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Japan Prize
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Lary Ramsey |
asatoshi Nei, Evan Pugh professor of biology and director of the Center for Molecular and Evolutionary Genetics, was recently awarded the International Prize for Biology by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Nei is most noted for developing a statistical method that defines, from molecular data, the degree of genetic distance between populations. Applying this method to human populations, Nei obtained the first evidence pointing to the African origin of modern humans. The society recognized his important contributions to his own field of molecular evolutionary biology, and to every branch of biology concerned with diversity and evolution. His statistical methods applied to molecular data, according to a statement, have “allowed new ways of studying the genetic diversity of populations, evolutionary relationships among organisms, the times of species divergence from common ancestors, the location of gene regions in which natural selection is operating, and related areas.” Nei’s statistical approach has meant, significantly, that molecular evolutionary biology can now be verified quantitatively rather than discussed solely on a conceptual level.
The award was presented in the presence of the Emperor and Empress of Japan during a ceremony in Tokyo in December 2002 .
— Hannah Thomas-Peter
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One Giant Leap
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Image Resource Center |
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enn State’s Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics has been recognized for its rising impact in the field of space science by ISI Essential Science Indicators, an organization whose rankings are a respected indicator of quality across scientific disciplines. After analyzing citations of research papers published since January 1992 in astronomy, astrophysics, and other space-related topics, ISI determined that Penn State had the highest increase of any institution in the number of citations for the papers its faculty have authored during the past ten years. In recognition of the achievement, ISI invited current department head Peter Mészáros to write an essay for its website (http://incites.com/institutions /pennstate.html) titled “Penn State’s Rise in Space Science.”
The department had its beginnings in the mid-sixties under head John Hagen, veteran of NASA’s Vanguard project. Its scientific contributions accelerated in the mid-1980s when Penn State took the lead in building the ACIS X-ray CCD camera for NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. Other milestones include the design and building of the Hobby-Eberly telescope, also beginning in the mid-1980s, and the first detection of extra-solar planets in 1991.
Notable among current efforts, Penn State is the lead university partner for NASA’s Swift satellite, a gamma-ray-burst detector scheduled for launch in September 2003.
— Hannah Thomas-Peter
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Academy Award
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obert N. Proctor, Ferree professor of the history of science, has been inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, an international society of the world’s leading scientists, scholars, artists, business people, and public leaders. Proctor was elected as a member of the 2002 class along with U. S. Senator Edward M. Kennedy, violinist Itzhak Perlman, physician Oliver Sacks, and novelist Milan Kundera, among 202 others. Proctor specializes in 20th century science, technology, and medicine, with an emphasis on controversy in those fields. His work engages what he terms the cultural production of ignorance, or agnatology. Proctor’s books include Racial Hygiene: Medicine Under the Nazis (1988), Value-Free Science? Purity and Power in Modern Knowledge (1991), Cancer Wars: How Politics Shapes What We Know and Don’t Know About Cancer (1995), and The Nazi War on Cancer (1999). He is currently engaged in three more writing ventures: “a book on Darwin, a book on human origins, and a book on popular rockhounding,” his long-time hobby (see R/PS September 2001). Proctor is also co-director of the Science, Medicine and Technology in Culture initiative at Penn State, a diverse group of faculty and graduate students dedicated to exploring the history, rhetoric, philosophy, and culture of science, technology, and medicine. The group recently earned a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation.
— Clare Sigrist
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Sound Patch
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Gene Maylock |
iabetics who currently rely on hypodermic needles or implanted catheters for insulin delivery may soon have a less painful and more convenient alternative, powered by sound. Nadine Barrie Smith, assistant professor of bioengineering, is working on an ultrasonic drug-delivery system the size and weight of a matchbook that can be worn as a patch. The key to the device is a tiny “cymbal” transducer developed by Robert Newnham, Alcoa professor emeritus of solid state science. Consisting of a thin disk of piezoelectric ceramic material sandwiched between cymbal-shaped titanium caps, the transducer produces sound waves just above the level of human hearing. When the transducer is activated behind a thin reservoir of insulin, the sound waves push the medication through the skin and into the blood stream. Experiments with human skin and live rats show that the prototype patch delivers therapeutically effective doses of insulin, Smith reports. “We are hopeful that eventually we may be able to tune the system so that one to five minutes
of exposure may be enough,” she adds. The patch may also be useful for other medications that are deliverable by ultrasound, which include drugs used to treat AIDS, pain relievers, asthma drugs, and hormones.
— David Pacchioli
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Can-Do Chemistry
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art of doing research is coming to know your field thoroughly enough to write a textbook about it. Chemistry professor Peter Jurs is co-author, with John Moore of the University of Wisconsin and Conrad Stanitski of the University of Central Arkansas, of Chemistry, the Molecular Science. The book, published in 2002 by Harcourt College Publishers, has earned plaudits from science educators for “clear, concise, and accurate writing” that integrates biochemistry and organic chemistry, “two subdisciplines of chemistry that are barely touched by other textbooks.” An innovative feature is a set of “Chemistry You Can Do” exercises, such as recovering the iron with which Special K, a popular breakfast cereal, is fortified. Scattered through the text are 28 short profiles of distinguished scientists from Wilson Greatbatch (invented a lithium battery for powering heart pacemakers) to Susan Solomon (first to propose a good explanation for the Antarctic ozone hole). The book has been used in more than 25 colleges and universities. It recently won the Talbot prize for visual excellence, awarded by the Society of Academic Scholars.
— Charles Fergus
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