Complexity Digest 2004.37

13-Sep-2004

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Content

  1. How Life Began on Earth: A Status Report, Earth and Planetary Science Letters
    1. Redrafting the Tree of Life, Science
    2. Evolutionary Biology: Early Evolution Comes Full Circle, Nature
  2. Diminishing Returns In Social Evolution: The Not-So-Tragic Commons, J. Evol. Biol.
    1. National Cultural Values And The Evolution Of Process In International Strategic Alliances, J. Appl. Behav. Sc.
  3. China Increases Share Of Global Scientific Publications, Nature
    1. Medical Journals Tackle Biased Reporting Of Results, Nature
    2. How The Globalization Of R&D Competition Affects Trade And Growth, Japanese Econ. Rev.
  4. Decision Station: Situating Decision Support Systems, Decision Support Systems
    1. Metadata? Thesauri? Taxonomies? Topic Maps! Making Sense Of It All, J. Info. Sc.
  5. Epistemic Communities: Description and Hierarchic Categorization, arXiv
    1. Study Finds Stature Not A Factor In Ability To Make Friends, Associated Press
  6. Dreamless Woman Remains Healthy, Nature
    1. Brain Scans Show Hypnosis At Work, Nature
    2. Disruption Of Protein-folding Causes Neurodegeneration, Mental Retardation, ScienceDaily
  7. Open-Federer's 'Beautiful Tennis' Sets The Standard, Reuters
  8. Only Pride Hurt As Predicted Quake Fails To Strike California, Nature
  9. Palaeoclimate: Into An Ice Age, Nature
    1. Scientist: Extreme Weather Will Kill Millions, Reuters
    2. Groups Work on Schemes to Stop Hurricanes, Associated Press
    3. Letters: Stopping a Hurricane Before it Strikes, NPR TOTN
  10. Lightning Research: The Bolt Catcher, Nature
  11. Visualizing the Dynamics of the Onset of Turbulence, Science
    1. Tackling Tubular Turbulence, Science Now
    2. Experimental Observation of Nonlinear Traveling Waves in Turbulent Pipe Flow, Science
  12. Natural Proportions, Nature
    1. Cell Biology: An Unexpected Social Servant, Nature
  13. Palaeontology: Parental Care In An Ornithischian Dinosaur, Nature
    1. Parrots Speak In Tongues, Nature
  14. A New Treaty Strives To Save 10,000 Years Of Plant Breeding, Science News
    1. Noah's Ark Plan From Top Moon Man, BBC News
  15. Do Genes Respond To Global Warming?, ScienceDaily
    1. Local Co-Adaptation Leading To A Geographical Mosaic Of Coevolution In A Social Parasite System, J. Evol. Biol.
  16. Condensed-Matter Physics: The Qubit And The Cavity, Nature
  17. Peer-Reviewed Paper Defends Theory Of Intelligent Design, Nature
  18. The Dynamics Of The Partisan Gender Gap, Ameri. Poli. Sc. Rev.
  19. Complex Challenges: Global Terroist Networks
    1. Nuclear Terrorism: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe, Times Boods
    2. Atomic Activity in North Korea Raises Concerns, NY Times
    3. Graham: Bush Covered Up Saudi Ties to Sept. 11, NPR ME
    4. Hiding Genome Data Won't Protect Us, Experts Say, Reuters
  20. Links & Snippets
    1. Other Publications
    2. Webcast Announcements
    3. Conference & Call for Papers Announcements

  1. How Life Began on Earth: A Status Report, Earth and Planetary Science Letters Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpts: There are two fundamental requirements for life as we know it, liquid water and organic polymers, such as nucleic acids and proteins. Water provides the medium for chemical reactions and the polymers carry out the central biological functions of replication and catalysis. (...) If the basic components water and organic polymers were, or are, present on other bodies in our solar system and beyond, it is reasonable to assume that a similar series of steps that gave rise of life on Earth could occur elsewhere.

    1. Redrafting the Tree of Life, Science Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt:
      Ancient origins. Yeast and other eukaryotes evolved from a mix of early microbial genomes.
      Credit: Cdc/Libero Ajello
      For more than a century, the "tree of life" has been the most popular metaphor for depicting evolutionary ties among Earth's flora, fauna, and microbes. But in the mid-1990s, new gene data about microbes threw some of the lowest branches into disarray. Now, some biologists are suggesting a new way to sketch it: Evidence of extensive gene switching between bacteria, microbes called archaea, and the first microbes with a nucleus--the eukaryotes--means that the lowest branches should be drawn as a ring with different groups of organisms spinning off over time.

    2. Evolutionary Biology: Early Evolution Comes Full Circle, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Biologists use phylogenetic trees to depict the history of life. But according to a new and roundabout view, such trees are not the best way to summarize life's deepest evolutionary relationships. (...)

