BioScience articles from November 2003

BioScience archives from November 2003

Open access? Open wallets!(Editorial)
November 1, 2003... The "open access" model for free online access to scientific journals--wherein the costs of publication are paid for by published authors, not by subscribing libraries--continues to build momentum in the United States, driven in large part by...

Amphibians in a very bad light.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2003... In "Shedding Light on Ultraviolet, Radiation and Amphibian Embryos in the June 2003 issue of BioScience, Lawrence E. Licht argues that there is no convincing evidence linking ambient ultraviolet-B (UVB) radiation and amphibian population...

Teaching Darwin with Darwin.(Viewpoint)
November 1, 2003... It happened again in 2003. With predictable regularity, local or (in one case) state school boards have tried to minimize or eliminate certain aspects of evolutionary biology from their high school curricula. It is disquieting that...

Island biogeography's lasting impact.(Feature)
November 1, 2003... Islands are, and always have been, special places. They are the basic stuff of daydreams, a source of life for shipwrecked souls, valuable pawns in inter national diplomacy. And they're especially special for scientists. For Charles Darwin on...

Will EPA attain cabinet status?(Washington Watch)
November 1, 2003... Since 1987, no fewer than 18 independent expert panels and 13 pieces of legislation have called for the elevation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to cabinet status. Dozens of experts, including four former EPA administrators, have...

Molecular dissection of allometry, ontogeny, and plasticity: a genomic view of developmental biology.
November 1, 2003... Allometric power scaling, ontogenetic growth, and phenotypic plasticity represent three fundamental developmental features for every living organism. To analyze these three features of an organism at the interface between development and...

An ecological perspective on the biodiversity of tropical island streams.(Articles)
November 1, 2003... Ecological processes of insular tropical stream drainages are not well understood. Furthertnore, it is not yet clear how the concepts and paradigms derived from studies of continental stream ecosystems in the temperate zone can be effectively...

Impacts of human disturbances on biotic communities in Hawaiian streams.
November 1, 2003... Streams throughout the tropics have been altered by water diversion, channel modification, introduced species, amt water quality degradation. The Hawaiian Islands, with watersheds ranging from the relatively pristine to the highly degraded,...

The global spread of parasites: what do Hawaiian streams tell us?
November 1, 2003... The global spread of parasites threatens native animals even in the most isolated of all habitats on Earth. In the Hawaiian archipelago, the five native species of stream fishes are infected with several species alien parasites introduced...

Damming tropical island streams: problems, solutions, and alternatives.
November 1, 2003... The combination of human population growth, increased water usage, and limited groundwater resources often leads to extensive damming of rivers and streams on tropical islands. Ecological effects of dams on tropical islands can be dramatic,...

Geomorphology, development of running water habitats, and evolution of black flies on Polynesian islands.
November 1, 2003... Running water habitats develop in concert with the age of hotspot volcanic islands. This study tracks the geologic and hydrologic processes involved in this development /or the Society Islands, French Polynesia. Over a period of about 6 million...

A comparison of freshwater macroinvertebrate communities on small Caribbean islands.
November 1, 2003... An ongoing survey of macroinvertebrates inhabiting the relatively unstudied freshwater habitats on 14 small Caribbean islands was initialed in 1991. These collections have yielded almost 200 species; when these species are combined with...

Conserving Madagascar's freshwater biodiversity.
November 1, 2003... The island nation of Madagascar, an international conservation priority, is now also recognized as a global hotspot for freshwater biodiversity. Three emerging characteristics of Madagascar's threatened freshwater biota deserve increased...

Biological stoichiometry: an ecological perspective on tumor dynamics.(Forum)
November 1, 2003... Biological stoichiometry is the study of the balance of energy and multiple chemical elements in biological systems. A key idea in biological stoichiometry is the growth rate hypothesis, which states that variation in the...

Application of research on learning to college teaching: ecological examples.(Education)
November 1, 2003... Encouraged by improvements in the quality of science education since the 1960s, cognitive researchers are testing and applying theory-based research on learning in science classrooms. To introduce faculty to research on cognition and learning,...

Current understanding of succession.
November 1, 2003... Primary Succession and Ecosystem Rehabilitation. Lawrence R. Walker and Roger del Moral. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom, 2003. 456 pp., illus. $130.00 (ISBN 0521800765 cloth). Natural and anthropogenic disturbances to...

Farmers and scientists working together to improve crops.
November 1, 2003... Farmers, Scientists, and Plant Breeding: Integrating Knowledge and Practice. David A. Cleveland and Daniela Soleri, eds. CABI Publishing, Wallingford, United Kingdom, 2002. 368 pp. $100.00 (ISBN 0851995853 cloth). By examining crop...

City life.
November 1, 2003... Understanding Urban Ecosystems: A New Frontier for Science and Education. Alan R. Berkowitz, Charles H. Nilon, and Karen S. Hollweg, eds. Springer-Verlag, New York, 2002. 523 pp., illus. $49.95 (ISBN 0387952373 paper). Biologists have...

