Intermediate-Range Nuclear Weapons
Systems of this kind, also known as long-range theater nuclear forces, fall into a "gray area" between tactical and strategic nuclear forces, adding a new dimension to the nuclear-arms race...
Features
Galileo's Sighting of Neptune
He first observed it in 1612 and thought it was a fixed star, some 234 years before it was discovered to be a planet. His data cast doubt on the accuracy of modern orbital calculations for Neptune...
The Cosmic Asymmetry between Matter and Antimatter
It seems the universe today is almost entirely the former. Evidence from both cosmology and particle physics (the study of the universe on the largest scale and the smallest) now suggests an explanation...
Plasmids
These accessory genetic elements in bacteria, best known as carriers of resistance to antibiotics and as vehicles for genetic engineering, are actually subcellular organisms poised on the threshold of life...
Early Man in Soviet Central Asia
In the Tadzhik S.S.R. deep deposits of loess have accumulated over a span of two million years. Stone tools embedded in them were made by hunter-gatherers of the Lower Paleolithic some 250,000 years ago...
Addictive Behavior
Whether the addiction is to drugs, alcohol or tobacco, the problem is self-destructive behavior. One treatment that has succeeded in restoring health is the maintenance of heroin addicts on methadone...
The Escape System of the Cockroach
How does the insect evade the swipe of a hand or the lunge of a toad? The mechanisms by which it does so are a simple model of those that mediate more complex forms of behavior
Mirror Images
The mirror image is not always a faithful reflection: it can be inverted, reversed in handedness or distorted in other ways. The transformations are analyzed through a few basic curved mirrors...
Departments
50 and 100 Years Ago, December 1980
Science and the Citizen, December 1980
- Letters
Letters to the Editors, December 1980
- Recommended
Books, December 1980
- Mathematical Recreation
Mathematical Games, December 1980
- Amateur Scientist
The Amateur Scientist, December 1980
- Departments
The Authors, December 1980
Annual Index 1980
Bibliography, December 1980