      Unknown to Darwin, microbes use two mechanisms of natural variation that disobey the rules of tree-like evolution: lateral gene transfer and endosymbiosis. Lateral gene transfer involves the passage of genes among distantly related groups, causing branches in the tree of life to exchange bits of their fabric. Endosymbiosis - one cell living within another - (...).

  2. Diminishing Returns In Social Evolution: The Not-So-Tragic Commons, J. Evol. Biol. Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpts: A challenge for evolutionary theory is to understand how cooperation can occur in the presence of competition and cheating, a problem known as the tragedy of commons. Here I examine how varying the fitness returns from reproductive competition or cooperation affects the negative impact of competition on a social group. (...) I show that diminishing returns are common in many systems, including social vertebrates, microbes, social insects and mutualisms among species. This suggests that the tragedy of the commons is not so tragic and that the disruptive effects of competition upon social life will often be minor.

    1. National Cultural Values And The Evolution Of Process In International Strategic Alliances, J. Appl. Behav. Sc. Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpts: The article assesses the role played by national cultural values in shaping the evolution of international strategic alliances. The authors build on a systems dynamic model of alliance evolution in which the developmental path of an alliance depends on how the partners manage process and outcome discrepancies that may emerge during the course of an alliance. They argue that national culture affects alliance evolution by influencing partners' sensitivity to discrepancy detection, shaping the nature of attributions they make, and by affecting the partners' reactions to discrepancies. They focus on differences in three value orientations among cultures. (...)

  3. China Increases Share Of Global Scientific Publications, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: China's scientific growth is keeping up with its meteoric economic rise, (...). But the growth seems to vary widely between fields and the quality of the work may be lagging in some of them.

    Between 1981 and 2003, China clocked a 20-fold increase in its publications in international scientific journals (...).

    Although China publishes only half as many papers as Japan, it is pulling away from other nations in the region, such as South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore. China now accounts for over 5% of the world's scientific publications.

    1. Medical Journals Tackle Biased Reporting Of Results, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Editors of the world's leading medical journals said yesterday that drug companies should disclose more information about studies of new medicines.

      The editors' statement was released on 8 September, the day before a highly anticipated public hearing on clinical trial data at the US Congress. (...) concerns that publications about antidepressant drugs have underestimated the medicines' risks to children.

      The journal editors say that they will now require companies to register a clinical trial in a public database before it starts if they hope to publish its final results.

    2. How The Globalization Of R&D Competition Affects Trade And Growth, Japanese Econ. Rev. Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Abstract: The implications of international R&D competition on trade and growth are investigated. The model is one in which a separate R&D sector competes with the manufacturing sector to secure human capital, and technology is licensed to manufacturers by the winner of a pre-emptive R&D competition. The results show that globalization of R&D competition leads to trade between countries (even identical countries), because the result of competition leads to a reallocation of human capital between sectors. The winning country exports technology and traditional goods, while the loser exports manufactured goods. Globalization with indiscriminate technology licensing increases the world's economic growth rate.

  4. Decision Station: Situating Decision Support Systems, Decision Support Systems Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Abstract: Internet facilitates access to data, information, and knowledge sources, but at the same time, it threatens to cognitively overload the decision makers. This necessitates the development of effective decision support tools to properly inform the decision process. Internet technologies require new type of decision support that provides tighter integration and higher degree of direct interaction with the problem domain. The central argument of this work is that in dynamic and highly complex electronic environments decision support systems (DSSs) should be situated in the problem domain. A generic architecture, the set of capabilities for our vision of a situated DSS is proposed, and the architecture is illustrated with a DSS for investment management.

    1. Metadata? Thesauri? Taxonomies? Topic Maps! Making Sense Of It All, J. Info. Sc. Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpts: (...) Information architecture is the discipline dealing with the modern version of this problem: how to organize web sites so that users can actually find what they are looking for. (...) raises the question of how topic maps compare with the traditional solutions, and that is the question this paper attempts to address. The paper argues that topic maps go beyond the traditional solutions in the sense that they provide a framework within which they can be represented as they are, but also extended in ways which significantly improve information retrieval.

  5. Epistemic Communities: Description and Hierarchic Categorization, arXiv Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpts: Social scientists have shown an increasing interest in understanding the structure of knowledge communities, and particularly the organization of "epistemic communities", that is groups of agents sharing common knowledge concerns. (...) we introduce a formal framework (...) and propose a method (...) for categorizing epistemic communities in an automated and hierarchically structured fashion. Suggesting that our process allows us to rebuild a whole community structure and taxonomy, and notably fields and subfields gathering a certain proportion of agents, we eventually apply it to empirical data to exhibit these alleged structural properties, and successfully compare our results with categories spontaneously given by domain experts.

