Issues in Science and Technology articles from June 2006

Issues in Science and Technology archives from June 2006

Nuclear amnesia.(Letter to the editor)
June 22, 2006... Jack Mendelsohn is certainly right about "nuclear amnesia" ("Delegitimizing Nuclear Weapons," Issues, Spring 2006). Even in official administration documents, there is a rather casual attitude about the possibility of using nuclear weapons in...

Respect for China.(science and technology policy)
June 22, 2006... In "Don't "Dis" Chinese Science" (Issues, Spring 2006), Alexander P. De Angelis characterizes the U.S. government's apparatus for focusing on China's science and technology (S & T) policy as "woefully inadequate and scattered." It is not the...

Iran's nuclear threat.(Letter to the editor)
June 22, 2006... "Controlling Iran's Nuclear Program" by Joseph Cirincione (Issues, Spring 2006) makes little mention of the two issues that today motivate all Iranian factions to want nuclear weapons. The first is the fear of attack by the United States, given...

Aquaculture and the environment.(FORUM)
June 22, 2006... As a team leader working "on the ground" of a major interdisciplinary, multi-institutional effort to demonstrate the technological feasibility of offshore aquaculture in the southeastern United States and Caribbean regions, I would like to...

Genetic testing.(FORUM)
June 22, 2006... The subject of "Federal Neglect: Regulation of Genetic Testing," by Gail H. Javitt and Kathy Hudson (Issues, Spring 2006) is clearly an important one as advances in genetics and genomics contribute to the development of new genetic tests and...

Taxes and highways.(FORUM)(Department of Transportation's annual highway capital spending needs )(Cover story)
June 22, 2006... As the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation concluded in its November 2005 report, the only real problem facing the gas tax at present is that it has been 13 years since it was last adjusted. Since 1993, it has lost 30% of its purchasing power....

Ethanol futures.(FORUM)(federal funding for research, development, and demonstration)
June 22, 2006... The centerpiece of a stronger national commitment to expanding domestic ethanol production must be sustained and adequate federal funding for research, development, and demonstration (RD & D) of biorefineries and related technologies. Federal...

Protecting the West.(FORUM)(Bureau of Land Management)
June 22, 2006... From my perspective, "Protecting the Best of the West" by Wendy Vanasselt and Christian Layke (Issues, Spring 2006) appears to touch on many of the issues that beset the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The BLM is an agency charged with...

Regulatory regime for greenhouse gases discussed.(FROM THE HILL)(Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee)
June 22, 2006... The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee held an all-day conference on April 4 on the issues involved in creating a program to regulate the greenhouse gases that cause climate change. Among other issues, the committee examined whether...

Effectiveness of Project Bioshield examined.(FROM THE HILL)
June 22, 2006... A hearing in early April of the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Health highlighted continuing congressional concerns that the country's program to combat the possible use of biological, chemical, and radiological weapons...

Senate bill would raise H-1B visa quotas.(FROM THE HILL)
June 22, 2006... Shortly before departing for the Memorial Day recess, the Senate passed a comprehensive immigration bill (S. 2611) that would raise the existing H-1B non-immigrant visa quota from the current 65,000 to 115,000 annually and increase that number...

Congress attempts to rein in earmarks.(lobbying reform bill)
June 22, 2006... In the wake of recent lobbying scandals, leaders in both chambers of Congress are attempting to control the number of earmarks introduced into bills after conference. The habit of inserting earmarks late in the legislative game has increased...

Let engineers go to college.(engineering education)
June 22, 2006... The challenges that engineers will face in the 21st century will require them to broaden their outlooks, have more flexible career options, and work closely and effectively with people of quite different backgrounds. Yet engineering education...

A healthy mind for a healthy population: the U.S. health care system must pay more attention to providing quality care to people with mental problems or substance-use conditions.
June 22, 2006... Each year, more than 33 million U.S. residents receive health care for mental problems and/or for conditions resulting from the use of alcohol, illegal drugs, or prescription medications. The total comprises approximately 20% of working-age...

New nukes: the Bush administration's plan to use fuel reprocessing as the spark to revive nuclear power will not succeed. Only centralized interim waste storage can make a difference in the near term.
June 22, 2006... For the first time in decades, nuclear power is back on this country's list of possible energy sources. New nuclear power plants are on the drawing board. Public opinion is shifting in favor of nuclear energy. Even some veteran antinuclear...

Nuclear waste and the distant future: regulation of nuclear hazards must be consistent with rules governing other hazardous materials and must balance its risks against those linked to other energy sources.
June 22, 2006... Although most of the radioactive material generated by nuclear energy decays away over short times ranging from minutes to several decades, a small fraction remains radioactive for far longer time periods. Policymakers, responding to public...

Power play: a more reliable U.S. electric system; U.S. utilities have a lot to learn about avoiding power outages. They can benefit from the experience of foreign utilities, other U.S. industries, and even their own nuclear power plants.(Industry overview)
June 22, 2006... The United States ranks toward the bottom among developed nations in terms of the reliability of its electricity service. Catastrophic events, such as the August 14, 2003, blackout that put 50 million people in the dark, are well known, but...

Natural gas: the next energy crisis? The United States has long been "addicted" to foreign oil. But we now risk becoming dependent on foreign natural gas as well.
June 22, 2006... The day after President Bush's State of the Union address on January 31, 2006, the headline in many U.S. newspapers and in the electronic media was: "America Addicted to Oil." Indeed, a major newsworthy section of the speech was the president's...

The Pentagon's Defense Review: not ready for prime time; The quadrennial review fails to realign the military to defend against new threats or reorder funding priorities to meet those threats.
June 22, 2006... The trouble with our times is that the future is not what it used to be. This witty observation by 19th century French poet Paul Valery captures precisely the ever-changing nature of today's global security environment. Consider the events and...

Dee-fense! Dee-fense!: preparing for pandemic flu; Federal research, economic incentives for industry, and a more responsive regulatory regime will all be necessary to produce a timely and widely available vaccine.
June 22, 2006... Vaccination to prevent viral and bacterial diseases is modern medicine's most cost-effective intervention. Were a vaccine to be available quickly after the onset of the widely predicted pandemic from an H5N1 strain of avian influenza, it might...

Containing the fire.(American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of Robert Oppenheimer)(Book review)
June 22, 2006... American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin. New York: Vintage, 2005, 721 pp. Now that American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin...

Transport II.(ARCHIVES)
June 22, 2006... Transport II shows a theoretical simulation of the flow pattern for electrons traveling over a nanoscale landscape. The total area seen here corresponds in size to a typical bacterium and represents the tracks of about 200,000 individual...