Category: Nanotechnology

from the not-quite dept.
ChrisHibbert writes "There was a recent scientific announcement closely enough related to the Foresight Idea Futures claim Germ15 that the organizers of the market called in an expert to determine whether the claim should be judged true at this point. The claim simply says:

      By 2015, the NY Times will report the live birth of a
      germline-modified human, who lived more than one year
      after. (This birth can happen anywhere in the world.)"

Read more for the results . . .

from the good-news,-bad-news dept.
Two recent items indicate some of the effects the Internet is having on scientific research:
A study by University of Michigan researcher Stephanie Teasley describes the use of technology that allows distributed collaboration via a "collaboratory" — a virtual center where people in different locations work together as easily as if they were all in the same place — is gaining appeal in science and education, as well as business and industry. Teasley and her co-workers report on some of the benefits and opportunities collaboratories offer, as well as the stumbling blocks associated with a distributed problem solving environment, in the 29 June 2001 issue of Science. An article in the New York Times ("Inside the Virtual Laboratory, Ideas Percolate Faster Than Rivalries", by I. Austen, 5 July 2001) provides additional coverage.
Another item in the the NY Times ("The Web as Dictator of Scientific Fashion", by J. Glanz, 19 June 2001) indicates the Web and cheap satellite communications may be fostering a sort of "pack science." The article notes that "instead of fostering many independent approaches to cracking problems, the Web, by offering scientists a place to post their new results immediately, can create a global bandwagon in which once-isolated scientists rush to become part of the latest trend . . . In the resulting stampede, all but a few promising avenues are quickly abandoned.î

Note: Access to the NYT website is free, but may require registration.

Researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas have shown that genes near human telomeres can be silenced, or turned off. This discovery may help explain how and why humans age. Telomeres are repeating sequences of DNA located at the end of each chromosome and are believed to function as a counting mechanism for cellular aging. The cell biology researchers report in the 15 June 2001 issue of Science that human cells can exhibit telomere position effect (TPE), in which genes near telomeres can be turned off, and that the strength of gene silencing is proportional to the length of nearby telomeres.

from the nanoengineering dept.
As a preview of its upcoming conference sessions on nanotechnology, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) ran an interview with Oak Ridge National Lab researcher Michael Simpson in a recent issue of ASME News.

Nanotechnology will be the focal point of one of the many technical tracks that will be featured during ASME's 2001 Congress and Exhibition in November. Nanotechnology will also be the subject of several tutorials to be given during the conference.

The nanotechnology track will start 12 November with a keynote panel discussing their work in the field. One of the panelists will be Simpson, who is the founder and principal investigator of the Molecular-Scale Electronics and Nanoscale Technologies Group at Oak Ridge National Lab. Simpson's group has been active in the controlled synthesis and directed assembly of carbon nanofibers into devices and systems.

from the hold-everything dept.
Researchers at Seattle's Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center have developed a method to induce a state of so-called suspended animation in the zebrafish, a relatively new model of vertebrate developmental biology. Their work is reported in the 12 June 2001 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Early Edition No. 24). The abstract is available without a subscription.

The researchers discovered that after 24 hours of oxygen deprivation — resulting in cessation of all observable metabolic activity, including heartbeat — zebrafish embryos can resume a normal course of development with no harmful effects on their health or growth. "Understanding the mechanisms that control biological quiescence could have dramatic implications for medical care, as it could give us an ability to control life processes at the most basic, fundamental level," said Mark Roth, Ph.D., a member of the Hutchinson Center's Basic Sciences Division and one of the principal researchers.

from the itís-the-little-things dept.
An article in Science News ("Molecular Chemistry Takes a New Twist", by J. Gorman, 2 June 2001) describes new calculations by a research team at Rutgers University that seem to show that a basic tenet of chemistry is wrong: Ethane forms its most stable structure not due to so-called steric effects, but because of a quantum mechanical influence. This research is important because chemists have long attributed many of the structural properties of organic molecules to steric effects. As the article concludes, "Researchers can no longer assume that steric effects play the major role in determining stable forms . . . They should give more attention to quantum mechanical effects when studying biological molecules and processes such as protein folding."

from the it's-about-time dept.
SteveLenhert at nanotech.about.com writes "Encyclopedia Nanotech is an attempt to minimize confusion resulting from interdisciplinary terminology. Recently I redefined assembler the way I understand the concept and introduced two specific types of assemblers – self-assembler and directed assembler. I'm also trying to clarify the concepts of self-replication and self-assembly. I welcome any suggested definitions of words relating to nanotechnology – in particular, the word nanotechnology itself!"

from the computing-with-microbes dept.
Patrick Underwood writes "A short New Scientist article describes the work of Michael Simpson, Gary Sayler and James Fleming of Oak Ridge, who have modified _Pseudomonas putida_ bacteria cells to produce AND and OR gates. Online at http://www.newscientist.com/dailynews/news.jsp?id=ns9999778"

from the sorting-things-out dept.
alison writes "A recent posting on the Advanced Light Source website describes how UCSF researchers have figured out the structure and mechanism of selective cell membrane channels in E. coli. The channel in question, called GlpF, admits glycerol and water into cells, but not ions. This research has important implications not only for our understanding of how cells regulate their chemical environment, but also for stimulating new ideas about manipulation and selection of molecules for molecular assembly projects."

from the gene-blues dept.
In an extensive article in The New Republic ("Preventing a Brave New World", May 2001), Leon R. Kass considers some of the moral, ethical, philosophical and legal issues surrounding the possibility of human cloning, and argues that it should be banned. "Human nature itself lies on the operating table," Kass asserts, ìready for alteration, for eugenic and psychic 'enhancement,' for wholesale re-design . . . evangelists are zealously prophesying a post-human future."

Kass, a professor at the University of Chicago and co-author of a book on the ethics of cloning, appears to assume that a "post-human future" implies a future without humans (or at least, human values — as he defines them) when he writes, "No friend of humanity cheers for a post-human future." A ban on human cloning, Kass concludes, is necessary because "Now may be as good a chance as we will ever have to get our hands on the wheel of the runaway train now headed for a post-human world and to steer it toward a more dignified human future."

While focused on human cloning and biological procreation, the article provides a possible insight into how some segments of society may react to the development of non-biological enhancements to human beings, as well as entities with artificial intelligence.