January 2006 |
Researchers Discover Gene Linked to Human Pigmentation | |||
Until now, the genetics underlying human skin pigmentation mystified researchers. But while studying the zebrafish, a fish common to household aquariums and research laboratories, scientists found a gene that plays a major role in human coloration. Keith Cheng and his Pennsylvania State University colleagues first discovered a gene they called "golden" that regulated pigmentation in the golden zebrafish, a variety of lighter-colored zebrafish. Next, the scientists found the gene's counterpart in humans by searching an on-line database. This and other work suggested to the team that the golden-like gene could be involved in human coloration. And in fact, a specific tiny variation in this human gene was prevalent in individuals from lighter-skinned European populations, while the gene without the change was common among West Africans and East Asians with darker pigmentation. For more on this story, see NSF's "A Fish of a Different Color" press release. |
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Complex Work Scheduling Made Simple | |||
Chemical engineers at Princeton University did not set out to invent a computer program to transform the way day-to-day work assignments are handled across government and industry. But this is precisely what happened while they were determining the best way for NSF to assign grant proposals efficiently and fairly to its many external reviewers. So, why did chemical engineers end up solving a problem with no apparent tie to chemistry? They specialize in "optimization," the science of inventing mathematical solutions to make things run at maximum efficiency. |
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Clarity at the Core: First Clear Picture of Milky Way's Center |
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Using a new laser-generated "virtual star" at the W.M. Keck observatory in Hawaii, UCLA astronomer Andrea Ghez and colleagues took the first clear picture of the heart of our Milky Way galaxy 26,000 light years away--including evidence of a super-massive black hole at its very center. This NSF-supported research will advance the study of black holes and planets in the Milky Way and other galaxies. Read NSF's press release, "Clarity at the Core," for more details. |
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Web Tool Provides Answers for Doctors | |||
DynaMed, the Dynamic Medical Information System, is a Web-based tool offering a collection of clinical summaries on more than 1,800 medical topics. Developed with support from an NSF Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award, DynaMed offers doctors an online resource to compare patients' ailments with a peer-reviewed, searchable database. | |||
In a new study, primary care clinicians were able to answer more clinical questions in the same amount of time when using DynaMed in addition to their usual information sources. NSF's SBIR program emphasizes high-risk, high-payback innovations congruent with NSF's mission to advance science, engineering and education. For more, see NSF's "Web Tool May Help Doctors Make Better Decisions." |
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NSF Grantees Among the Brightest of 2005 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
In 2005, a number of NSF awardees were featured in Popular Science magazine's "Annual Brilliant 10" issue and Technology Review's "Top 35 Innovators Under the Age of 35." Keep a watchful eye for their names in the Discoveries section of the NSF website in 2006. For now, our hats are off! Meet a few below! |
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2005: A Banner Year for Science Research -- A Review of Top News Stories Featuring NSF Bipedal Bots Star at AAAS Media Briefing (2/17/05) Members of three independent research teams jointly unveiled a new breed of powered, energy-efficient, two-legged robots with a surprisingly human gait. All three robots verified a long-held hypothesis that suggests motors can substitute for gravity in passive-dynamic walking devices. A slope is not required, only careful engineering. -- #59 in Discover Magazine's Top 100 Stories of 2005 Geologists Find First Clue to T. rex Gender in Bone Tissue (6/2/05) North Carolina State University paleontologist Mary Schweitzer and colleagues extracted unusual bone tissue from a 68 million-year-old T. rex fossil and determined that the fossil was that of a young female producing eggs when she died. Also see related NSF news release, "T. rex Fossil Yields Soft Tissue" (3/25/05). -- #7 in Discover Magazine's Top 100 Stories of 2005 Reappearance of Missing Genetic Information Poses Exception to the Rule (3/23/05) For more than a century, a basic tenet of inheritance has dictated that an organism's genome passes directly from one generation to the next in a predictable manner: from grandparents-to parents-to children. Susan Lolle, Robert Pruitt and colleagues showed this cardinal rule of inheritance is sometimes broken. The scientists reached their conclusion by tracking how genetic information passes through multiple generations of the plant Arabidopsis. In violation of current genetic theory, they found a significant percentage of the plant grandchildren had genetic information identical to that of the grandparent, but not the parent. -- #3 in Science Magazine's Top Ten of 2005 Inka Textile Devices Served as Business Ledgers (8/11/05) New evidence shows Peru's original inhabitants used a three-dimensional system of knotted strings to keep track of things. Harvard University anthropologist Gary Urton and database developer Carrie Brezine say their computer analysis of 21 of the knotted objects, known as "khipu," revealed distinct patterns that help confirm the textile devices were used for record keeping and to communicate affairs of state throughout the sprawling empire of the Inka. -- #55 in Discover Magazine's Top 100 Stories of 2005 For the complete list, see the press release, "2005: Year in Review." |
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The National Science Foundation (NSF), an independent federal agency, supports fundamental research and education with an annual budget of nearly $5.47 billion. NSF funding reaches all 50 states through grants to nearly 2,000 universities and institutions. Each year, NSF receives about 40,000 competitive requests for funding and makes about 11,000 new funding awards. Contact NSF's Office of Legislative and Public Affairs for more information, to unsubscribe, or for permission to reuse newsletter images. |
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