    1. Study Finds Stature Not A Factor In Ability To Make Friends, Associated Press Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Being short -- or tall, for that matter -- doesn't appear to have a bearing on a child's popularity. (...)

      In the study published in the journal Pediatrics, researchers found that height plays no role in the number of friendships very short or very tall children have or their adjustment in life.

      The study results could add to the controversy over the treatment of healthy short children with human growth hormone to make them taller.

  6. Dreamless Woman Remains Healthy, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: The patient reported no dreams even when woken in the midst of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, which is normally associated with dreaming. But to the researchers' surprise, her sleep pattern was perfectly normal.

    This shows that REM sleep and dreaming do not always go hand in hand, says Bassetti. The occipital lobe, which was damaged by the woman's stroke, is likely to play an important role in dreaming. But different neural areas, such as the brain stem and midbrain, are thought to control REM sleep.

    1. Brain Scans Show Hypnosis At Work, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Those who are easily hypnotized show different activity in a brain region called the anterior cingulate gyrus, which is involved in planning our future actions, (...). In a hypnotic trance, the function of this region may be impaired, he says, meaning that subjects are more likely to follow a hypnotist's suggestion (...).

      But in hypnotized volunteers, the anterior cingulate, and the regions that govern it, were more strongly activated when they were in a trance, showing that they were struggling harder to plot their actions, (...).

    2. Disruption Of Protein-folding Causes Neurodegeneration, Mental Retardation, ScienceDaily Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpts: Excess accumulation in brain cells of a fat molecule called GM1-ganglioside (GM1) disrupts the folding of newly assembled proteins into their proper shapes, triggering nerve degeneration and mental retardation in children. (...) The disease, called GM1 gangliosidosis, disrupts the normal function of brain cells and causes them to self-destruct. (...) GM1 gangliosidosis is a lysosomal storage disorders, an inherited disease in which one or more enzymes in the lysosomes are defective. Lysosomes are the cell's recycling centers, where proteins, fats and other molecules are broken down into their basic building blocks, which are then reused to make new molecules. (...)

  7. Open-Federer's 'Beautiful Tennis' Sets The Standard, Reuters Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpts: Federer's fourth grand slam title, courtesy of his 6-0 7-6 6-0 destruction of Lleyton Hewitt, was a victory for artistry over brute strength, for subtle angles and spins over the bludgeoning groundstrokes that dominate the modern game.

    (...) "But I do feel that I play beautiful tennis, when my movement and my technique come together I feel totally in balance on the court. (...)

    "When he's playing like this you would need Agassi's returns, my volley, Hewitt's speed and Roddick's serve, then you might have a chance," he said.
    Editor's Note: This is an example in motor coordination that illustrates the multiple dimensions of behavior that contribute critically to performance outcome.

    It seems like a positive alternative to the "Winning ugly" approach of Agassi's former coach Brad Gilbert.

  8. Only Pride Hurt As Predicted Quake Fails To Strike California, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: Recently he predicted that an earthquake of magnitude 6.4 or greater would hit somewhere in 32,000 square kilometres of southern California (see map). The United States Geological Survey and the California Earthquake Prediction Evaluation Council said the method "appears to be a legitimate approach". But they took no action; (...).

    Keilis-Borok looks for patterns in the smaller earthquakes that precede large ones. He uses a similar method to analyse other systems such as crime waves and elections; his numbers predict that George W. Bush will win in November.

  9. Palaeoclimate: Into An Ice Age, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: Analyses of a new ice core from Greenland yield the first high-resolution picture of the start of the last ice age in the Northern Hemisphere, and of the onset of climate instability as our planet cooled.

    The relatively warm and stable climate that humanity has enjoyed for the past 10,000 years will inevitably give way to a new ice age - a tremendous environmental transformation that is destined to bury the sites of Boston, Edinburgh and Stockholm under glacial ice.

    1. Scientist: Extreme Weather Will Kill Millions, Reuters Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Millions of people across the globe are set to die early due to extreme weather events such as floods and heat waves caused by climate change, a British scientist said Tuesday.

      Professor Mike Pilling cited the heatwave in Europe last year that killed thousands of people from a combination of heat exhaustion and an increase in atmospheric pollution.

      "We will experience an increase in extreme weather events," (...). "There are predictions of a 10-fold increase in heat waves.

    2. Groups Work on Schemes to Stop Hurricanes, Associated Press Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Amateur hurricane-busters have come up with any number of crackpot ideas to spare Florida from ferocious storms. Among them: blowing hurricanes away with giant fans or blowing them up with nuclear warheads.

      Even the federal government got into the act, with three decades of ill-fated research called "Project Stormfury" before shelving the idea of weather modification in the 1980s.

