October 1996
Scientific American Magazine

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Cover; October 1996; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

Table of Contents; October 1996; by Staff Editor; 2 Page(s)

From the Editors, including Masthead; October 1996; by Rennie; 1 Page(s)

Microbes from Mars? Maybe

Letters to the Editors; October 1996; by Staff Editor; 2 Page(s)

50, 100 and 150 Years Ago; October 1996; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

In Focus: Bugs in the Data?; October 1996; by Gibbs, Powell; 2 Page(s)

The controversy over Martian life is just beginning

Fish Fight; October 1996; by Mukerjee; 2 Page(s)

A struggle over resources in Indian waters comes to a boil

Field Notes: Building a Better T-Bone; October 1996; by Zorpette; 1 Page(s)

I step out of my rental vehicle and get a lungful of the end product of bovine digestion.

In Brief; October 1996; by Leutwyler, Sinha; 3 Page(s)

Hormonal Relief from Alzheimer's; Garden of Earthly Stench; Remarkable Sight; Ultraviolet Radiation on the Rise; Choosing Abortion; A Fish Smarter Than a Man; Spinal Repairs; An Ocean on Jupiter's Europa?; Software Gone Awry; Halt, Aquatic Interloper

A Spinning Crystal Ball; October 1996; by Schneider; 3 Page(s)

Seismologists discover that the inner core rotates

On the Tail of the Tiger; October 1996; by Drollette; 3 Page(s)

Is a Tasmanian legend still wandering the bush?

By the Numbers: Soil Erosion of Cropland in the U.S., 1982 to 1992; October 1996; by Doyle; 1 Page(s)

America's position as the world's leading exporter of grains depends largely on a layer of topsoil typically less than a foot thick.

Hurricane Hullabaloo?; October 1996; by Schneider; 2 Page(s)

Atlantic cyclones prove to be in decline

Unicorn Hunts?; October 1996; by Yam; 2 Page(s)

Searching for monopoles, free quarks and antimatter

Anti Gravity: Just Say NO; October 1996; by Mirsky; 1 Page(s)

Nitric oxide, former molecule of the year as pronounced by the journal "Science", has not just been resting on its laurels.

Cyber View: Television by Any Other Name; October 1996; by Browning; 1 Page(s)

European governments are discovering the Internet, and they aren't too sure they like it.

"X" (Rays) Mark the Tumor; October 1996; by Zorpette; 2 Page(s)

A technology used to develop nuclear weapons may lead to an effective cancer treatment

Picking on Cotton; October 1996; by Beardsley; 2 Page(s)

Engineered crops need fewer pesticides but may foster resistance

Programming with Primordial Ooze; October 1996; by Gibbs; 2 Page(s)

Useful software begins to crawl out of digital gene pools

Recently Netted...; October 1996; by Eisenberg; 1 Page(s)

Snailmail Fights Back; Cookies Redux

Profile: Wayne B. Jonas; October 1996; by Stix; 2 Page(s)

Probing Medicine's Outer Reaches

Single Mothers and Welfare; October 1996; by Bassuk, Browne, Buckner; 6 Page(s)

For the first time since the Great Depression, large numbers of families are homeless. Recent welfare revisions will put even more women and children on the stress.

Microbes Deep inside the Earth; October 1996; by Fredrickson, Onstott; 6 Page(s)

Recently discovered microorganisms that dwell within the earth's crust could reveal clues to the origin of life

Friction at the Atomic Scale; October 1996; by Krim; 7 Page(s)

Long neglected by physicists, the study of friction's atomic-level origins, or nanotribology, indicates that the force stems from various unexpected sources, including sound energy

Controlling Computers with Neural Signals; October 1996; by Lusted, Knapp; 6 Page(s)

Electrical impulses from nerves and muscles can command computers directly, a method that aids people with physical disabilities

Ten Days under the Sea; October 1996; by Edmunds; 8 Page(s)

Living underwater in the world's only habitat devoted to science, six aquanauts studied juvenile corals and fought off "the funk"

How an Underwater Habitat Benefits Marine Science; October 1996; by Miller; 2 Page(s)

Scuba divers joke that there are two ways to avoid decompression sickness, the rare but dreaded "bends": don't go down, or don't come up.

Charles Darwin and Associates, Ghostbusters; October 1996; by Milner; 6 Page(s)

When the scientific establishment put a spiritualist on trial, the co-discoverers of natural selection took opposing sides

Confronting Science's Logical Limits; October 1996; by Casti; 4 Page(s)

The mathematical models now used in many scientific fields may be fundamentally unable to answer certain questions about the real world. Yet there may be ways around these problems

Sounding Out Science; October 1996; by Holloway; 7 Page(s)

Prince William Sound is recovering, seven years after the "Exxon Valdez" disaster. But the spill's scientific legacy remains a mess

The Amateur Scientist; October 1996; by Carlson; 2 Page(s)

Working in a Vacuum

Mathematical Recreations; October 1996; by Stewart; 3 Page(s)

Monopoly Revisited

Reviews; October 1996; by Adams, Powell, Nuland; 5 Page(s)

Reviews

Commentary: Wonders - New World and Old: A Matter of Magnitude; October 1996; by Morrison; 2 Page(s)

Scientists and engineers map their world in numbers, a form of expression that is as colorless as it is information-rich.

Commentary: Connections - Making Your Mark; October 1996; by Burke; 2 Page(s)

I was watching the news the other night when I saw a story about somebody being identified by the so-called DNA-fingerprinting technique.

Working Knowledge; October 1996; by Holt; 1 Page(s)

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