Scientific American Magazine

The trend of events in weaponry and in arms control tends to refute arguments presented a decade ago against a limited nuclear-test ban and to indicate that the time may be ripe for a comprehensive test ban

The anterior pituitary gland, which controls the peripheral endocrine glands, is itself regulated by "releasing factors" originating in the brain. Two of these hormones have now been isolated and synthesized

By using an electron beam to trace the patterns of electronic circuits it should soon be possible to put 100,000 transistors and similar devices on a silicon chip a few millimeters square

Similarities between the fossils found in widely separated areas led to the first theories of continental drift. Today's advocates of plate-tectonic theory are also supported by the fossil record

The complex and permanent social organization of these insects is maintained by interactions among a great nlany individuals. Each individual, however, can alter its behavior only slightly

Do people of one culture perceive a picture differently from people of another? Experiments in Africa show that such differences exist, and that the perception of pictures calls for some form of learning

Comparison of Chartres and Bourges by optical stress analysis relates the aesthetic achievement to structural imperatives and suggests that later Gothic cathedrals may have been patterned on the wrong building

An electron in an atom can be briefly replaced with another particle. The resulting new atom yields information on the nature of the nucleus