General Interest (Cultural) Articles from Scientific American

Readings from Scientific American

General Interest (Cultural)
1/52	66	"Father of Aviation Medicine." Olmsted; the development of Aviation medicine which deals with the behavior of the human body at high altitudes.
2/52	60	"Mongolism." Ingalls; new studies and experiments suggest that mongolism and other congenital defects may someday be prevented.
2/52	68	"Man's Genetic Future." Stern; ponders the question of what man will be like in the future genetically.
4/52	31	"Schizophrenic Art: A Case Study." Bettelheim; deals with the successful treatment of a child who lost both of her parents and developed schizophrenia.
4/52	49	"The Progress of Antibiotics." Raper; how the discovery of penecillin, followed by the discovery of other anti-biotics, has revolutionized medicine.
6/52	22	"The Eradication of Malaria." Russell; Deals with Italy and how she has succeeded in preventing the disease.
6/52	66	"Plant Cancer." Braun; studies with tumorous growths of plants and how it is analogous to malignant animal tumors.
7/52	58	"Lethal Heredity." Hollander; dealing with the hidden recessive genes in most people and how the mating with another carrier could bring lethal affects to our off-spring.
10/52	32	"The Diphtheria Toxin." Pappenheimer; the substance secreted by the diphtheria bacillus is one of the most potent poisons known; how does it work?
11/52	26	"A New Era in Polio Research." Melnick; the virus, before only grown in monkeys by an expensive and inconvenient procedure, now is easily cultivated in a test tube.
11/52	66	"Client-Centered Psychotherapy." Rogers; New approaches to treatment of troubled and neurotic people.
8/54	60	"Tsunamis." Bernstein; discusses the origin and characteristics of tidal waves.
12/54	88	"The Ultimate Atom." Corben and DeBenedett; discusses the combination of an electron and positron to form an atomic particle called a 'positronium'.
1/55	25	"Are Scientists Different?" Terman; interesting study to determine the different traits which set scientists apart from nonscientists.
4/55	58	"Man Viewed as a Machine." Kemeny; claims by students of computing machinery that they can build devices that are capable of learning and reproduction. This leads to the question of whether man is only a machine.
6/55	58	"James Clerk Maxwell." Newman; an account of the life and works of this great theoretical physicist including his theory of the electromagnetic field.
3/56	42	"Experiments in Protein Synthesis." Ernest Gale; early speculation on what mechanism arranges amino acids into the proper sequence of a given protein.
5/56	109	"Stick and Slip." Ernest Rabinowiez; an account for the squeak of bearings and many other sounds of daily life.
12/57	143	"The Amateur Scientist" story and history of Robert Stroud, the 'birdman of Alcatraz.'
6/58	115	How to make a pendulum that will demonstrate the rotation of the earth.
7/58	108	How a Kansas amateur group counts meteors by reflection of radio waves.
1/59	46	"Dying Stars." Myths and theories about what is happening to stars that are or already have exhausted their supply of nuclear fuel.
1/59	121	"A Witness in the Scopes Trial." One small step for the theory of evolution.
3/59	72	"The Weak Interactions." The recognition of the fourth force of physics - electromagnetism.
5/59	149	"Artificial Satellites and the Theory of Relativity." Satellites test Einstein's theories.
5/59	175	"The Amateur Scientist." How to recreate the apparatus with which the charge of the electron was measured.
6/59	60	"An Ancient Greek Computer." A mechanism over 2,000 years old that was an astronomical calculator.
7/60	142	"Things that Go Faster Than Light." Rothman; Phenomena which propagate at a speed greater than that of light in a vacuum.
3/61	94	"Gravity." by George Gamow. One of the most familiar forces in nature, it is also one of the most mysterious.
1/63	48	"The Structure of Viruses." Home; Electron micrographs of viruses show 3 principle types of structural symmetry, assembled from a limited number of building blocks.
3/63	43	"Organic Matter from Space." Mason; Organized hydrocarbons and elements found in meteorites may be remnants of life or more possibly non-biological carbon compounds formed early in solar system history.
