destructive, influence on their neighbors.

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