      But dozens of ideas - (...) - continue to crop up among weather wonks, Internet bloggers and others who think they have come up with a way to spare coastal residents the misery of hurricanes.
      Editor's Note: Since hurricanes are clearly self-organized structures far from equilibrium they pose a challenge to spatio-temporal control of complex systems.One would have to exploit local instabilities to take advantage of the "butterfly effect" of chaos theory.

    3. Letters: Stopping a Hurricane Before it Strikes, NPR TOTN Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpts: NPR's Neal Conan reads e-mail from listeners and meteorologist Frank Marks addresses the question: Can anything be done to stop a hurricane before it hits land?

  10. Lightning Research: The Bolt Catcher, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: But in summer 2003, the group's last rocket-triggered bolt of the season revealed something even more incredible than the X-ray emissions. An unusually strong current pulse arrived at the detector before the lightning was fully under way. Such spikes happen occasionally, but are not well understood.

    During this early spike, the instruments recorded hundreds of gamma-rays 10 to 300 times more powerful than the X-rays they had been observing. The team believes that these rays originated several kilometres above the ground, (...).

  11. Visualizing the Dynamics of the Onset of Turbulence, Science Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: The transition to turbulence in fluid flow is an everyday experience. As a faucet is slowly opened, the initially laminar flow of water changes into an irregular chaotic flow. As a result, friction is much increased and, for the same discharge, a higher pressure head must be applied than in the laminar case. This transition is of fundamental importance in engineering problems dealing with fluid flows. On page 1594 in this issue, Hof et al. (1) present the first observation of a basic dynamical property of the transition.

    1. Tackling Tubular Turbulence, Science Now Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt:
      Streaking. The observation of streaky swirling waves bolsters a theory of turbulence in pipes.
      CREDIT: C.W.H. van Doorne

      (...) scientists have puzzled over how the smooth flow of a liquid through a pipe suddenly erupts into a chaotic tangle of eddies and swirl (...).

      Researchers know how turbulence develops in a few special cases. For example, the flow of fluid trapped between two concentric cylinders grows more complicated in well ordered steps as the outer cylinder rotates about the inner one faster and faster. But they've struggled to explain turbulence in a simple pipe, in which all hell breaks loose as soon as the speed passes a critical value.

    2. Experimental Observation of Nonlinear Traveling Waves in Turbulent Pipe Flow, Science Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Transition to turbulence in pipe flow is one of the most fundamental and longest-standing problems in fluid dynamics. Stability theory suggests that the flow remains laminar for all flow rates, but in practice pipe flow becomes turbulent even at moderate speeds. This transition drastically affects the transport efficiency of mass, momentum, and heat. On the basis of the recent discovery of unstable traveling waves in computational studies of the Navier-Stokes equations and ideas from dynamical systems theory, a model for the transition process has been suggested.

  12. Natural Proportions, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: Redfield ratios: the uniformity of elemental ratios in the oceans and the life they contain underpins our understanding of marine biogeochemistry. An interesting empirical observation in biology is the relationship between the elemental composition of organisms and ecosystems. All organisms are composed primarily of a mixture of six major elements: hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulphur. But the proportion of these basic ingredients varies between organisms - and such variations can lead to interesting properties within ecosystems.
    • Source: Natural Proportions, Paul G. Falkowski, Cabell S. Davis, DOI: 10.1038/431131a, Nature 431, 131, 04/09/09

    1. Cell Biology: An Unexpected Social Servant, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Cells communicate through signals that must be propagated from cell surface to nucleus. Tracking the signals generated by the transforming growth factor beta- protein reveals a surprising partner (...).

      During the development and maintenance of multicellular organisms, cells spend a lot of time communicating with each other to ensure that they are behaving in an appropriate and harmonious manner. This 'social' behaviour is mediated by the production of various signals outside the cell. These are interpreted in responding cells by networks of signal-transduction proteins that regulate the appropriate cellular response.

  13. Palaeontology: Parental Care In An Ornithischian Dinosaur, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: A dramatic fossil may shed light on how modern archosaurs became devoted parents.

    Crocodilians and birds show extensive parental care of their young, but whether this behaviour evolved independently in these two groups of living archosaurs is unknown - in part because features of parenting among related fossil groups such as dinosaurs are unclear. A dramatic specimen (...)) from Liaoning in China reveals a single adult clustered with 34 juveniles within an area of 0.5 square metres, providing strong evidence for post-hatching parental care in Dinosauria.

    1. Parrots Speak In Tongues, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Ability to modify vowels underpins mimicry skillEver wondered what makes parrots so good at mimicking human speech? It turns out that the feathered impressionists use their tongues to create vowel-like sounds, (...).

      In human speech, noise is produced in the larynx and can then be modified by the movement of the tongue in the mouth. This helps us to make complex vowel and consonant sounds.

      Until now, many researchers thought that birds produced and modified their song in the avian equivalent of the larynx, the syrinx, and that the tongue played no role at all.