3/63	80	"The Genetic Code: II." Nirenberg; How the sequence of nitrogenous bases in DNA is transcribed and translated into the formation of proteins.
4/63	104	See Category 1.
5/63	100	"Pheromones." Wilson; How these secreted substances are important in animal communication.
7/63	54	"Sex Differences in Cells." Mittwoch; the chromosomes, as well as other cell structures, differ by sex. These differences are discussed as clues to the processes that determine divergence of the sexes.
10/63	46	"Foreign Nucleic Acids." Isaacs; details the role of the protein Interferon in the protection of a cell against all foreign nucleic acids. (Relate to current research).
11/63	96	"Aspirin." Collier; discussion of the history of the drug as well as its mode of action in counteracting the body's defense mechanisms of fever, pain, and inflammation.
4/64	29	"The Hallucinogenic Drugs." Barron; drugs that alter a person's ego can be permanently damaging.
7/64	66	"The Thymus Hormone." Levey; blood cells produced in the thymus produce antibodies.
12/64	106	"How Cells Make Antibodies." Nossal; genes control the manufacturing of antibodies.
11/65	75	"The Reversal of Tumour Growth." Armin C. Braun; the I spontaneous remission1 of some malignant cell types to normal growth is hypothesized to be a function of repression and activation of sets of genes.
12/65	28	"Violations of Symmetry in Physics." Eugene P. Wigner; I don't understand this one well enough to describe it, but anyone really into physics should find it fascinating. Nobel Prize Winner.
4/66	122	"The Amateur Scientist." Stong; details on how to use animal cells in living tissue culture.
6/66	21	"The Health of the American People." Linder; details the new techniques developed to assess the nation's health problems.
3/67	114	"Advances in Superconducting Magnets." Sampson; discussion of the practical means that have been developed for superconducting magnets.
4/67	28	"The Induction of Cancer by Viruses." Dulbecco; how viruses of known animal cancers cause cells to become cancerous.
8/67	96	"Robert Boyle." Hall; discussion of how Boyle was the founder of the experimental method.
11/67	62	"Lysosomes and Disease." Allison; the role of lysosomes in the normal life process and their functions in pathological process are discussed.
12/67	19	"Infectious Drug Resistance." Watanabe; how bacterica can become suddenly resistant to certain antibacterial drugs and how this resistance can be transferred from one strain to another by an "episome."
12/67	36	"X-Ray Stars." Giacconi; discussion of how some stars are strong sources of x-rays.
1/68	115	"Perpetual Motion Machines." Angrist; outlines the history of the development of the laws of work and the second law of thermodynamics, while giving fascinating examples of perpetual motion machines designed through the ages and why they violate these laws.
3/68	32	"Human Cells and Aging." Hayflick; attempts to correlate the phenomenon of the deterioration of cell culture growth as seen in the in-vitro cell division, with the process of aging.
6/68	50	"Standards of Measurement." Astin; the history of defining precise and reproducible standards for length, mass, time and temperature.
11/68	124	"The Aerodynamics of Boomerangs." Hess; explains the phenomena observed in this instrument's use through aerodynamic principles.
1/69	98	"The Control of Vibration and Noise." T. P. Yin; includes discussion of sounds generated by vibrating objects.
2/69	15	"The End of the Monkey War." L. S. de Camp; reports on the history of legal restraints against the teaching of evolution; the final Supreme Court decision being then 3 months old.
3/69	93	"Plague Toxin." S. Kadis, T. C. Nontie, and S. J. Ajl; the protein toxin from the bacillus that caused the "Black Death" is analyzed.
6/69	40	"Wound Healing." R. Ross; a variety of cells are involved in the process.
7/69	38	"Porphyria and King George III." I Macalpine and R. Hunter; the British King at the time of the American Revolution was sick, not insane.
7/69	122	"The Metabolic Rate of Small Animals is Measured in Home-Made Apparatus." (The Amateur Scientist.) C. L. Stong.
8/69	101	"The Weddell Seal." G. L. Koozmnn; under-ice nagivation during arctic night.
