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M A Y 2 0 0 1 Can you believe his eyes or his nose or his smile? Facing the Truth Using Science to Evaluate Expressions Hypertension • DNA’s Machinery • Classroom Design • Molecular Art 18 Touching the Invisible One Molecule at a Time Carlos Bustamante, who took apart toy cars as a boy, is now exploring the machinery of DNA. Cover: Courtesy of Paul Ekman M AY 2 0 0 1 FEATURES VOLUME 14 NUMBER 2 12 Facing the Truth 22 Solving 28 Overcoming the A New Tool to Analyze Hypertension’s Intractable Our Expressions Deadly Puzzle Problem Rick Lifton’s Team at Increasing the Numbers of Yale Is Putting the Pieces Underrepresented Minorities Together in Science 34 N OTA B ENE 2 Awards and Honors 39 Teens Tend to Be Night Owls HHMI TRUSTEES ETTERFROM James A. Baker, III, Esq. L HHMI Awards $15 Million to Senior Partner THE P RESIDENT Baker & Botts European Researchers Alexander G. Bearn, M.D. Executive Officer American Philosophical Society 3 The Other Genome Race Adjunct Professor 40 Untangling the Web of Yeast The Rockefeller University Professor Emeritus of Medicine Protein Interactions Cornell University Medical College Frank William Gay Former President and Chief Executive Officer U P F RONT SUMMA Corporation 41 Vaccination Experiment Casts James H. Gilliam, Jr., Esq. Former Executive Vice President 4 The Human Genome Goes to a Key Guilty Vote Against and General Counsel, Beneficial Corporation Hanna H. Gray, Ph.D., Chairman Amyloid in Alzheimer’s President Emeritus and High School Harry Pratt Judson Distinguished Service Professor of History The University of Chicago 6 Fruit Fly Gene Survey Finds Garnett L. Keith Bringing Biology’s Models to Chairman Correlation Between Aging SeaBridge Investment Advisors, L.L.C. Wall Street and Beyond Former Vice Chairman and and Free Radicals Chief Investment Officer The Prudential Insurance Company of America 8 Jeremy R. Knowles, D.Phil. Shane Crotty Has a Hot Paper Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and a New Biography, Too and Amory Houghton Professor of C LOSE -U P Chemistry and Biochemistry Harvard University William R. Lummis, Esq. Former Chairman of the Board of Directors 42 The Art of Science and Chief Executive Officer P ERSPECTIVE The Howard Hughes Corporation Irving S. Shapiro, Esq., Chairman Emeritus Of Counsel Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom 10 Genetically Modified Crops Former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer O BJECT L ESSON E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Company Anne M. Tatlock Chairman and Chief Executive Officer F ROMTHE T OOLBOX 46 Redesigning Laboratory Fiduciary Trust Company International Classrooms HHMI OFFICERS Thomas R. Cech, Ph.D., President 34 Peter J. Bruns, Ph.D., Vice President for Grants Dam! A New Method and Special Programs for Pinpointing David A. Clayton, Ph.D., Vice President for Science Development I NSIDE HHMI Stephen M. Cohen, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Gene Transcription Joan S. Leonard, Esq., Vice President and General Counsel Gerald M. Rubin, Ph.D., Vice President for Biomedical Research 48 Peter Bruns Seeks to Bind Nestor V. Santiago, Vice President and Chief Investment Officer N EWS & N OTES Science to Education HHMI BULLETIN STAFF David Jarmul, issue editor Kimberly Blanchard, production supervisor BARBARA RIES 35 Fine-Tuning a Blood Pressure Elizabeth Cowley, copy editor H H M I O NLINE Jennifer Donovan, education editor Regulator Patricia Foster, manager of publishing Jim Keeley, science editor Inside Back Cover Dean Trackman, copy editor 36 Medicine and Computing Converge in a New Career RCW Communication Design Inc., publication design Telephone (301) 215 8855 • Fax (301) 215 8863 • www.hhmi.org The Bulletin is published by the HHMI Office of Communications, 37 How Sperm Jump-Starts Robert A. Potter, director. the Embryo © 2001 Howard Hughes Medical Institute LETTERS TO THE EDITOR We invite your comments. Send your letters via e-mail to 38 ‘First Light’ Gives [email protected] or regular mail to Letters, Office of Communications, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, 4000 Jones D.C. Students a Bridge Road, Chevy Chase, MD 20815-6789. We reserve the right to edit for space and clarity. Please also include your name, address Second Chance to (e-mail or postal) and phone number. Discover Science The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by authors 37 in the HHMI Bulletin do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints or official policies of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. N O T A B E N E the 2000 Premio Phoenix-Anni Verdi HHMI President Thomas R. Cech, three award for genetic research from Italy. Thomas M. Jessell, an HHMI investiga- HHMI investigators and two members of tor at Columbia University College of the HHMI Scientific Review Board (SRB) Physicians and Surgeons, received the were elected to the Institute of Medicine Sean B. Carroll, an HHMI investigator at Paul Jansen Prize in Advanced (IOM) of the National Academy of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Biotechnology and Medicine