Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
PANDA Electronics Co, China's leading television manufacturer, has had enough of selling no-frills sets. It is gearing up for a into the satellite dish and telephone businesses. Panda believes that only by expanding into new areas will it be able to keep pace with foreign competitors, who are bound to …
A RECENT move by the government of India should pacify sceptics of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and intellectual property rights (IPRs). In a remarkable step, it has begun the procedure for revoking a patent for a method of producing transgenic cotton granted in May 1991 to …
THE Prime Minister, P V, Narasimha Rao, took a commendable step by revoking the patent granted to the US company, Agracetus, in 1991. Agracetus was awarded the patent for its transgenic cotton by the Indian Patent Office even though the Patent Act specifically forbids the Patenting of "investing process related …
UNCLE Sam has done it once again. In mid-February, the Kim Il Sung regime in North Korea finally agreed to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to inspect its seven declared nuclear sites. The decision came after 10 nerve-wracking days during which the two countries hurled verbal missiles at …
IN JANUARY, after a break of 22 years, the US once again turned its attention to the moon. This time, however, it was not NASA that launched a spacecraft, but the Ballistic Missile Defence Organization (BMDO), the successor to the Strategic Defence Initiative Organization. The spacecraft, christened Clementine, was originally …
US drug companies are responding to criticism of the high cost of prescription medicines by putting out a new message for consumers: "We are not out to fleece you. We are, in fact, toiling hard to 'discover' drugs that will cure terminal diseases". They have kicked off a television advertising …
CAPITALISING on more than 100 years of expertise in plant product chemistry, Dabur, one of India's largest Ayurvedic formulation manufacturers, has now ventured into modern pharmaceutical research and product development. Dabur recently announced that it had perfected a method to extract taxol -- a potent drug used to treat ovarian …
IMAGINE a building swaying like a pendulum so that it doesn't crumble during an earthquake. Engineer Victor Zayas of Earthquake Protection Systems in San Francisco has designed just such a system (Science, Vol 262, No 5139). The new Friction Pendulum System (FPS) is quite unlike others, which dissipate tremor energy …
In much of the US east coast north of Washington, a salt shortage is compounding a wretched winter. Rock salt, which is dumped by the tonne on roads to prevent the formation of ice, is now in great demand. In Pennsylvania, for instance, 90 per cent of the salt ordered …
THE US government is planning to discourage overseas governments from requiring airliners to be sprayed with insecticides after arriving at airports. "It needlessly exposes millions of Americans to harmful chemicals and our top priority is the safety of our passengers," declares Federico F Pena, the US transportation secretary. US environmentalists …
IS CAFFEINE, which is present in tea, coffee and coke, harmful to pregnant women and foetuses? Although there have been indications to the contrary, a recent Canadian study has found evidence that expectant mothers who take caffeine before and during pregnancy may run a greater risk of foetal death (Journal …
AS RUSSIA moves to a market economy, some celebrated but impecunious cosmonauts are cashing in on their space legacies. Alexei Leonov, the first man to walk in space, pocketed $255,500 as he watched his training space suit go under Sotheby's hammer in New York in December (Nature, Vol 366, No …
The United States has finally conceded India's right to reprocess spent fuel from the Tarapore Atomic Power Station (TAPS). An indication to this effect came recently when the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) cleared India's plan to use the locally produced mixed oxide fuel (MOx). India's Atomic Energy Commission will …
AN AQUATIC army of American origin has invaded the Black Sea and is wreaking havoc on the fisheries there. Small jellyfish-like, tentacled creatures called ctenophores arrived there in 1982, hiding in the ballast waters of a ship travelling across the Atlantic Ocean. They lay low and reproduced, emerging in full …
PEOPLE who suffer wild swings of moods -- from ecstatic highs to melancholic lows -- have their mother to blame. At least this is what researchers at Johns Hopkins Hospital, USA, suggest: Every woman on a sprawling family tree they have drawn up passes this disorder, called the manic-depressive psychosis, …
A REVIEW of previously classified documents has revealed that the US had used babies and unsuspecting patients for experiments on radioactivity for many years. It had also released large amounts of radiation into the environment in the 1940s and early 1950s. At least 19 mentally retarded teenagers were fed radioactive …
THE CLINTON administration's policy on nuclear proliferation and the use of plutonium -- the main ingredient of nuclear warheads -- is being put to test by a Swiss request to ship used commercial nuclear fuel to Britain. The fuel was provided by the US on the condition that it retain …
Lockheed Corp of the US has developed an inexpensive, part liquid, part solid telephoto lens that guarantees a sharper and better-contrasted picture than the conventional lens. Besides correcting colour distortion from light bending through glass, the new lens is unaffected by imperfections on its surface, reducing the need for polishing …
NOT ONLY do smiles reflect happiness, they can even induce it, says psychologist Paul Ekman of the Human Interaction Lab at the University of California (Science, Vol 262, No 5132). However, not any smile will do. In 1862, French neurologist Duchenne de Boulogne noted that half-hearted smiles only involve mouth …
An agreement between the Maharashtra State Electricity Board (MSEB) and Enron Corp, a US-based multinational power company, to set up a 2,015 megawatt power plant in Dabhol in Ratnagiri district has come in for criticism. The plant is to be set up by General Electric and Bechtel Corp of the …
