Council for the Advancement of Science Writing

A new generation of nuclear power technology seeks to transform one of the industry's most enduring problems--its radioactive waste--into an energy solution... from /National Geographic News/

Preemptive removal of breasts or ovaries in women with two common breast cancer genes can sharply reduce the risk of contracting cancer and dying, even if a woman has already been diagnosed with breast cancer, a new study confirms... from the /Los Angeles Times/ (Registration Required)

Milk is well known as a great dietary source of protein and calcium, not to mention an indispensable companion to cookies. But "nature's perfect food," a label given to milk over time by a variety of boosters, including consumer activists, government nutritionists and the American Dairy Council, has become a great source of controversy, too... from /Scientific American/

For the past 46 years, biologists have used a theory to make sense of how animal societies evolve. But in the latest issue of the journal /Nature/, a team of prominent evolutionary biologists at Harvard try to demolish the theory... from the /New York Times/ (Registration Required)

Quantum hackers have performed the first 'invisible' attack on two commercial quantum cryptographic systems. By using lasers on the systems--which use quantum states of light to encrypt information for transmission--they have fully cracked their encryption keys, yet left no trace of the hack... from /Nature News/

Federal officials said last week that they will appeal a judge's ruling that seriously curtailed federally funded embryonic stem-cell research. [1] Meanwhile, the National Institutes of Health told anxious researchers that if they have already received federal money this year, they can keep doing their stem-cell experiments. ... [1] http://ow.ly/2uyuC

It was officially confirmed last week that U.S. military computers suffered the "most significant breach" ever in a 2008 episode [1], according to the /New York Times/. A foreign agent reportedly used a flash drive to infect computers, including those used by the Central Command in overseeing combat zones in Iraq and Afghanistan. ... [1] http://ow.ly/2vGXj

It was reported last week that the Kepler Telescope may have spotted a planet about the size of Earth [1] orbiting a star 2,000 light-years away. This was the first announcement of a candidate Earth-size planet by the Kepler mission, one of more than 700 candidate planets announced in June. ... [1] http://ow.ly/2vGF5

Last week researchers in South Africa reported finding what could be the earliest evidence of human-made arrows [1], in the form of stone points that date back 64,000 years. ... [1] http://ow.ly/2vH3f

New evidence suggests that the capacity of plants to absorb carbon could be on the decline [1]. As global temperatures have risen in recent decades, the amount of atmospheric carbon being converted into plant biomass has increased. So researchers said this new finding comes as a surprise. ... [1] http://ow.ly/2tkTq

Coverage of various studies engenders frustration

Fresh wave of articles highlight uncertainty about lingering oil

Day Two stories go a step farther in drawing connection to climate change

A few weeks ago, while I was on vacation, the *San Jose Mercury News*’s *Paul Rogers* sent me the link to a piece he considers pretty important [1]. It is about revoking Proposition 32, now law, which would happen if another Proposition -  23 – on the November ballot passes. This measure, sponsored mainly by the Velero and Tesoro oil refiners of Texas, would suspend California laws and regulations compelling industry and the citizenry generally to emit less fossil carbon in coming years – returning to 1990 levels by 2020. They would stay suspended until

Just one popular media reporter, far as I can tell,  has so far perked up at news that an often-cited trophic cascade in Yellowstone Park, one embraced by partisans of reintroducing wolves to the area a few decades back, may not have happened.  At the *Bozeman Chronicle*, *Daniel Perso*n explains it without once foisting the term “trophic cascade” [1] on his Montana readers (I think he might better  have slipped it in, just for edification). It’s not a long story but important for public update on what had become a minor scripture among groups hoping to

One finds a funny little juxtaposition in *The Times* in the UK when paying the small fee to read its *Eureka* science magazine today [1]. First, it is getting a tremendous reaction, in number of stories if not their heft, in other outlets by reporting the bejeezus out of the part about God in Stephen Hawking’s upcoming book, /The Grand Design/ [2], co-written by Caltech physicist and author Leonard Mlodinow (pub. date next week). Thanks to the infinite possibilities of M-theory, it appears, the world’s best known physicist declares there is no reason to

