June 1997
Scientific American Magazine

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Cover; June 1997; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

Table of Contents; June 1997; by Staff Editor; 2 Page(s)

From The Editors, including Masthead; June 1997; by Rennie; 1 Page(s)

Recognizing Technological Genius

Letters To The Editors; June 1997; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

50, 100 and 150 Years Ago; June 1997; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

The 1997 National Medal of Technology; June 1997; by Staff Editors; 4 Page(s)

Among this nation's highest honors, this prize recognizes outstanding achievements in the innovation, development and commercialization of technology, as well as the human resource management that advances innovation. This year's winners include an audio pioneer, a biomedical inventor, an aerospace executive and two Internet designers

In Focus: Pinning Down Inflation; June 1997; by Horgan; 2 Page(s)

Cosmologists strive to preserve a popular theory of creation

War Without End?; June 1997; by Beardsley; 2 Page(s)

Land mines strain diplomacy as technology advances

BEE Blight; June 1997; by Mukerjee; 2 Page(s)

Looking for alternatives to the troubled honeybee

In Brief; June 1997; by Leutwyler; 3 Page(s)

Topping Taxol; Screaming Leaves; Fatal Attraction; British Blues; Gorilla Warfare; MAP Kinase Confusion; Tracks or FAQs; Oil's Lasting Effects; Flunking Genetic Tests; Jumpin' Jupiter

When Nutrients Turn Noxious; June 1997; by Beardsley; 2 Page(s)

A little nitrogen is nice, but too much is toxic

Sex, Flies and Videotape; June 1997; by Horgan; 2 Page(s)

A mutant gene alters the sexual behavior of fruit flies

By the Numbers: Lung Cancer in U.S. Males; June 1997; by Doyle; 1 Page(s)

The U.S. is now in the seventh decade of a lung cancer epidemic that started with the introduction of milder, more inhalable cigarettes near the turn of the century.

Anti Gravity: Small Fry; June 1997; by Mirsky; 1 Page(s)

Douglas Tallamy returned from an insect-collecting trip in April to find a message on his answering machine.

Profile: Raymond V. Damadian; June 1997; by Schneider; 2 Page(s)

Scanning the Horizon

Seller Beware; June 1997; by Zorpette; 2 Page(s)

German high-tech sales to Iran provoke concerns in the U.S.

Floating Giants; June 1997; by Stix; 1 Page(s)

Sea-based platforms eyed for launch sites and airstrips

Medical Mismatch; June 1997; by Mukerjee; 2 Page(s)

When hospitals act like men

Spying Saucer; June 1997; by Zorpette; 1 Page(s)

Among the hundreds of experimental machines built to go where humans cannot (or should not), there have been rollers, crawlers, fliers, orbiters and undersea cruisers.

Attacking Arthritis; June 1997; by Nemecek; 1 Page(s)

New treatments seek to rebalance the immune system

Cyber View; June 1997; by Eisenberg; 1 Page(s)

Disliking the Internet

Iran's Nuclear Puzzle; June 1997; by Schwarzbach; 4 Page(s)

Rich in fossil-fuel resources, Iran is pursuing a nuclear power program difficult to understand in the absence of military motives

Configurable Computing; June 1997; by Villasenor, Mangione-Smith; 6 Page(s)

Computers that modify their hardware circuits as they operate are opening a new era in computer design. Because they can filter data rapidly, they excel at pattern recognition, image processing and encryption

Early Hominid Fossils from Africa; June 1997; by Leakey, Walker; 6 Page(s)

A new species of "Australopithecus", the ancestor of "Homo", pushes back the origins of bipedalism to some four million years ago

Panoramas of the Seafloor; June 1997; by Pratson, Haxby; 6 Page(s)

Modern sonar techniques map the continental margins of the U.S. and reveal the richly varied scenery usually hidden underwater

Searching for Digital Pictures; June 1997; by Forsyth, Malik, Wilensky; 6 Page(s)

Computers that can reason about images may be able to pick out distinct features of a person, place or object from photograph archives

Making Gene Therapy Work: Table of Contents; June 1997; by Staff Editor; 1 Page(s)

Special Report

Overcoming the Obstacles to Gene Therapy; June 1997; by Friedmann; 6 Page(s)

Treating disease by providing needed genes remains a compelling idea, but clinical and basic researchers still have much to do before gene therapy can live up to its promise

Nonviral Strategies for Gene Therapy; June 1997; by Felgner; 5 Page(s)

Many drawbacks of viral gene delivery agents might be overcome by nonviral systems. Studies in patients suggest these systems have potential as therapies and as vaccines

Gene Therapy for Cancer; June 1997; by Blaese; 5 Page(s)

Inserted genes could in theory arrest tumor growth or even AIDS

Gene Therapy for the Nervous System; June 1997; by Ho, Sapolsky; 5 Page(s)

Inserting genes into brain cells may one day offer doctors a way to slow, or even reverse, the damage from degenerative neurological disease

What Cloning Means for Gene Therapy; June 1997; by Mirsky, Rennie; 2 Page(s)

The recently debuted technology for cloning is usually discussed as a means of creating genetic copies of whole adult individuals.

Bringing Schrödinger's Cat to Life; June 1997; by Yam; 6 Page(s)

Recent experiments have begun to demonstrate how the weird world of quantum mechanics gives way to the familiarity of everyday experience

The Amateur Scientist; June 1997; by Carlson; 3 Page(s)

Getting Inside an Ant's Head

Mathematical Recreations; June 1997; by Stewart; 3 Page(s)

The Sifting Sands of Factorland

Reviews; June 1997; by Damasio, Beardsley, Powell; 4 Page(s)

Reviews

Commentary: Wonders - wrapping up Science and Art; June 1997; by Morrison, Morrison; 2 Page(s)

Technology, the aggregated tools of complex societies, sustains our everyday lives.

Commentary: Connections - Notice the Difference; June 1997; by Burke; 2 Page(s)

I was jogging along the Azorean pavements in predawn dark on New Year's Day and listening to the radio through my headphones when the incongruity struck me.

Working Knowledge; June 1997; by Katz; 1 Page(s)

Decaffeinating Coffee