9/69		Entire issue on the Oceans.
1/70	58	"The Shapes of Organic Molecules." Lambert; certain molecules can take various forms by rotations around chemical bonds.
2/70	68	"Particles that Go Faster than Light." Feinberg; they have not been discovered, but there are reasons to believe they may exist.
5/70	78	"Intercellular Communication." Loewenstein; it appears that junctions between living cells can pass relatively large molecules.
1/71	26	"Stress and Behavior." Seymour Levin; explains how hormones regulate responses to stress, which may indicate that effective behavior depends on some optimum level of stress.
1/71	96	"The Origins of Hypodermic Medication." Normari Howard-Jones; how injection of drugs are taken for granted, originally used for the relief of local pain, but now?
3/71	26	"Enzymes Bound to Artificial Matrices." Klaus Moskach; explains how enzymes bound to matrices act as biocatalysts in industry and offer a new medical tool.
4/71	83	"Superconductivity at High Pressure." N. B. Brandt and N. I. Ginzburg; pressure may raise the superconductive temperature of metals.
4/71	104	"Mapping of Human Chromosomes." Victor A. Mckusick; where are the genes for man , 5 traits positioned on his 23 prs. of chromosomes?
5/71	22	"The Detection of Gravitational Waves." Joseph Webber; such waves are predicted by relativity, experiments demonstrate that they are emitted from direction of galactic center. Not since confirmed, as of 5/79.
6/71	60	"The Structure of the Proton and Neutron." Henry W. Kendall and Wolfgang Panofsky; explains that they just may consist of smaller bodies.
6/71	92	"Endemic Goiter." R. Bruce Gilbie; has a long historic record, and the record indicates that many people still suffer from it.
10/71	14	"The Physiology of Starvation." Vernon R. Young and Nevin S. Scrimshaw; studies of fasting objects clarify the body's nutritional needs.
10/71	96	"The Measurement of the'Man-Day'." Eugene S. Ferguson; explains how scholars have tried to measure the muscular input of an 'honest day's work.'
11/71	114	"Mathematical Games." Martin Gardner; worth walking over to the library for a try! (final solutions in 12/71 p. 99).
1/72	24	"RNA-Directed DNA Synthesis." Temin; in certain cancer-causing animal viruses genetic information flows in reverse.
2/72	84	"The Physiology of Meditation." Wallace and Benson; study shows physiological changes associated with meditation.
10/75	29	"Final Steps in Secretion." Satir; various mechanisms of secretion, theories based on cell membrane structure and formation.
1/77	50	"The Antibody Combining Site." J. D. Capra and A. B. Edmundson; key-in-lock stucture determination.
4/77	42	"The Status of Interferon." D. C. Burke; a progress report of research on a protein that defends cells from viruses.
3/77	62	"Cancer Immunology." L. J. Olds; why does the immune system sometimes attack cancer cells?
6/77	100	"The Lesson of Retrolental Fibroplasia." W. A. Suverman; an epidemic amongst premature infants, caused by excessive oxygen, a "parable of issues in medical experimentation."
8/77	120	"A New Kind of Cipher that Would Take Millions of Years to Break." (Mathematical Games) N. Gardner; a good introduction to a fascinating field - more important in the coming era of electronic mail.
11/77	129	"The Program of Fertilization." D. Epel; the events following fusion of sperm and egg that prevent multiple sperm fusions and that initiate development.
1/78	86	"How Bacteria Stick." J. W. Costerton , G. G. Geesy, and K.-J. Cheng; fiber coatings on uncultured bacteria help them to stick to a desirable surface.
2/78	117	"The Genetics of Human Cancer." C. M. Croce and H. Koprowski; the identification of specific aberrant chromosomes.
3/78	58	"The Electronic Telephone." P. P. Luff; recent advances begin to have impact.
4/78	154	"The Physics and Chemistry Underlying the Infinite Charm of Candle Flame." (Amateur Scientist) J. Walker.
5/78	140	"Junctions Between Living Cells." L. A. Staehelin and B. E. Hull; impressive electron microscopy of the details.
