In The News

Stem Cell Research Must Go Global

Roger Pedersen June 16, 2003
Like the internationally known Human Genome Project, stem cell research is attracting much attention because of the promises it holds for medical science. In this article, biomedical expert, Roger Pedersen, argues that in order to ensure success for this project, more international collaboration is needed. He emphasizes the importance of transparent communication and exchange, among researchers...

Researchers Have New Theory on Origin of AIDS Virus

Donald G. McNell, Jr. June 13, 2003
How HIV first infected humans is still a puzzle waiting to be solved. Past research has traced the virus to chimps in Africa. Now scientists have gone a step further – they have found that chimps got the virus from two kinds of monkeys that they ate, each with its own virus. The HIV virus may have been a combination of these two viruses. It is still unknown when and how the viruses merged,...

Fossil Find May Back 'Out of Africa' Theory

Guy Gugliotta June 12, 2003
Scientists now have more evidence to support the claim that modern humans arose from one common ancestor in Africa. The recent discovery of the remains of two adults and a child from 160,000 years ago in northeast Ethiopia closes "a temporal and geographical gap" in the route on which human ancestors moved north out of Africa, to the Middle East and other regions of the world. Other...

The New Global Food Fight

Kathleen McAfee June 6, 2003
Genetically modified (GM) food offered as aid by the US is not simply manna from the heavens for people in famine-stricken countries, says Yale scholar Kathleen McAfee. African nations have refused GM food aid from the US not just because they fear losing access to the European Union market, where imported GM foods are subject to substantial restrictions. They also worry about environmental...

Globalization with Few Discontents?

June 3, 2003
As a sub-section of the Pew Global Attitudes Project survey, "View of a Changing World," this article examines the global public's attitudes towards globalization in the past five years. Generally, peoples of the world agree - albeit to different degrees - that after experiencing globalization through trade, finance, travel, communication and culture, they favor an interconnected...

Getting Our Bearings

Joan Johnson-Freese May 23, 2003
Human beings have occupied most of the inhabitable surface of the earth for tens of thousands of years, but only recently have we had the means to accurately determine where on Earth we actually are. The technology that supports this is one of a new breed of global utilities and, surprisingly enough, comes free - compliments of Uncle Sam. Global Positioning System (GPS) technology allows or...

Leading Iraqi Scientist Says He Lied to U.N. Inspectors

Judith Miller April 27, 2003
Since the earliest days of fighting, the US-led coalition in Iraq has been searching for the scientists, documents and biological and chemical toxins that would validate Washington’s charges that Iraq had developed a sophisticated program for creating weapons of mass destruction. While there have been few significant discoveries to date, new testimony by one of Iraq’s top scientists, who has...