  14. A New Treaty Strives To Save 10,000 Years Of Plant Breeding, Science News Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: Crop diversity constitutes agriculture's "global wealth-the set of genes that have been developed by farmers over 10,000 years," explains Clive Stannard of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome.

    Unfortunately, the successes of large agribusiness companies are adding to the need for a strong seed-repository system and worldwide crop diversity.

    A small number of popular, high-yielding crop varieties bred by these companies have increasingly edged out landraces, the varieties adapted to localized conditions during millennia of farming.

    1. Noah's Ark Plan From Top Moon Man, BBC News Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt:
      Europe's first lunar probe is due to orbit the Moon in November
      The European Space Agency's chief scientist has said there should be a "Noah's Ark" on the Moon, in case life on Earth is wiped out by an asteroid or nuclear holocaust.

      Speaking exclusively to BBC News at the British Association Festival of Science, Dr Bernard Foing said the ark should be a repository for the DNA of every single species of plant and animal.

      Dr Foing is head of Europe's Moon missions, so his thoughts on matters lunar should be taken seriously.

  15. Do Genes Respond To Global Warming?, ScienceDaily Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpts: Scientists continue to argue the extent that human activities drive global warming, but few would argue that it exists. The International Panel on Climate Change predicts that greenhouse gases will increase global temperatures by 3.6 degrees F by 2100--a rise unprecedented over the past 10,000 years. While the effects of climate change on species' geographic range and population dynamics are increasingly understood, scientists know little about how species respond to climate change at the genetic level. (...) have analyzed three different dynamic processes--environmental change, population response, and gene diversity fluctuations--and report that climate change influences variation in genetic diversity. (...)

    1. Local Co-Adaptation Leading To A Geographical Mosaic Of Coevolution In A Social Parasite System, J. Evol. Biol. Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpts: The geographical mosaic theory of coevolution predicts differences in the advance or trajectory of the coevolutionary process between local communities due to their composition and the strength of ecological selection pressures through competition and resource availability. In this study, we investigate local co-adaptation in different populations of a social parasite. We conducted cross-fostering experiments to test for interpopulational differences in raiding efficiency between various populations of a slave-making ant and the defence abilities of local hosts. Here, we demonstrate that the success of raids strongly depends on the combination of populations of the parasite Harpagoxenus sublaevis and its host (...).

  16. Condensed-Matter Physics: The Qubit And The Cavity, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: Coherent coupling of superconducting qubits and electromagnetic modes, analogous to atom-photon coupling, has been demonstrated - a step towards the communication of quantum information. For some time, the efforts of the quantum-optics community have been dedicated to reaching the so-called strong-coupling regime of cavity quantum electrodynamics (QED). (...)

    Now Wallraff et al., inspired by quantum optical cavity QED, have coupled a Josephson qubit (the 'atom'), on a chip, to a harmonic-oscillator mode of a transmission line (the superconducting 'cavity').

  17. Peer-Reviewed Paper Defends Theory Of Intelligent Design, Nature Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpt: In the article, senior fellow Stephen Meyer uses information theory and other techniques to argue that the complexity of living organisms cannot be explained by darwinian evolution (...).

    Many of Meyer's arguments have already been aired by advocates of intelligent design, but critics say that publication will be used to back up claims that the theory is scientifically valid.

    Kenneth Miller, (...), who has argued against Meyer in public debates, does not doubt that this will happen. "They've tried very hard to get material into peer-reviewed journals."

  18. The Dynamics Of The Partisan Gender Gap, Ameri. Poli. Sc. Rev. Next Article Bookmark and Share

    Excerpts: Gender differences in vote choice, opinion, and party identification have become a common feature of the American political landscape. We examine the nature and causes of gender differences in partisanship using a time series approach. We show that gender differences are pervasive-existing outside of the context of specific elections or issues-and that they are a product of the interaction of societal conditions and politics. We find that from 1979 to 2000, the partisan gender gap has grown when the political climate moved in a conservative direction, the economy deteriorated, and the percentage of economically vulnerable, single women increased. (...)
    • Source: The Dynamics Of The Partisan Gender Gap, J. M. B.-Steffensmeier - jboxstef+aosu.edu, S. De Boef - sdeboefapsu.edu, T.-M. Lin - tmlamail.la.utexas.edu, DOI: 1017/S0003055404001315, American Political Science Review, Aug. 2004
    • Contributed by Pritha Das - prithadas01ayahoo.com

  19. Complex Challenges: Global Terroist Networks Next Article Bookmark and Share

    1. Nuclear Terrorism: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe, Times Boods Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: In NUCLEAR TERRORISM: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe, Graham Allison, founding dean of Harvard's modern John F. Kennedy School of Government, a former top Pentagon official, and one of America's leading scholars of nuclear strategy and national security, gives us an urgent call to action. He makes the case that nuclear terrorism is inevitable-if we continue on our present course-and he sets out an ambitious but achievable plan for preventing a catastrophic attack before it's too late.
      See Also: Nuclear Terrorism , NPR Science Friday, 04/09/10

    2. Atomic Activity in North Korea Raises Concerns, NY Times Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Officials said if North Korea proceeded with a test, it would probably be with a plutonium bomb, perhaps one fabricated from the 8,000 spent nuclear fuel rods that the North has boasted in the past few months have been reprocessed into bomb fuel.(...)