from the Sciences. Investigators Günter Blobel, received the Herbert W. Dickerman Rutgers University Center for Advanced The Rockefeller University; Peter S. Kim, Award from the Wadsworth Center of Biotechnology and Medicine. Whitehead Institute for Biomedical the New York State Department of Research; and Huda Y. Zoghbi, Baylor Health for his contributions to biomed- College of Medicine, will join the IOM, ical research. Susan L. Lindquist, an HHMI investiga- as will SRB members Steven E. Hyman, tor at The University of Chicago, National Institute of Mental Health, and received the Novartis-Drew Award in Thomas J. Kelly, The Johns Hopkins Steven F. Dowdy, an HHMI investigator Biomedical Research, which is given University School of Medicine. They at Washington University School of annually by Drew University and were among 60 new IOM members Medicine, received the first annual Novartis Pharmaceuticals. elected from the United States. Aventis Innovative Investigator Award for his work on protein transduction to deliver drugs, peptides and proteins into Nikola P. Pavletich, an HHMI investiga- HHMI investigators David E. Clapham, cells. tor at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Children’s Hospital, Boston; Mark M. Center, was named one of “20 Young Davis, Stanford University School of Scientists to Watch” in Discover maga- Medicine; Randy W. Schekman, Paula K. Frazer, a high school science zine’s 20th-anniversary issue. University of California, Berkeley; Paul teacher and member of the curriculum de - W. Sternberg, California Institute of velopment team of the HHMI-supported Technology; and Joseph S. Takahashi, Science Education Partnership at the Fred Charles F. Stevens, an HHMI investigator Northwestern University, were elected to Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in at The Salk Institute, received the 2000 the American Academy of Arts and Seattle, won a Presidential Award for Karl Spencer Lashley Award from the Sciences. The honorary society recognizes Excellence in Science and Mathematics American Philosophical Society for his achievement in the sciences, arts and Teaching. The annual awards are admin- research into the cellular and molecular humanities. istered and funded by the National mechanisms of synaptic plasticity. Science Foundation. Margaret Andrews, a third-grade teacher Jack W. Szostak, an HHMI investigator in New Haven, Connecticut, and found- Jeffrey M. Friedman, an HHMI investi- at Massachusetts General Hospital, ing member of the HHMI Steering gator at The Rockefeller University, received the 2000 Genetics Society of Committee at the Yale Peabody Museum, received the 2000 Osborne Mendel America Medal for his contributions to received the 2000 Milken Educator Award from the American Society for genetics research. Award, a $25,000 prize. Nutritional Sciences and the 2000 Endocrinology Transatlantic Medal from the Society for Endocrinology of the David A. Williams, an HHMI investiga- Nancy C. Andrews, an HHMI investiga- United Kingdom, both for his research tor at Indiana University School of tor at Children’s Hospital, Boston, on the role of leptin in weight regulation. Medicine, received the 2000 William received the American Federation for Damesek Award from the American Medical Research Foundation’s 2000 Society of Hematology. The prize recog- Outstanding Investigator Award in Basic David L. Garbers, an HHMI investigator nizes his contributions to the field of Science for her work on the genetics of at the University of Texas Southwestern retroviral-mediated gene transfer and iron transport. Medical Center at Dallas, won the Edwin human gene therapy. B. Astwood Award, presented annually by the Endocrine Society for research in Mario R. Capecchi, an HHMI investiga- endocrinology. tor at the University of Utah, received the 2001 Jimenez-Diaz Prize from Spain and HHMI BULLETIN 2 M A Y 2 0 0 1 KAY CHERNUSH KAY THE OTHER GENOME RACE ecently, two teams raced to complete their long-awaited Smelling the World and Blazing a publications about the human genome. One included sev- Genetic Trail—have also been Reral prominent institutions, led by the National Institutes adapted for the Web and are of Health (NIH). The other was a single Maryland-based organi- among the most popular features zation working on its own version of the genome publication. on HHMI’s site, www.hhmi.org. Both teams knew their work would be read widely, and they The latest volume, once again looked forward to making a splash among both scientists and edited by Maya Pines, includes the public. stories on how geneticists are Do I refer to the publication of the human DNA sequence in using “microarrayers” to analyze Science and Nature this past February? Of course not; you multiple genes simultaneously, already know about that. Instead, I’m referring to two related how studies of the cell-division cycle in yeast are helping us educational publications that will help students and the public understand cancer in humans and how genetic analysis of mice understand why the historic genome papers have caused so much could lead to better treatment of human diseases ranging from excitement.