Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!munnari!otc!metro!ipso!runx!jon From: jon@runx.ips.oz (Jonathon Seymour) Newsgroups: sci.bio Subject: Nature Articles. Anyone read them? Message-ID: <1628@runx.ips.oz> Date: 1 Jul 88 12:02:44 GMT Organization: RUNX Un*x Timeshare. Sydney, Australia. Lines: 40 I'm after issue dates for two issues of Nature which have been referred to recently in the Sydney Morning Herald. The first article is about a discovery made by Prof. Paul Schimmel, a professor of biochemistry and biophysics at MIT. It centres around what Schimmel thinks is a second, more primitive genetic code which performs some of the functions of DNA. It was referred to in an article in the SMH on May 17th this year as "appearinging in this week's issue of ... Nature ". Given the media's propensity for distorting reality in order to squeeze it between the cigarette advertisements I wouldn't be at all suprised if the article is a few months old. Today another interesting article was referred to in the SMH. This time the subject was a controversial experiment which seemed to show that "the immune system's antibodies can work even when the solution they are in is so diluted that no antibody molecules are left in it". Powerful stuff. What's more: "the result...was particularly objectionable because it tends to support homeopathy - the discredited practice of using herbs and oils 'attuned' to organs in order to cure ailments in them.....The authors said that shaking the solution for 10 seconds was essential; failure to shake it resulted in a failed experiment" Stories like this last one no doubt excite people involved intimately with the field. For me, a person who has to take a tractor to the monthly issue of Scientific American to plough through to the end, such stories have a quaintly destabilising effect on the keel of my belief system. A Mr. J. Benveniste of the French Medical Research Council was the Chief Author of the report, which appeared in Nature. This story sounds as if it would get into the paper even if a shuttle blew up. So it probably is this week's news. My local library (the Mitchell Library, no less) is about two months behind publication in the issues of Nature. Is there anyone with a more uptodate collection? I would be interested in hearing peoples comments about the two articles I have mentioned. jon.