      Several officials speculated that the test, if it occurred, could be intended to influence the presidential election, though a senior military official said while "an election surprise" could be the motive, "I'm not sure what that would buy them."
      Editor's Note: A successful nuclear test certainly would increase the market value of their bombs for terrorists.

    3. Graham: Bush Covered Up Saudi Ties to Sept. 11, NPR ME Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: In his new book Intelligence Matters, Florida Democrat Sen. Bob Graham -- a former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee -- accuses the Bush administration of hiding evidence linking Saudi Arabia's government to the Sept. 11 hijackers. Graham speaks with NPR's Juan Williams.

    4. Hiding Genome Data Won't Protect Us, Experts Say, Reuters Next Article Bookmark and Share

      Excerpt: Making the genetic codes of dangerous pathogens a secret will not save anyone from bioterrorism and may make the population vulnerable to attacks from Mother Nature, (...).

      Scientists now freely share information on the genomes of all sorts of bacteria and viruses, many of them potential biowarfare agents, and that should continue. (...). "The current vitality of the life sciences depends on a free flow of data and ideas, which is necessary if science is to deliver new biodefense capabilities and improve our ability to fight infectious disease."
      Editor's Note: One might consider tracking who uses sensitive information to increase the chance of early detection of clandestine projects with potential terrorist goals.

