The Real Cost of Energy
Bringing market prices in line with energy's hidden burdens will be one of the great challenges of the coming decades
Features
The Structure of Quasicrystals
Quasicrystals are neither uniformly ordered like crystals nor amorphous like glasses. Many features of quasicrystals can be explained, but their atomic structure remains a mystery...
Molecular Zippers in Gene Regulation
Recurring copies of the amino acid leucine in proteins can serve as teeth that "Zip" two protein molecules together. Such zippering plays a role in turning genes on and off
Collisionless Shock Waves
To many theorists' surprise, shock waves form even in the rarefied material between the planets. These shocks sculpt the space environment and lie at the heart of a variety of astrophysical phenomena...
Hepatitis B Virus
This small, extraordinary virus causes liver diseases and a common form of cancer. New vaccines produced by genetic engineering hold the promise of eventually eradicating both
Photochromic and Photosensitive Glass
Unlike ordinary glass, these glasses respond to light, resulting in structures that find uses in electronics, optics and the decorative arts
How Dinosaurs Ran
Did the giants of the Mesozoic period lumber sluggishly, or were they formidable running machines? Techniques borrowed from modern physics and engineering may give us the answer
Hard Words
How deeply can language be traced? Radical linguists look back to the Stone Age. Traditionalists disagree.
Departments
50 and 100 Years Ago: April 1991
Cold Start
Tracking the Missing Carbon
Seeking Senescence
A Gentler Therapy?
Into the Lattice
Looking for Nothing
Old Masters
A Press Release on Dioxin Sets the Record Wrong
History Lessons
Political Engineer
Love and Terror
A Plague of Plaques
Call and Tell
Is Morse Code Signing off?
Mind Reader
- Letters
Letters to the Editors, April 1991
Erratum
Errata
- Recommended
Books, April 1991
- Mathematical Recreation
Mathematical Recreations, April 1991
- Departments
Gas Vaccine
The Analytical Economist - April, 1991
America' Green Strategy
