ORDER #1: VOICES FROM THE PAST
Previously unheard recordings from wartime Britain, including the Queen as a teenager and a speech by Winston Churchill, have been resurrected with an optical stylus invented by Swiss researchers. The device can play ageing 78 rpm discs and cylinders that are too fragile or damaged to play by conventional means. Page 6
ORDER #2: BUCKINGHAM PALACE, WHERE'S THAT?
London's legendary taxi drivers are helping neuroscientists understand how people create a "cognitive map" that allows them to navigate. The brain's cartographer appears to be the hippocampus, a sea-horse shaped structure that plays a vital role in storing and retrieving memory. Page 16
ORDER #3: CANCER CATCH
High doses of antioxidants that may help prevent cancer could make things worse once the disease has struck. Antioxidants such as vitamin C seem to prevent cancer by mopping up free radicals that can damage DNA. But a Dutch study reveals that these same free radicals can also kill cancer cells - bad news for cancer patients. Page 16
ORDER #4: FREAK FROGS
The breakdown products formed when the Sun's ultraviolet rays act on common pesticides could be to blame for a wave of deformed frogs and other amphibians turning up across North America. A researcher from Oklahoma State University has discovered that exposing methoprene, a pesticide used against mosquitoes, to sunshine produces chemicals that can trigger the abnormalities seen in the wild. Page 18
ORDER #5: RELAXING COMPANY
Pain tolerance seems to be infectious - for rats, at least. Scientists in Sweden have shown that when one rat is injected with a painkilling and anxiety-reducing hormone, its cage mates start to feel less pain as well. Page 10
ORDER #6: THE ENEMY WITHIN
Deadly bacteria could be wafting undetected through air-conditioning systems. Microbiologists in Maryland have shown that current tests can miss airborne bacteria even when the cells are abundant. Many unexplained hospital disease outbreaks, they suggest, could be triggered by infected ventilation systems. Page 4
ORDER #7: WISE MONKEYS HEAR EVIL
Monkeys in Cote d'Ivoire have learnt to evade human hunters by distinguishing the calls of jungle animals from trick calls made by poachers. The discovery may lead to new methods of conservation, in which endangered monkeys are taught how to avoid their human foes. Page 14
ORDER #8: CARS EARN THEIR KEEP
Owners of tomorrow's electric cars won't just buy electricity from their power company - they will also sell it back. That's the vision of a scientist from the University of Delaware in Newark, who believes that electric cars could replace dozens of power-generating plants. Page 5
ORDER #9: TAXI SERVICE
It's not just passengers who get lost at airports, pilots do it too, often causing accidents as they attempt to pick out the route to the right gate. Now, NASA has developed a computerised system that guides a pilot around an airport by superimposing virtual directions before their eyes and showing the exact position of other taxiing planes. Page 12
ORDER #10: COMPUTERS JUST SAY NO
Drugs can screw you up - and the CD-ROMs given away by the British government to educate youngsters about them can mess up your computer too. The use of D-Code, an interactive CD-ROM that uses video games and pop music to inform children about the dangers of drug abuse, may spoil the performance of other CD-ROMs or even crash your PC.
ORDER #11: MIND-ALTERING BUGS
A virus that kills horses could cause up to half the cases of clinical depression in humans. And the virologists who makes the claim says they have the drug which can wipe out the infection. Pages 42-45
ORDER #12: SWIMMING FOR DEAR LIFEPa
Coral fish fry can swim for kilometres against ocean currents although they are only millimetres long, say Australian oceanographers. The discovery will change the way biologists think about the colonisation of reefs and the best way to protect them from over-exploitation. Pages 28-32
ORDER #13: CHEMICAL SLIPPERS
Chemists have made molecular "plaster casts" that remember the shape of molecules that have been embedded in them. The cast can then be used to separate similarly shaped molecules from complex mixtures. Pages 34-37
ORDER #14: CYBERCRASH
Virtual crashes are taking the place of real collisions to improve road safety at the National Crash Analysis Center in the US. The crashes are cheaper than real tests, yield more information and involve virtual cars that are identical in every respect to road-going versions. Pages 38-41
- ENDS -
September 10, 1997
Issue cover date: September 13, 1997.
For fax copies of full stories or to arrange an interview, please conact Barbara Thurlow at [email protected] or on 202 452 1178. In Europe please contact Lucy Banwell, IPC Press Office Tel: (0171) 261 6415 or e-mail: [email protected] New Scientist is the recipient of over 23 major awards, including the 1996 UTNE Reader's Alternative Press Award in the "Emerging Issues" category. New Scientist Planet Science provides Internet users with news, features, reviews and comment drawn weekly from the pages of New Scientist magazine, as well as extra material exclusive to the web site. The site can be found at http://www.newscientist.com
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