  20. Links & Snippets Next Article Bookmark and Share

    1. Other Publications Next Article Bookmark and Share

      1. Immune Reaction To Poison Gas Brings Delayed Effects, Researchers have a new understanding of why some survivors of carbon monoxide poisoning later develop concentration problems, personality changes, or sensory impairments.
      2. North Pole Once Enjoyed Mediterranean Climate, Quirin Schiermeier, 04/09/07, Nature News
      3. New Batteries Aid Climate Battle, Paul Rincon, 04/09/08, BBC News Onlin, A new generation of rechargeable lithium batteries could reduce global warming, a leading expert says.
      4. Climate Impact on Plankton Ecosystems in the Northeast Atlantic, Anthony J. Richardson, David S. Schoeman, 04/09/10, Science : 1609-1612
      5. Quantum Chip Circuitry Demonstrated, R. Colin Johnson, 04/09/10, EE Times
      6. Flight of the Bumblebee, Ivars Peterson, 04/09/11, Science News. "Like the bumblebee, they said it could never fly."
      7. No Deep Breathing: Air pollution impedes lung development, 04/09/11, Science News, Spending one's childhood in a community with polluted air stalls lung development roughly as much as does having a mother who smokes.
      8. Cool Harvest: Frost On Sea Ice May Boost Atmosphere's Bromine, 04/09/11, Science News, Frost flowers, the delicate crystals that sometimes grow atop fresh sea ice, can be a substantial source of ozone-destroying bromine in lower atmosphere near the poles.
      9. Model Growth: Simulations Expose Branching Nature Of Polymer Crystals, 04/09/11, Science News, Using computer models, scientists have uncovered previously unknown facets of the physics underlying polymer crystal growth.
      10. An Exploitable Mutation: Defect Might Make Some Lung Cancers Treatable, 04/09/11, Science News, Nonsmokers who develop lung cancer are more likely than their smoking counterparts to have a mutation in the gene encoding epidermal growth factor receptor.
      11. Falling Into Place: Atom Mist Yields Nanobricks And Mortar, Peter Weiss, 04/09/11, Science News
      12. Super Bird: Cooing Doves Flex Extra-Fast Muscles, 04/09/11, Science News, Muscles that control a dove's cooing belong to the fastest class of muscles known.
      13. Compost Reduces Landfill Gas, 04/09/11, Science News, Field tests suggest that covering solid waste with compost instead of conventional soil could reduce methane-gas emissions from landfills.
      14. Gold Quantum Dots, 04/09/11, Science News, Scientists have created a new type of quantum dot that could find applications in everything from biological imaging to computer displays.
      15. Meteorites May Have Delivered Phosphorus, 04/09/11, Science News, Meteorites may have supplied enough phosphorus to prebiotic Earth to spawn the first signs of life.
      16. Step Toward Universal Computing , Leander Kahney, 04/09/13, Wired
      17. A Constructive Approach to Gene Expression Dynamics, T. Ochiai, J.C. Nacher, T. Akutsu, 2004/08/12, Physics Letters A, Article in Press, Corrected Proof, DOI: 10.1016/j.physleta.2004.07.045
      18. That Picture In Your Wallet May Relieve Stress, E. Southern - emma.southernabbsrc.ac.uk, 2004/09/06, Alphagalileo & Babraham Institute
      19. Will Open Access Close The Door On Ecological Publishing?, B. Allen, beckyallen@ntlworld.com, 2004/09/06, Alphagalileo & British Ecological Society
      20. Extreme Stretch-growth Of Axons: Pushing Neurons' Physiological Limits Provides Researchers With New Ways To Repair Nerve Damage, 2004/09/08, ScienceDaily & University Of Pennsylvania Medical Center
      21. Robots Can Learn From Their Mistakes, O. Pettersson - ola.b.petterssonase.abb.com, 2004/09/10, Alphagalileo & Oerebro University
      22. The Social Model Of Disability: A Philosophical Critique, L. Terzi, Aug. 2004, Journal of Applied Philosophy, DOI: 10.1111/j.0264-3758.2004.00269.x
      23. Why Equal Opportunity Is Not A Valuable Goal, S. Kershnar, Aug. 2004, Journal of Applied Philosophy, DOI: 10.1111/j.0264-3758.2004.00270.x
      24. Wage Inequality And Urban Density, C. H. Wheeler - cwheeleatulane.edu, Aug. 2004, Journal of Economic Geography, DOI: 10.1093/jnlecg/lbh033
      25. Zipf's Law Strikes Again: The Case Of Tourism, M. A. Ulubaolu - maulubasadeakin.edu.au, B. R. Hazari - hazariadeakin.edu.au, Jun. 2004, Journal of Economic Geography, DOI: 10.1093/jnlecg/lbh030
      26. Buzz: Face-To-Face Contact And The Urban Economy, M. Storper - m.storperalse.ac.uk, A. J. Venables - a.j.venablesalse.ac.uk, Jun. 2004, Journal of Economic Geography, DOI: 10.1093/jnlecg/lbh027
      27. 9/11 In The Service Of Corporate Rhetoric: Southwest Airlines' 2001 Letter To Shareholders, J. H. Amernic, R. J. Craig, Oct. 2004, Journal of Communication Inquiry, DOI: 10.1177/0196859904267121
      28. Worker Reproduction And Policing In Insect Societies: An ESS Analysis, T. Wenseleers, H. Helanterä, A. Hart, F. L. W. Ratnieks, Sep. 2004, Journal of Evolutionary Biology, DOI: 10.1111/j.1420-9101.2004.00751.x
      29. Population Responses To Perturbations: Predictions And Responses From Laboratory Mite Populations, T. G. Benton, T. C. Cameron, A. Grant, Sep. 2004, Journal of Animal Ecology, DOI: 10.1111/j.0021-8790.2004.00859.x
      30. European Identities And The EU - The Ties That Bind The Peoples Of Europe, F. C. Mayer, J. Palmowski, Sep. 2004, Journal of Common Market Studies, DOI: 10.1111/j.0021-9886.2004.00519.x
      31. Policy Making In Deflationary Japan, K. Hamada, Sep. 2004, Japanese Economic Review, DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-5876.2004.00301.x

    2. Webcast Announcements Next Article Bookmark and Share

      1. The 4th Intl Workshop on Meta-synthesis and Complex System, Beijing, China, 04/07/22-23
      2. Intl Conf on Complex Networks: Structure, Function and Processes, Kolkata, India, 04/06/27-30
      3. From Autopoiesis to Neurophenomenology: A Tribute to Francisco Varela (1946-2001), Paris, France, 2004/06/18-20
      4. ECC8 Experimental Chaos Conference, Florence, Italy, 04/06/14-17
      5. Evolutionary Epistemology, Language, and Culture, Brussels, Belgium, 04/05/26-28
      6. International Conference on Complex Systems 2004, Boston, 04/05/16-21
      7. Life, a Nobel Story, Brussels, Belgium, 04/04/28
      8. Nonlinear Dynamics and Statistical Mechanics Days, Brussels, Belgium, 04/04/26-27
      9. Science Education Forum for Chinese Language Culture, Panel Discussion, Taipei, Taiwan, 04/05/01
      10. Biologically Inspired Approaches to Advanced Information Technology, , Lausanne,Switzerland, 04/01/29-30
      11. Nonlinear Dynamics And Chaos: Lab Demonstrations, Strogatz, Steven H., Internet-First University Press, 1994
      12. World Economic Forum 2004, Davos, Switzerland
      13. CODIS 2004, International Conference On Communications, Devices And Intelligent Systems, 2004 Calcutta, India, 04/01/09-10
      14. EVOLVABILITY & INTERACTION: Evolutionary Substrates of Communication, Signaling, and Perception in the Dynamics of Social Complexity, London, UK, 03/10/08-10
      15. The Semantic Web and Language Technology - Its Po tential and Practicalities, Bucharest, Romania, 03/07/28-08/08
      16. ECAL 2003, 7th European Conference on Artificial Life, Dortmund, Germany, 03/09/14-17
      17. New Santa Fe Institute President About His Vision for SFI's Future Role, (Video, Santa Fe, NM, 03/06/04)
      18. SPIE's 1st Intl Symp on Fluctuations and Noise, Santa Fe, NM, 2003/06/01-04
      19. NAS Sackler Colloquium on Mapping Knowledge Domains, Video/Audio Report, 03/05/11
      20. 13th Ann Intl Conf, Soc f Chaos Theory in Psych & Life Sciences, Boston, MA, USA, 2003/08/08-10
      21. CERN Webcast Service, Streamed videos of Archived Lectures and Live Events
      22. Dean LeBaron's Archive of Daily Video Commentary, Ongoing Since February 1998
      23. Edge Videos