How many stories do we have to read about overmedicated kids? And why on earth, if the *New York Times* felt the need to do yet another one, would it feature the thing so prominently? I’m referring to *Duff Wilson*’s “Child’s Ordeal Shows Risk of Psychosis Drugs for Young [1]” in today’s paper. I’ll save you the trouble of reading this 2,000-word monster. Here’s what it says: Some doctors are too quick to give drugs to kids who don’t need them. Is that front-page news? Some doctors are too quick to give drugs to 80-year-olds, too, or

Lots of reporters have written about the clear dividing lines among orcas, or killer whales. Some eat fish, some eat seals and sea lions. Some residents stick around one restricted spot, others are transients ranging widely across the sea.  Spots and fin sizes are different. Sub-species they seem to be, at the least. *BBC*’s *Matt Walker* is out today with a report [1], picked up from Danish researchers and the journal /Biology Letters/, that in Antarctica at least two such orca populations appears so genetically different that they either are, or are moving rapidly

The UCLA School of Public Health is trying to get rid of epidemiologist James Enstrom, and the media is taking notice. Enstrom [1] has made news before. In 2003, Enstrom co-authored a paper, which looked at a 100,000-person cohort over almost 40 years and concluded that second hand smoke was no big deal (British Medical Journal, 326, 1057 - 1061 [2], 2003). The study was partly funded by the tobacco industry and roundly pooh-poohed by the British Medical Association (which publishes the BMJ) and the American Cancer Society. [See our story [3]from 2003]. More

As the effects [1] of a stop on government funding for human embryonic stem cell research continue to reverberate, medical researchers are taking a stand. In a full page ad that will appear 3 September in the Washington Post, the Association of American Medical Colleges [2] (AAMC) urges Congress to pass legislation ensuring federal funding for stem cell research. Signed by the deans of 75 medical colleges, the ad states that “unless this research is allowed to resume immediately, important momentum will be lost.” The ad lists many of the diseases that could potentially receive treatment with

Nearly a month ago the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center [1] placed 90-percent odds that the current hurricane season would be more active than normal. Things seemed quiet for a while, but the Atlantic Ocean has come through in the past week or so, churning out Danielle, Earl, Fiona and now Gaston (the last three are visible in the accompanying satellite image). Danielle wandered the high seas [2] before petering out, threatening only an expedition to the Titanic [3]. Earl battered a few islands in the Caribbean and is now menacing

Foreign students are turning away from Australia. According to new numbers from the nation’s Department of Immigration and Citizenship [1], applications for student visas have dropped by 11.5% in the 2009-10 academic year. The drop mirrors a decline in the number of foreign students studying in Australia, which has fallen by roughly 16% to roughly 270,000 this year. The National Tertiary Education Union [2], the country’s main union for academic staff, says that tightened immigration rules and campus attacks on foreign students have led to the declines. If they continue, they will soon threaten

On 2 September, the same day that BP began removing [1] the failed Deepwater Horizon blowout preventer, an oil production platform to the west exploded and caught fire, causing one injury. The platform is in comparatively shallow waters (150 m deep), 160 km off the coast of Vermilion Bay in Louisiana and early reports are that it is not currently producing product. At the time of the explosion, the platform had 13 crewmembers on board; all were evacuated and have been accounted for. There are no reports of any oil leaking from the platform, which

No better place to commence this new column on science writing for science writers than with some optimism about clearing up our profession's cloudy future. Literally cloudy, according to Dot Earth's Andrew Revkin, who discusses what he calls "cloud financing" of investigative work by science journalists. Revkin's example is a Nov. 9 New York Times piece by Lindsey Hoshaw on vast trash heaps in the ocean.