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. …
A SRI LANKAN research team has dismissed as "biased" and "rushed" a UN study that claims the country is among the world's top five dolphin- catchers. The release of the team's report this month is keenly awaited by Colombo, which fears that if Sri Lanka continu6s to be identified with …
THOUGH reports linking brain, cancer to the use of mobile phones pushed down shares of US Cellular telephone companies, Japanese firms remain mostly unaffected. Tokyo stock market analysts explain this is because the Japanese have been inoculated by earlier reports of radioactive cellular phones. Says Edward Staiano of Motorola, the …
EVEN AS Kenya announced the World Bank would contribute US $29 million of the $85 million needed for the country's drought recovery programme, more than 60 people died when flash floods in the river Ngai Ndethya ("God save me" in Swahili) d-estroyed a bridge, which caused a train to tumble …
A US $700 million "nuclear safety account" to reduce the risk of accidents in east Europe - agreed in principle last July - has finally been approved by specialists from the Group of Seven industrialised nations. At least 32 reactors are deemed sufficiently safe for upgrading; 26 are excluded as …
SOCIAL insects such as ants, bees, wasps and termites fascinate us. Few, however, believe we have direct lessons to learn from social insects. Much like our fascination for a tribal society, it's more a question of wanitng to know how they do things. Our curiosity about social insects relates to …
PARTICLE physicists at Fermilab near Chicago may have sighted the elusive "top" quark, one of the smallest constituents of matter (Science, Vol 258, No 5086; New Scientist, Vol 136, No 1851). An experiment at the Tevatron collider -a large particle smasher -yielded a pattern of particle debris that was anticipated …
PRESIDENT Bill Clinton wants American research to adopt the Japanese stress on industrial applications. But his call may have come too late as Japanese scientists are switching their thrust to basic research, in which the Americans have hitherto been pre-eminent. Clinton plans to add at least $7 billion to the …
NEARLY half the world's population depends on rice for food. Yet, it was only i.n the early :980~ thaHhe crop was Included in biotechnology research to enhance yield and quality. Since then, however, while the research has thrown up break-throughs, problems have cropped up that could hinder the development of …
A REVOLUTION is taking place in medical immunology with the discovery of a method to produce monoclonal antibodies, which offer a powerful and less toxic treatment for diverse diseases, from cancer to rheumatoid arthritis, than most available drugs (British Medical Journal, Vol 340, Nos 6864-6). In the mid-1970s, a group …
BUCKYBALLS or fullerenes, a newly discovered form of carbon, have opened up a new field in carbon chemistry and new applications are coming to light in electronics and electrochemistry. Japanese scientists have recently made thin films of fullerene crystals that show the electrical behaviour of semi-conductors such as silicon. Other …
DISPOSING low-level radioactive waste from hospitals, pharmaceutical manufacturers and electric utilities will become more difficult and expensive in the US, with the collapse of a waste-disposal system functioning under a 12-year-old law. Now, the three states that have been operating radioactive waste dumps can refuse to accept waste generated outside …
THE CLINTON administration jumped into a contentious issue even before assuming office by announcing it would block a final-stage, testing permit for a hazardous waste incinerator in East Liverpool, Ohio. Vice-president Al Gore, casting his lot with a Greenpeace campaign to stop the US incinerator industry, said there are "serious …
HOW IMPORTANT is a chief executive's personality in the way a corporation works? Very, says Matthew Lynn in this book. In a game with billions at stake, it is a rare breed of people who have the vision and the nerve to stay the course and win. Roy Vagelos of …
US PRESIDENT-elect Bill Clinton's appointment of Carol Browner as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is a clear signal that the new US administration will move aggressively on environmental issues. Browner, 36, has excellent credentials for this key job, whose main challenge will be to settle the thorny issue …
CAR MANUFACTURERS in the US will begin offering "zero emission" vehicles by 1998. Overriding monopolistic concerns, the big three -- General Motors, Ford and Chrysler -- will cooperate closely in the development, design, testing and even possible manufacturing of the components of these electronic cars. While electric cars are still …
THE CAMPAIGN by astronomers to stop artificial light in cities from affecting stellar views, which prevents them studying stars, is gaining a wider audience. Relentless light from surrounding cities has shut down the largest telescope at Mount Wilson in Southern California. Scientists believe artificial lights should be shielded so that …
FINALLY, an AIDS vaccine that works -- on monkeys. Harvard University researchers in despair turned to the old-fashioned, but unsafe, method and injected four rhesus monkeys with a weakened, live form of SIV, the virus that causes AIDS in primates. The researchers reported that the vaccine immunised the monkeys with …
SCIENTISTS from the University of Michigan in the US have discovered that stony lumps of calcium carbonate, known as otoliths, found in the ears of most fishes, can offer clues to seasonal temperatures thousands or even millions of years ago (Science, Vol 258 No 5085). The finding has given a …
WHEN HARVARD researchers Bruce Yankner and Neil Kowall discovered in 1991 that amyloids -- small proteins -- injected into the brain of rats could destroy nerve cells in the same manner as observed in Alzheimer's patients, there was much excitement. Alzheimer's disease is the fourth largest killer in the developed …
