January 2004
Scientific American Magazine

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Cover; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

Table of Contents; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 2 Page(s)

SA Perspectives: Can Biologists Be Trusted?; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 2 Page(s)

Can biologists be trusted?

How to Contact Us and On the Web; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

Letters to the Editors; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 2 Page(s)

50, 100 and 150 Years Ago; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

Stone Age Treasure; Air Age Optimism; Petrochemical Light

NECTAR for Your Health; January 2004; by Daniel G. Dupont; 2 Page(s)

Revamping U.S. medical research means unifying data

Uncertain Threat; January 2004; by Gunjan Sinha; 2 Page(s)

Does smallpox really spread that easily?

String Theory; January 2004; by Laura Wright; 1 Page(s)

A weak sun may have sweetened the Stradivarius

Aching Atrophy; January 2004; by Lisa Melton; 3 Page(s)

More than unpleasant, chronic pain shrinks the brain

Seeing Single Photons; January 2004; by Graham P. Collins; 2 Page(s)

A superconducting way to spot photons one by one

Planning for Prestige; January 2004; by Luis Miguel Ariza; 2 Page(s)

Hope for getting the oil out of a sunken tanker

By the Numbers: Living Together; January 2004; by Rodger Doyle; 1 Page(s)

In the U.S., cohabitation is here to stay

News Scan Briefs; January 2004; by Charles Choi, Chris Jozefowicz, JR Minkel; 2 Page(s)

Gut Feeling; Holding in Suspense; Slip and Slide; Blasts, Bursts and Flashes; A Pulse for Magnetic Memory; Snoop Tube

Innovations: Supercharging Protein Manufacture; January 2004; by Gary Stix; 2 Page(s)

A career deviation leads to a dynamic approach to producing biotech drugs

Staking Claims: In Search of Better Patents; January 2004; by Gary Stix; 1 Page(s)

How to get rid of bad filings without costly lawsuits

Skeptic: Bunkum!; January 2004; by Michael Shermer; 1 Page(s)

Broad-mindedness is a virtue when investigating extraordinary claims, but often they turn out to be pure bunk

Insights: Why Machines Should Fear; January 2004; by W. Wayt Gibbs; 2 Page(s)

Once a curmudgeonly champion of "usable" design, cognitive scientist Donald A. Norman argues that future machines will need emotions to be truly dependable

Our Growing, Breathing Galaxy; January 2004; by Bart P. Wakker and Philipp Richter; 10 Page(s)

Long assumed to be a relic of the distant past, the Milky Way turns out to be a dynamic, living object

Decoding Schizophrenia; January 2004; by Daniel C. Javitt and Joseph T. Coyle; 8 Page(s)

A fuller understanding of signaling in the brain of people with this disorder offers new hope for improved therapy

RFID: A Key to Automating Everything; January 2004; by Roy Want; 10 Page(s)

Already common in security systems and tollbooths, radio-frequency identification tags and readers stand poised to take over many processes now accomplished by human toil

Atoms of Space and Time; January 2004; by Lee Smolin; 10 Page(s)

We perceive space and time to be continuous, but if the amazing theory of loop quantum gravity is correct, they actually come in discrete pieces

Women and Men at ¿atalh¿y¿k; January 2004; by Ian Hodder; 8 Page(s)

The largest known Neolithic settlement yields clues about the roles played by the two sexes in early agricultural societies

Spring Forward; January 2004; by Daniel Grossman; 8 Page(s)

As temperatures rise sooner in spring, interdependent species in many ecosystems are shifting dangerously out of sync

The Curious History of the First Pocket Calculator; January 2004; by Cliff Stoll; 8 Page(s)

It was called the Curta, and it proved lifesaving when its inventor was trapped in a Nazi concentration camp

Working Knowledge: Phantom Gain; January 2004; by Mark Fischetti; 2 Page(s)

Virtual 1st down marker

Voyages: A Great Echelon of Birds; January 2004; by Marguerite Holloway; 2 Page(s)

Half a million sandhill cranes stop along a stretch of Nebraska's Platte River every spring

Reviews: Metaphorical Suns...; January 2004; by Philip Morrison; 2 Page(s)

...but very real destruction. 100 Suns photographically documents thermonuclear tests, one mushroom cloud at a time

Puzzling Adventures: Verifying Your Circuits; January 2004; by Dennis E. Shasha; 1 Page(s)

Verifying circuits

Anti Gravity: Check Those Figures; January 2004; by Steve Mirsky; 1 Page(s)

Hey, it's playtime! Icons - you can, too!

Ask the Experts; January 2004; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

How does spending prolonged time in microgravity affect astronauts? How do geckos' feet unstick from a surface?

Fuzzy Logic; January 2004; by Roz Chast; 1 Page(s)