New titles.
November 1, 2003... Birds, Scythes and Combines: A History of Birds and Agricultural Change. Michael Shrubb. Cambridge University Press, New York, 2003. 371 pp., illus. $50.00 (ISBN 0521814634 cloth). A Brain for All Seasons: Human Evolution and Abrupt Climate...

Announcing the BioScience bulk-purchase program for AIBS member societies and organizations.(AIBS news)
November 1, 2003... AIBS member societies and organizations looking to provide their own individual members with additional, low-cost benefits are invited to participate in the new BioScience bulk-purchase program. Details. AIBS will provide a 12 month print...

2003 AIBS salary survey results.(AIBS news)
November 1, 2003... E-mail invitations to participate in the survey were sent during the summer of 2003 to (a) AIBS members, (b) subscribers to The Scientist magazine, and (c) members of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Usable responses...

Plan to participate: 2004 Congressional Visits Day.(AIBS news)
November 1, 2003... The Science, Engineering, aim Technology Working Group, a cross-disciplinary coalition of professional societies and organizations (including AIBS), has announced that its annually sponsored Congressional Visits Day (CVD) will be held 3-4 March...

Register now for the 2004 AIBS Annual Meeting on invasive species.(AIBS news)
November 1, 2003... Registration for the 2004 AIBS Annual Meeting is now live online at www.aibs. org/annual meeting/. The meeting is being held 16-18 March 2004 at the Westin Grand Hotel, 2350 M Street NW, Washington, DC 20037. Seating is limited; don't delay in...

Draft report from IBRCS NEON coordination and implementation conference now open for public comment.(AIBS news)
November 1, 2003... AIBS seeks comments from the biological community on the draft IBRCS (Infrastructure for Biology at Regional to Continental Scales) report on the co ordination and implementation of the National Ecological Observatory Net work (NEON). The...

Recent public policy reports online at www.aibs.org.(AIBS news)
November 1, 2003... Public Policy Report for 14 October 2003 * White House Office of Science and Technology Policy seeking input from research community on research business models; fall workshops announced * ACTION ALERT: Help sustain funding for the...

Calendar of meetings.(Calendar)
November 1, 2003... November 2-5 24th Annual Meeting of the American College of Toxicology, Washington, DC; www.actox.org/ regpkt24/index.html 2-5 2003 Joint Annual Meeting of the Entomological Societies of Canada and British Columbia, Kelowna, British...

British biologists form Biosciences federation.(BioBriefs)
November 1, 2003... A new biological organization, the Biosciences Federation, was officially launched in mid-September in Britain's House of Lords. The federation brings together 26 biology societies representing 60,000 biologists into a single association that...

Welcome.
November 1, 2003... Science and technology, particularly the new genetic and reproductive technologies, are breathtaking in their novelty and promise. They allow us to make and manipulate human life in startling new ways, and most of us are committed to the values...

Fact or fiction?
November 1, 2003... Also see Fact or Fiction at www.pbs/org/bloodlines. Advances in biomedicine--particularly in genetic and reproductive technology--often seem like science fiction. Explore your assumptions and test your knowledge by playing this simple game....

1 Who is a parent?
November 1, 2003... Relates to "Who is a parent?" in BLOODLINES (in 02:08/out 25:44) BL00DLINES tells the story of an infertile couple desperate to have a child. After many failed attempts at in vitro fertilization (in vitro is Latin for in dish, as opposed...

2 What is a family?
November 1, 2003... Relates to "Who is a parent?" in BLOODLINES (in 02:08/out 25:44) You are a 20-year-old female college student, In the college paper, you read an advertisement recruiting young women to become egg donors for infertile couples. You answer...

3 What kind of children should there be?
November 1, 2003... Relates to Who is a parent? in BLOODLINES (in 02:08/out 25:44) You and your spouse have been trying to have a baby for years. After three miscarriages, your doctor recommends in vitro fertilization, in which your eggs are fertilized with...

4 What is human?
November 1, 2003... Relates to What is human? in BLOODLINES (in 25:45/out 39:59) Stuart Newman, a developmental biologist, has applied for a patent to make a human/chimp combination, or "chimera," by mixing human embryonic cells with those of a chimpanzee. As...

5 Who owns your body?
November 1, 2003... Relates to What is human? in BLOODLINES (in 25:45/out 39:59) You are a 25-year old medical student with a promising future--that is, until one afternoon you are hit by a car and end up in the hospital with severe internal injuries. Unable...

6 Who has rights?
November 1, 2003... Relates to Who has rights? in BLOODLINES (in 40:00/out 53:25) BLOODLINES tells the story of Dave Escher and Gary Avary, railway maintenance workers and loyal employees of the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway (BNSF) for over 25 years....

7 Who has responsibility?
November 1, 2003... Relates to Who has rights? in BLOODLINES (in 40:00/out 53:25) You are a family doctor seeing a 55-year-old mother of three grown boys. Six months ago, when she complained of being distracted, clumsy and "out of sorts," you ran a number of...