Catálogo de publicaciones - revistas

<jats:p>With the National Science Foundation about to give the go-ahead for the Millimeter Array and several smaller projects under way, some astronomers fear that there won't be enough money to support research on these new instruments.</jats:p>

<jats:p>The world's most powerful telescope for investigating emissions in the millimeter-wavelength range—a rich source of information about early galaxies, star formation, the history of stellar evolution, and much more—will move from the drawing board to early development if Congress grants an upcoming budgetary wish from the National Science Foundation. And the proposed site for the Millimeter Array will take your breath away.</jats:p>

<jats:p> <jats:bold>CAMBRIDGE, U.K.</jats:bold> —The brave new world of searching biological databases via the World Wide Web is becoming increasingly balkanized. Differences in database structure and nomenclature hinder research, and efforts at standardization have met resistance. But researchers are optimistic that Web tools developed for other uses may come to the rescue. </jats:p>

<jats:p>This month, Switzerland's Paul Scherrer Institute formally inaugurates a $65 million neutron source that will help close one gap and bridge another. The first is the gap between supply and demand, as researchers clamor for access to neutron beams; the other is technological: how to produce sought-after “cold” neutrons on the cheap.</jats:p>

<jats:p>As chipmakers shrink features on computer chips to ever smaller dimensions, electrons begin to spill over the barriers meant to confine them. Now researchers are designing a new class of devices that overcomes this problem by manipulating electrons one at a time. These new devices could give rise to computers that are far more powerful—and less power-hungry—than today's computers.</jats:p>

<jats:p> <jats:bold>ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO</jats:bold> —Tube worms living hundreds of meters beneath the sea rely on symbiotic bacteria and energy provided by a toxic gas—hydrogen sulfide—to provide the food that nourishes. New studies reported at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology are now revealing the adaptations that help tube worms thrive in this demanding environment. Some extend rootlike tubes into the sea floor to help them take in hydrogen sulfide in areas where the gas is scarce, while others have transport mechanisms that help protect them from the gas's toxic effects in areas where it is plentiful. </jats:p>

<jats:p> <jats:bold>ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO</jats:bold> —Studies of the flight muscle of the dragonfly are helping physiologists understand what makes muscles strong. Results reported at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology suggest that during development the muscle switches from making one form of a protein called troponin T to another form that boosts the muscle's sensitivity to the contraction-triggering effects of calcium ions. </jats:p>

<jats:p> Compared to nature's chemical wizardry, human chemists are all thumbs. Inside plant cells, for instance, tiny chemical factories manage to crank out just one version of a chemical flawlessly, while most test-tube reactions yield messy mixtures of many isomers. But now researchers report on page <jats:related-article xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" ext-link-type="doi" page="362" related-article-type="in-this-issue" vol="275" xlink:href="10.1126/science.275.5298.362" xlink:type="simple">362</jats:related-article> that they have discovered what appears to be a whole new class of compounds, so-called “dirigent” proteins that seem to grab and maneuver chemical building blocks so they join in the proper orientation. The finding could be a boon for drug companies and the paper industry. </jats:p>

<jats:p> A quantum computer, tapping into the quantum weirdness of the microscopic world, could in theory collapse calculations that would take billions of years on mundane supercomputers into a few seconds. Experimentally, though, quantum computers have been daunting. Now two groups of researchers have come up with a way to realize at least some of that potential by applying nuclear magnetic resonance—a standard technique in medical imaging and chemical analysis—to a liquid as simple as coffee (see Research Article on <jats:related-article xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" ext-link-type="doi" page="350" related-article-type="in-this-issue" vol="275" xlink:href="10.1126/science.275.5298.350" xlink:type="simple">p. 350</jats:related-article> ). By flipping, coupling, and reading out the spins of individual nuclei in the coffee, the strategy can turn it into a quantum logic gate and even a quantum integrated circuit. </jats:p>