In The News

An Age-Old Salt Lake May Yield a Washday Miracle

Marc Lacey February 21, 2006
The otherworldly microbes in Kenya’s Lake Bogoria have proved instrumental in perfecting many worldly goods. Genencor International, Inc., has patented and used enzyme samples it purchased from scientists who visited the lake to enhance such mundane commodities as detergent and blue jeans. While Genencor touts the commercial success of innovative science, however, Kenyans demand that the...

Outsourcing Is Climbing Skills Ladder

Steve Lohr February 20, 2006
The Bush administration announced an initiative to increase spending on science education and research – to encourage more US students to take up the generally scorning the field. But the plan may be too late. Multinational companies – who always shop around for the best prices and the best talent – plan to move research and development jobs overseas, to countries with the fastest growing...

How to Ease the Pain of Globalization

Catherine L. Mann February 17, 2006
Frequent news articles detail the offshoring of information technology (IT) jobs, sounding alarms for all US workers. Catherine Mann suggests that such alarm may be unwarranted and points out steps to maximize the benefits of globalization. Research indicates that the globalization of IT actually promotes productivity, creates new jobs, reduces inflation and enhances innovation, both in the US...

Economists Price the Ravages of Climate Change

Scheherazade Daneshkhu February 8, 2006
The emerging discipline of environmental economics struggles to persuade people to set aside concrete short-term economic advantages to act against the long-term problem of global environmental change. No individual country can solve the problem on its own, and some economists fear that this means the problem could go unsolved - why should nations risk competitive edge today for a problem with...

China and the Iranian Nuclear Crisis

Jing dong-Yuan February 6, 2006
China has joined the US, Britain, France, Germany and the EU in deciding the time has come to report Iran’s pursuit of nuclear power to the UN Security Council. Despite joining the unified front, China has expressed less anxiety over Iran’s actions and continues to press, along with Russia, for a diplomatic solution to the standoff. China depends on Iranian oil and political ties, and hesitates...

America Should Open Its Doors Wide to Foreign Talent

Craig Barrett February 1, 2006
Discussion about challenges in America’s immigration policies tends to focus on the millions of illegal immigrants. But the more pressing immigration problem facing the US today, writes Intel chairman Craig Barrett, is the dearth of high-skilled immigrants required to keep the US economy competitive. Due to tighter visa policies and a growth in opportunities elsewhere in the world, foreign...

The Basics: How to Outwit the World’s Internet Censors

Tom Zeller Jr. February 1, 2006
While China’s censorship of the internet receives increased attention, less publicized are the system’s imperfections. Relying on loopholes, greater freedom can be sought, even in a restrictive environment. One way individuals subvert a watchdog government is by surfing the web through a proxy server, which dissociates computer addresses from visited websites. In China, an underground network of...