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February 2000 Archives

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14 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Quantity is Key for Hox Genes

by Gretchen Vogel
Like plumbers or carpenters at a construction site, each so-called Hox gene was thought to direct just one task in the assembly of a developing embryo. But in the 13...
Eros
14 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

An Asteroidal Embrace at Last for NEAR

by Richard A. Kerr
After roaming the solar system for 4 years in pursuit of the asteroid Eros, the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft this morning slipped into orbit around the largest of...
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11 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Double Magic for New Nickel Nucleus

by Adrian Cho
In what you might call a smashing success, physicists have chiseled out an atomic nucleus laden with a record eight more protons than neutrons. The new nucleus, nickel-48, self-destructs in...
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11 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Designing Enzymes to Spec

by Michael Hagmann
When a new protein evolves in nature, the process usually requires many genetic mutations that are acquired over many generations. But for years researchers have tried to put evolution on...
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11 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Controversy Claims CDC Lab Chief

by Martin Enserink
WASHINGTON, D.C.--A senior manager at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has been reassigned as agency officials scramble to quell a widening controversy about the misuse of funds...
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10 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

A Clue to How Alcohol Damages Brains

by Marcia Barinaga
Alcohol wreaks havoc on the developing brain, killing cells left and right. Children who were exposed to alcohol in the womb are often developmentally disabled. Now researchers have identified two...
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10 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

CERN Blows Matter Horn

by Charles Seife
For a few microseconds after the birth of the universe, quarks and gluons roamed free in a blazing hot jumble of matter known as a quark-gluon plasma. As the plasma...
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10 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

X-ray Satellite Lost After Blast-Off

by Govert Schilling
The Japanese-American x-ray satellite ASTRO-E burned up in the atmosphere Wednesday night, according to the Japanese Institute for Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) in Kanagawa. ASTRO-E was to be the...
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9 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Andro Bumps Up Testosterone Levels

by Dana Mackenzie
In 1998, baseball player Mark McGwire made headlines by hitting 70 home runs in one season, shattering the long-standing record. At the time, he was regularly--and legally--taking androstenedione, a steroid...
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9 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Dark Stirrings Within Lake Vostok

by Robert Irion
Frigid water is seeping into and out of a vast lake beneath 4 kilometers of ice in Antarctica. The newly unveiled circulation isn't quite as vigorous as the flow in...
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9 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Newton's Namesake to Watch X-rays

by Govert Schilling
Europe's new orbiting x-ray observatory made its public debut today. At a press conference in Villafranca, Spain, the European Space Agency released pictures of supernova remnants in the Large Magellanic...
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9 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Deep, Moist Heat Drives Jovian Weather

by Richard A. Kerr
Jupiter's weather is awesome but frustratingly mysterious. Meteorologists have wondered what drives the planet's weather engine: the feeble sunlight that bathes the jovian clouds, or heat seeping out from deep...
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8 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

President Signs Genetic Discrimination Ban

by Eliot Marshall
WASHINGTON, D.C.--President Clinton, warning that "the fear of misuse of private genetic information is ... widespread in this country," addressed some of those concerns today by signing an executive order...
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8 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

An Academy That Knows No Borders?

by Robert Koenig
BERN, SWITZERLAND--Behind the scenes of last week's World Economic Forum, science academy leaders from around the world took the first steps toward creating an international science organization. The proposed body,...
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8 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

A Closer Look at Space Hydrocarbons

by Alexander Hellemans
Walk into a parking garage or a bar and you'll probably inhale a ubiquitous pollutant called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs. Made up of two or more fused benzene rings,...
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8 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Slicing Up Iceland's Gene Pie

by Martin Enserink
For almost 2 years, Iceland's small scientific and medical community has been torn apart by a bold plan: a database of the entire country's medical records that would aid the...
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7 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Mixed Reaction to NIH Budget

by Eliot Marshall
The Administration's proposed 2001 budget for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is receiving less than a standing ovation from biomedical lobbyists. But they admit that the 4.5% increase supports...
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7 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

