Contents
Vol 335, Issue 6071
Contents
This Week in Science
Editorial
Editors' Choice
Podcasts
- Science Podcast
The show includes restoring ecological "networks of networks," climate change and early horse evolution, the state of science in India, and more.
Products & Materials
- New Products
A weekly roundup of information on newly offered instrumentation, apparatus, and laboratory materials of potential interest to researchers.
News of the Week
- Around the World
In science news around the world this week, space researchers in Switzerland are seeking funding to build a spacecraft that would help reduce space debris in orbit around Earth, the Gates Foundation is funding agricultural impact monitoring in Africa, and journals have been warned not to publish diesel exhaust studies.
- Newsmakers
This week's Newsmaker is Susan Hockfield, the first woman and first biologist to run the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is stepping down as president after 7 years.
- Random Sample
This week, InnoCentive announced the winners of its latest Web-based challenge: to use smartphones to detect potholes. And a graph posted by the National Institutes of Health this month highlights the growing imbalance between the youngest and oldest researchers.
- AAAS Meeting
Highlights of the AAAS annual meeting, which attracted about 4500 attendees to Vancouver, Canada, from 16 to 20 February, include a major review of fracking and a reactor-free recipe for isotopes.
Findings
News & Analysis
- WHO Group: H5N1 Papers Should Be Published in Full
An international group of 22 influenza scientists, public health officials, and journal editors recommended last week that the details of how a highly pathogenic bird flu virus was rendered capable of being transmitted easily among mammals be published in full.
- Scientists Decry Cuts That Would Doom ExoMars Missions
The president's 2013 budget request eliminates funding for the 2016 Mars mission called Trace Gas Orbiter, which received $27 million this year, as part of a 20% cut to NASA's planetary science division.
- Bigger Contribution to ITER Erodes Domestic Fusion Program
To pay for the ITER fusion reactor, the United States may have to sacrifice the very community of researchers who would use the machine when it is ready.
- Advocates Win 'Exceptional' Boost for Alzheimer's Research
The 2013 budget proposed by President Barack Obama last week gives special attention to one disease: Alzheimer's, which will receive $80 million in new research funding from a source outside NIH's budget.
- Kansas Veterinary Biosecurity Lab Trampled in Spending Plan
A flagship government biodefense laboratory set to be built in Kansas is facing critical funding troubles—in part because of fierce opposition from cattle ranchers the facility is supposed to help.
News Focus
- India Rising
India excels in rocketry and nuclear science but has produced few breakthroughs in other fields. Now, free of sanctions and swimming in cash, the world's largest democracy is gunning for status as a scientific powerhouse.
- Ad Astra, With a 'Uniquely Indian Flavor'
India's space program has a bold agenda this year: It aims to launch five rockets and four satellites, all built at home.
- India's Scholar-Prime Minister Aims for Inclusive Development
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh plans to increase the government's R&D spending and create incentives for the private sector to increase spending on science and technology as well.
- Crowd-Sourcing Drug Discovery
The Open Source Drug Discovery network's army of volunteers is building a kind of Wikipedia on tuberculosis, which is the leading cause of death in India for those in the prime of life.
- Drawing a Bead on India's Enigmatic Monsoon
This year, India's Ministry of Earth Sciences is launching a 5-year, $75 million "monsoon mission" to improve the study of complex ocean-atmosphere interactions.
Letters
Books et al.
- The Many Lives of Whales
Exploring the course and consequences of cetacean research through the 20th century, Burnett charts the interplay of science, conservation, and politics that substantially remade relationships between humans and whales.
- Grand Master of Reconstruction
Milner offers a beautifully illustrated survey of the life and work of the celebrated paleoartist Charles R. Knight.
- Books Received
A listing of books received at Science during the week ending 17 February 2012.
Essays on Science and Society
- A Season for Inquiry: Investigating Phenology in Local Campus Trees
Campus Trees, the IBI Prize–winning module, uses local phenology to create authentic inquiry experiences in undergraduate biology.
