ScienceWeek Update - May 22, 2000
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Table of Contents of the Current Issue of SCIENCEWEEK
May 19, 2000 -- Vol. 4 Number 20
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In physics, instead of saying, I have explained
such and such a phenomenon, one might say, I have
determined causes for it the absurdity of which
cannot be conclusively proved.
-- Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742-1799)
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Contents of This Issue:
1. History of Science:
The Puzzle of the Bohr-Heisenberg Copenhagen Meeting
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In 1941, during the German occupation of Europe, Werner
Heisenberg traveled to Denmark to meet with Niels Bohr. What was
said at that meeting has been debated for half a century and is
now the focus of a new London and New York play, and also the
focus of new attention by physicists and the media.
(Includes related background material.)
2. Earth Science:
On the Origins of the Great Ice Ages
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The periodicities of the great Pleistocene ice ages have long
been considered to be related to the periodicities of certain
changes in the orbit of Earth around the Sun. Now new evidence
more accurately dating the next to the last great ice age
suggests that a rethinking of current models of the origin of ice
ages may be required. (Includes related background material.)
3. Physiology:
On Biological Clocks
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Within individual cells of the suprachiasmatic nucleus of the
mammalian brain, specialized clock genes are switched on and off
by the proteins they encode in a feedback loop that has a 24-hour
rhythm. (Includes related background material.)
4. Zoology:
Emerging Infectious Diseases of Wildlife
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Many wildlife species are reservoirs of pathogens that threaten
domestic animal and human health, and emerging infectious
diseases of wildlife pose a substantial threat to the
conservation of global diversity.
5. Medical Biology:
A Revival of Electroshock Therapy
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Although in disfavor for several decades, electroconvulsive
therapy is currently applied to approximately 100,000 patients
each year in the US, and many more worldwide, and there is
apparently a renewed interest in the procedure as a treatment for
certain types of mental dysfunction.
6. Public Health:
Prevention of Mother-to-Child HIV Transmission
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Recent clinical trial results from international settings suggest
that short-course antiretroviral drug therapy regimens could
significantly reduce perinatal HIV transmission worldwide if
research results could be translated into practice.
(Includes related background material.)
In Focus: On Evolutionary Theory and the Social Sciences
72K ASCII text
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