6/78	106	"The Shaping of Tissues in Embryos." R. Gordon and A. G. Jacobson; computer simulations shed light on the forces involved.
7/78	112	"Synthetic-Membrane Technology." H. P. Gregor and C. D. Gregor; mostly membranes for filtering and desalination, rather than imitations of cell membranes.
9/78		Whole issue on Evolution.
10/78	154	"Pattern Formation in Biological Development" L. Wolpert; relation between gene expression and cell locations within the embryo.
11/78	62	"The Assembly of a Virus." P. J. G. Butler and A. Klug; tobacco-mosaic virus assembly of protein with RNA is unexpectedly complex.'
1/79	48	"The Assembly of Cell Membranes." Lodish and Rothman; how the inside is kept different from the outside; involves a lot of biophysics and biochemistry that should be familiar by itself.
2/79	134	"Genes that Violate Mendel's Rules." Crow; some genes subvert the reshuffling process of sexual reproduction to favor their own propagation.
4/79	120	"Teratomas and Chimeras." K. Ihlmansee and L. C. Stevens; superb article about fascinating research; mice grown from cells of different embryos and cancers demonstrate reversibility of malignant transformation.
7/79	48	"The Epstein-Barr Virus." W. Henk, G. Heule, and E. T. Lennette; mono and cancers.
8/79	40	"Bacterial Tests for Potential Carcinogens." R. Devoret; DNA damage and repair mechanisms.
6/79	57	"External Human Fertilization." C. Grobstein; a brief discussion of the biochemistry of"test-tube babies" and an excellent discussion on the ethical issues based on the biology.
12/79	178	"The Physics and chemistry of a failed sauce bearnaise." J. Walker (Amateur Scientist).
3/80	102	"Diseases caused by Impaired Communication Among Cells." E. Rubenstein, receptor sites.
5/80	168	"The N-Ray Affair." Irving M. Klotz; early in this century an eminent physicist discovered a new kind of radiation. It was imaginary.
6/60	47	"Genetic Amniocentesis." Fritz Fuchs. Hereditary disorders are detected by sampling the fluid that surrounds the fetus in the uterus.
7/80	118	"Supercoiled DNA." William R. Bauer, F.H. C. Crick and James H. White; the double helix can itself form a helix, a matter of much biological and mathematical interest.
10/80	47	"Health Maintenance Organizations." Ernest W. Saward and Scott Fleming; endorsed by the federal government a decade ago, HMO's are slowly gaining today.
11/80	70	"The Discovery of a Gravitational Lens." Frederic H. Chaffee, Jr.; two images of a single quasar are produced by a galaxy between the quasar and our galaxy.
4/81	41	"Catastrophic Releases of Radioactivity." Steven A. Fetter and Kosta Tsipis; the worst reactor accident could not be as bad as a single nuclear weapon explosion.
6/81	194	"The physics and chemistry of the lemon meringue pie." Jearl Walker (Amateur Scientist).
9/81		Entire issue on Industrial Microbiology
10/81	54	"The Patient Record in Epidemiology." Leonard T. Kurland and Craig A. Molgaard; the records of the Mayo Clinic have been very useful, in large part because of the way they are organized.
11/81	154	"The Lining of the Small Intestine." Florence Moog; active transport, not just diffusion.
2/82	150	"Henry A. Rowland." A. D. Moore; Rowland was the founder of the physics department at Johns Hopkins; a superb experimental physicist of the 19th century.
3/82	18	"Is the genetic code an arbitrary one, or would another code work as well?" Douglas R. Hofstadter (Metamagical Themas); an elegant discussion of the logic of cellular biochemistry.
3/82	80	"Oncogenes." J. Michael Bishop; cancer-causing genes in viruses and in normal cells.
4/82	120	"Variations in Medical Care Among Small Areas." John Wennberg and Alan Gittelsohn; impact of physicians' preferences on medical procedures used and the resulting expenses.

Dick Piccard revised this file (http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~piccard/scientam/culture.html) on April 25, 1999.

Please E-mail comments and suggestions to piccard@ohio.edu.