Policy Forum
- Preserving Montreal Protocol Climate Benefits by Limiting HFCs
With no impending global controls on HFCs, the Montreal Protocol offers a near-term path to preserve its climate benefits.
Perspectives
- Some Like It Hot
A study of horse evolution illustrates the connection between environmental temperature and mammal body size.
- Frictional Dissipation—Blame It on the Rain
Satellite observations reveal the extent to which rainfall removes kinetic energy from the atmosphere, and thus its impact on circulation.
- Cell Death by Glutamine Repeats?
A glutamine-rich protein plays a role in developmentally regulated cell death in C. elegans.
- How a Neurotoxin Survives
Botulinum neurotoxin must form a complex with a structurally similar protein to survive in the gastrointestinal tract.
- Solving Amorphous Structures—Two Pairs Beat One
Consideration of atomic ordering beyond just pairs of atoms shows that amorphous silicon is better modeled as paracrystalline material than as a disordered network.
- Mendelian Puzzles
Variations that lie outside of the coding region of a mutated gene can give rise to a range of clinical phenotypes for a Mendelian genetic disorder.
Association Affairs
Review
Brevia
- Extremely Long-Lived Nuclear Pore Proteins in the Rat Brain
Individual components of rat brain nuclear pores can be almost as old as the animal itself.
Research Article
- Evolution of Shape by Multiple Regulatory Changes to a Growth Gene
The comparison of two closely related parasitoid wasps reveals the genetic bases for differences in size and shape of male Nasonia wings.
Reports
- Field-Effect Tunneling Transistor Based on Vertical Graphene Heterostructures
Boron nitride or molybdenum disulfide layers sandwiched between graphene sheets act as tunneling barriers to minimize device leakage currents.
- The Local Structure of Amorphous Silicon
Amorphous silicon is more accurately described by a paracrystalline model, not the idealized continuous random network.
- Satellite Estimates of Precipitation-Induced Dissipation in the Atmosphere
Falling precipitation rivals turbulence in dissipating atmospheric energy.
- Collapse of Classic Maya Civilization Related to Modest Reduction in Precipitation
The fall of Maya civilization occurred over two centuries when droughts reduced precipitation by up to 40 percent annually.
- Evolution of the Earliest Horses Driven by Climate Change in the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum
Oxygen isotope measurements of fossil teeth show that the body size of the horse Sifrhippus decreased as temperature increased.
- One-Time Transfers of Cash or Capital Have Long-Lasting Effects on Microenterprises in Sri Lanka
Small businesses run by the urban poor enjoy greater profits and longevity 5 years after receiving a helping hand.
- Evolutionarily Assembled cis-Regulatory Module at a Human Ciliopathy Locus
Mutation in either of a pair of neighboring, coordinately expressed genes causes indistinguishable human disease.
- Control of Nonapoptotic Developmental Cell Death in Caenorhabditis elegans by a Polyglutamine-Repeat Protein
A nematode protein containing runs of the amino acid glutamine, like some linked to neurodegeneration, causes cell death.
- The Robustness and Restoration of a Network of Ecological Networks
Analysis of seven interconnected networks on a farm reveals that they vary in their fragility, but that they do not covary.
- Botulinum Neurotoxin Is Shielded by NTNHA in an Interlocked Complex
Structural and biochemical studies show how a bacterial toxin protects itself against digestion in the gut.
- Single-Molecule Fluorescence Experiments Determine Protein Folding Transition Path Times
Quickly and slowly folding proteins take the same time to cross the barrier from the unfolded to the folded state.
- The Alarmin Interleukin-33 Drives Protective Antiviral CD8+ T Cell Responses
A danger signal released from dying cells is required for antiviral immunity in mice.
- The Cellular Basis of GABAB-Mediated Interhemispheric Inhibition
Coordinating the right and left sides of the brain is mediated by the inhibition of activation in neuronal dendrites.
Technical Comments
From the AAAS Office of Publishing and Member Services
