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  June 23, 2000: Highlights

'Science & Engineering Indicators 2000'

Science and Engineering Indicators 2000 Science and Engineering "In Transition" as a New Century Begins
Increasing globalization of research and development (R&D;) and the prolific growth of information technology (IT) are major elements in a "science and engineering enterprise that is in transition," the National Science Board (NSB) said in its biennial report to the President and Congress on the nation's status in science and engineering. The new Science and Engineering Indicators 2000-- the first report of the new century and the first-ever two-volume edition -- emphasizes a changing context for NSF, and for science and engineering, generally. "Today, it is much more of an international landscape in S&E;," said Science Board chair Eamon Kelly.    More...
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Full volumes of Science and Engineering Indicators 2000

Medical New Test for Presence of Nitric Oxide Could Improve Medical Knowledge
Researchers supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) have developed a means to detect nitric oxide that could help improve scientists' understanding of this molecule's role in neurological signaling and other biological functions. Stephen Lippard, Katherine J. Franz and Nisha Singh of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology synthesized a nitric oxide sensing system that consists of a molecule whose fluorescence switches on when nitric oxide is present. Nitric oxide plays a major role in the regulation of blood pressure, the prevention of blood clotting, the dilation of blood vessels and the destruction of pathogens.    More...

New England Experienced "Ice Age" El Niño
The New England region underwent El Niño-like climate changes during the Ice Age, NSF-supported researchers have found. Scientists define El Niño as a disruption of the ocean-atmosphere system in the tropical Pacific, which has important consequences for weather around the globe. The team's findings show a strong three-to-five-year cycle of El Niño activity during the latter part of the last Ice Age--the same frequency with which El Niño occurs today.    More...

The Alaska Peninsula Discovery of Fossil Mollusks in Alaska Links Histories of Arctic Ocean and Isthmus of Panama
Finding two fossil mollusks in a California collection led a researcher funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to undertake field work in Alaska that he says links the formation of the Isthmus of Panama approximately 3.6 million years ago to a reversal of water flow through the Bering Strait. Louie Marincovich, of the California Academy of Sciences, is the first to produce fossil evidence that the flow of water through the strait, which separates Russia and Alaska, was reversed from southward to northward by the uplifting of the Isthmus. He also is the first to date the flow shift.    More...

Radio Telescopes Astronomers Win Protection for Key Part of Spectrum
Astronomers using the millimeter-wave region of the radio spectrum have won crucial protection for their science. The 2,500 delegates to the World Radiocommunication Conference (WCR 2000) have given final approval to dedicated spectrum allocations for radio astronomy. The new millimeter-wave allocations represent the culmination of more than three years of cooperative planning by radio astronomers in many countries. Millimeter waves -- high-frequency radio waves -- have come of age as an astronomical tool in the last ten years. They are one of the last technological frontiers for astronomers.    More...

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