Developments to Watch
Edited by Otis Port
Crystal-Clear Views of the Protein Factory
The spaghetti-like jumble above holds the key to life. Called a ribosome, it's the microscopic factory that turns DNA recipes into the proteins that sustain life. Every cell has thousands of ribosomes, churning out streams of precisely duplicated proteins.
Biologists figured out the role of ribosomes decades ago. But trying to nail down the step-by-step particulars has stumped the researchers. Now, thanks to new three-dimensional images like the one shown below, scientists hope to unravel the structure of these factories. That's important because many antibiotics work by gumming up the operation of ribosomes in bacteria. Understanding this machinery could lead to drugs for killing antibiotic-resistant bugs.
Published in the Mar. 30 issue of Science, the new images were produced by a team led by Harry Noller, a molecular biologist at the University of California at Santa Cruz. Crucial insights are provided by the gold, orange, and red areas. These are transfer RNA molecules--in what has long been the most mysterious part of ribosomes. Transfer RNAs bring protein components into the ribosome and, after reading the recipes on messenger RNA (not shown), line up the building blocks in the proper order. Then the ribosome triggers chemical bonds between components to produce a complete protein.
A Heat-Seeking Missile for Arterial Plaque
Most heart attacks are triggered when plaque--the gunk that accumulates inside unhealthy arteries--ruptures and precipitates a blood clot that blocks the supply of blood to the heart. Doctors have long been able to spot plaque deposits with X-ray angiograms. This allows cardiologists to use techniques such as balloon angioplasty to widen these choke points. But there was no way to spot so-called vulnerable plaque, or sections that might break free, in the 1 million Americans a year who have a heart attack.
Recently, researchers discovered that vulnerable plaque has a slightly different heat profile than normal plaque. That finding enabled scientists at Thermocore Medical Systems in Ghent, Belgium, to design a system that could draw a bead on it. The system maps the heat "signature" of arteries using tiny sensors on a catheter that glides through a patient's arteries. Soon, predicts Thermocore President John Yianni, many lives may be saved by taking preventive action. For example, inserting stents could hold the plaque in place. Stents are the miniature props now used to open plaque-clogged arteries.
Thermocore is now refining its system with help from Cambridge Consultants Ltd., the British arm of consultant Arthur D. Little Inc. Yianni expects to begin clinical trials in Europe late this year and in the U.S. by the end of 2002.
By Mitch Nelin
Who Let the RoboDogs Out?
Move over, Aibo. RoboDog is bigger, stronger, and smarter. Britain's rival to Sony Corp.'s famous pooch is about the size of a labrador retriever. It stands 27 in. tall, vs. Aibo's 11 in. RoboDog can carry a small child on its back. It will watch over a home while its masters are away, wirelessly linking to the Internet and relaying images from its video-camera eyes while prowling its turf. And when its owners return, RoboDog can greet them by reading e-mail messages aloud.
RoboDog was created by a small team led by Nicholas J.P. Wirth, who co-founded RoboScience in December, 1999, near Silverstone, England. Previously, he was chief race-car designer at Benetton Formula Ltd. But the 35-year-old engineer had been fascinated by robots ever since he saw Star Wars, and his Benetton experience with lightweight materials came in handy. RoboDog weighs just 26 pounds. "We're quite proud of what we've done in a short time--seven months--with limited resources," says Wirth.
RoboScience will hand-build up to 200 dogs--for about $30,000 each. That's far more than Aibo's $1,500 price, but Wirth says 50-odd dogs have been spoken for. He figures RoboDog could be made in volume for around $10,000, but that's not his shtick. RoboScience was formed to help companies sniff out better robot designs. Says Wirth: "Figuring out how to make things work is the bit I love."
Innovations
-- Dioxins are environmental disasters. The byproduct of many industrial processes, they have been linked both to cancer and to birth defects. Currently, industry uses activated charcoal to mop up dioxins, but small amounts still escape. Carbon nanotubes are far more effective scavengers, say researchers at the University of Michigan. The tiny, hollow tubes can even sop up mere billionths of a gram of dioxin in a cubic yard of incinerator exhaust. There's a big hitch, though: They cost $230,000 a pound. But Houston's Carbon Nanotechnologies Inc. hopes to get the price down to $10 a pound within a few years.
-- Call it a smelling-salts wakeup for ammonia production, which has not changed much in a half-century. It's a new catalyst developed by the Institute of Technical Chemistry in Bochum, Germany. What it does is slash in half the energy needed to make ammonia. Ammonia production consumes 1% of the world's energy, because synthesizing it requires enormous pressures. With the new ruthenium-barium catalyst, the pressure can be cut 92%.
-- The wonders of soybeans don't cease. Three undergraduates in Purdue University's School of Agriculture have discovered that a mixture of one part soybean oil and four parts fuel oil yields a home heating oil that burns cleaner than the conventional stuff--and costs about 10% less. The team's finding earned the students a $4,500 first-place prize in the seventh annual New Uses for Soybeans Student Contest.
By Petti Fong
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Copyright 2001 , by The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc. All rights reserved.
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