How Agencies Fared in Budget

by Science News Staff
Washington resembled a three-ring circus on 7 February as each agency put the best face on its 2001 budget request. Here are highlights from those presentations: NSF: The National Science...
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7 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

New and Improved Package for Gene Therapy

by Elizabeth Norton Lasley
Viruses are gene therapy's answer to the Trojan Horse. With their wily knack for invading the cells of other organisms, viruses should be an ideal courier of beneficial genes into...
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7 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

NASA Budget Brightens Solar Missions

by Andrew Lawler
This year, for a change, NASA gets to share in the budget wealth. The White House request for a $435 million increase, to $14.03 billion in 2001, marks the first...
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7 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

DNA Test to Thwart Tiger Trade?

by Pallava Bagla
British researchers say they are developing a DNA test that could help nab those who illegally trade in tiger products. And three recent raids in India that confiscated huge caches...
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4 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

A New Weapon Against Septic Shock

by Anna Davison
When a bacterial infection rages out of control and courses through the blood stream, the immune system can fight so hard that it throws the body into septic shock. Now...
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4 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

More Tests for Kennewick Man

by Constance Holden
Ever since the ancient skeleton called Kennewick Man was found on the banks of Washington's Columbia River, the U.S. government has kept the controversial remains under lock and key. This...
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4 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Secret of a Bee's Odometer

by Dana Mackenzie
Psychologists often use optical illusions to probe the workings of the human brain. Now a group of biophysicists has pulled the same trick on bees. By fooling the bees into...
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4 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Pygmy Crocs Found in Sahara Caves

by Michael Hagmann
Remember the urban legend about crocodiles thriving in New York City's sewers? A team of German zoologists has stumbled upon a population of Nile crocodiles in an equally improbable setting:...
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3 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Stretching the Horizon for Electrical Devices

by Adrian Cho
Hunting for materials that change shape when zapped electrically, researchers have found a new champion literally hanging out in the kitchen. A rubbery acrylic used as an adhesive on kitchen...
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3 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Recreating the Shadow of Crumbled Mountain Peaks

by Mark Sincell
"The top of a hill is not until the bottom is below," wrote the poet John Ciardi. "And you have to stop when you reach the top for there's no...
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3 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Gene Chip Predicts Outcome of Cancer Therapy

by Trisha Gura
Because cancer patients with the same diagnosis often vary widely in their response to treatment, researchers have long suspected that they might be dealing with different types of tumors. Now...
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2 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Could Testosterone Ward Off Alzheimer's?

by Michael Hagmann
Women who take estrogen pills after menopause are less likely to develop Alzheimer's disease than women who don't. Now, test tube experiments with nerve cells suggest that buffing up levels...
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2 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

The Long Reach of Asphalt

by Christie Aschwanden
Roadkill and weeds are graphic testimony to how roads can upset ecosystems. But because ecologists tend to steer clear of traffic, no one had quantified the total environmental impact. A...
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2 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Bouncing Balls of Burning Silicon

by Robert Irion
Among nature's most bizarre spectacles are the eerie, floating orbs of electrical fire called ball lightning, which sometimes pop up during thunderstorms. Thousands of eyewitnesses have reported ball lightning over...
tardigrade
1 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Candied Cells Have Longer Shelf Life

by Dan Ferber
You can buy them in any toy store: dried sea monkeys that spring to life in a dish of water. Now researchers have borrowed a chemical trick from these tiny...
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1 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Shoot for the Stars

by Wayne Kondro
Canadian astronomers will unveil an ambitious plan later this month for keeping their country at the forefront of exploration. But observers predict they face an uphill battle convincing politicians to...
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1 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

The Accordion in Your Ear

by Anna Davison
Whether it's a tabby perking up at the distant ratchet of a can opener, or an orchestra conductor cringing from a single wrong note in a Beethoven symphony, mammals have...
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1 February 2000 | ScienceNOW

Atom-Cleaving Light

by Charles Seife
Scientists have for the first time used laser light to crack open the nucleus of an atom. Two groups have harnessed lasers to split uranium apart, knock neutrons out of...
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