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      1. Gabriele Leidloff, Ugly Casting 1.4 , Berlin, Germany, 04/08/19-10/08
      2. Dynamic Ontology, An Inquiry into Systems, Emergence, Levels of Reality, and Forms of Causality, Trento, Italy, 04/09/08-11
      3. 9th Intl Conf on the Simulation and Synthesis of Living Systems (ALIFE9), Boston, Massachusetts, 04/09/12-15
      4. Dynamics Days 2004, XXIV Annual Conf , Palma de Mallorca, Spain, 04/09/13-17
      5. II. Socrates Workshop on Chaotic Systems, Maribor, Slovenia, 04/09/13-17
      6. Inquiries, Indices and Incommensurabilities: Managing Emergence, Complexity and Organization, Washington, DC, 04/09/18-19
      7. Neuroeconomics 2004, Charleston, SC, 04/09/16-19
      8. New Economic Windows 2004: Complexity Hints for Economic Policy, Salerno, Italy, 04/09/16-18
      9. The Verhulst 200 on Chaos, Brussels, BELGIUM, 04/09/16-18
      10. The 8th Intl Conf on Parallel Problem Solving from Nature (PPSN VIII), Birmingham, UK, 04/09/18-22
      11. The Nonlinear Waves in Fluids: Recent Advances and Modern Applications, Udine, Italy, 04/09/18-22
      12. XVII Brazilian Symposium on Artificial Intelligence, Sao Luis, Maranhao - Brazil, 04/09/22-24
      13. 2nd Annual Emerging Technologies Conference at MIT, Cambridge, MA, 04/09/29-30
      14. 3rd Natll Conf on Systems Science , Trento (Italy), 04/10/07-09
      15. TEDMED Conference , Charleston SC, 04/10/12-15
      16. Intl Workshop On Bifurcations In Nonsmooth And Hybrid Dynamical Systems , Milano (Italy), 04/10/21-22
      17. Wolfram Technology Conference, Champaign, Illinois, 04/10/21-23
      18. 6th Intl Conf on Electronic Commerce ICEC'2004: Towards A New Services Landscape, Delft, The Netherlands, 04/10/25-27
      19. Complexity and Philosophy Workshop - 2-Day Conference , Rio de Janeiro, 04/11
      20. ICDM '04: The Fourth IEEE Intl Conf on Data Mining, Brighton, UK, 04/11/01-04
      21. Denaturing Darwin: International Conference on Evolution and Organization , Amersfoort, The Netherlands, 04/11/12-14
      22. The 7th Asia-Pacific Complex Systems Conference, Queensland, Australia, 04/12/06-10
      23. 17th Australian Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Queensland, Australia, 04/12/06-10
      24. Cellular Computing Symposium, U Warwick (UK), 04/12/09-10
      25. International Conference On Computational Intelligence (Icci 2004) , Istanbul, Turkey, 04/12/15-17
      26. Kondratieff Waves, Warfare And World Security, NATO Advanced Research Workshop , Covilh? Portugal, 05/02/14-17
      27. 5th Creativity And Cognition Conference, London.UK, 05/04/12-15
      28. Powders & Grains 2005, Stuttgart, Germany, 05/06/18-22
      29. Workshop on Complexity and Policy Analysis, Cork, Ireland, 05/06/22-24
      30. ECAL 2005 - VIIIth European Conference on Artificial Life, Canterbury, Kent, UK, 05/09/05-09
      31. Complexity, Science and Society Conf 2005, Liverpool, UK, 05/09/11-14
      32. 18th International Conference on Noise and Fluctuations (ICNF 2005), Salamanca, Spain, 05/09/19-23


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