Charity Week Hills alive Karate master She’s back A roundup of the week’s The Fellwanderers reach the One of the greatest living martial Our verdict on Bridget’s latest events at Wye, page 7 Lake District, page 10 artists visits Imperial, page 10 chapter, page 14 The student newspaper of Imperial College ● Established 1949 ● Issue 1305 ● Thursday 11 November 2004 ● www.felixonline.co.uk Four more years Reaction to George W Bush’s College to election victory. Imperial ranked world’s uNEWS page 2 “The next four years of Bush’s presidency will effectively develop determine the state of the world’s economy, but whether 14th best university that is a good thing or not is vaccines anybody’s guess.” By Dave Edwards uBUSINESS page 3 Editor against Superbug scare Imperial College appears in Felix Science investigates the 14th place in a new list of the extent of the MRSA epidemic best universities in the world. biological and argues that much more Harvard University, in must be done. Massachusetts, took first uSCIENCE page 4 place by a considerable mar- weapons gin. Seven of the top ten Clubbing in the cold institutions in the list are Scientists at Imperial College “As the days get shorter, the American. are to help develop new vac- nights get longer. It’s now In the global rankings, com- cines in case of attacks by possible to go out, stay up piled by The Times Higher terrorists using biological partying all night, and crawl Education Supplement and weapons. home the next morning, with- published last week, univer- A team from Imperial out ever seeing the sun.” sities were placed in a table College and Hammersmith uNIGHTLIFE page 12 with points given for these Hospital has been award- key factors: findings from a ed $4.5m by the National Last week in sport survey of 1300 academics in 88 Institute of Allergy and Three football reports, plus countries, the amount of cited Infectious Diseases, part of news from rugby, hockey, research produced by faculty the US National Institute of shooting and all the week’s members, the ratio of staff to Health, to work on the vac- results. students, and a university’s cines against possible attacks uSPORT page 18 success in attracting foreign and new infectious diseases. students and internationally They will use state of the art renowned academics. technologies to develop new THIS WEEK Imperial is ranked fourth diagnostics and treatments News page 2 among UK universities, for anthrax. Business page 3 behind Oxford, Cambridge Dr Danny Altmann, lead Science page 4 and the London School of researcher, said: “Despite Economics. The only other many of the current possible Comment page 6 European university in the top bio-weapons having existed Around Campus page 7 20 is ETH Zurich, Switzerland, for many years, we only have What’s On page 9 in tenth place. a limited defence against Nightlife page 12 Mustafa Arif, President them. With the increased Arts page 13 of Imperial College Union, The South Kensington campus from above: part of the 14th best university in the world, threat of terrorism and bio- Film page 14 stressed the importance of according to a global survey undertaken by The Times Higher Education Supplement terrorism, it is vital that the College’s presence in we develop a much greater Books page 15 the world’s top 15 and com- graduate, to have the value of “However, there is a lot tutions, particularly given understanding of these bio- Coffee Break page 16 mented: “It’s a good thing for their degrees recognised by of work to be done to catch the resources they put into logical agents including Sport page 18 Imperial students, when they employers across the world”. up with the American insti- teaching.” anthrax. This programme will allow us to develop more effective measures to protect the population in the event of an attack. £3.4m for nanotechnology at Imperial “At the same time, the research will also be of By Dave Edwards in which objects are designed we are ideally positioned to “The application of nanote- huge benefit in under- and built by the specifica- push forward the barriers chnology to medicine... opens standing new and emerging Imperial College’s Institute of tion and placement of indi- of this new field of science. up new possibilities for diag- infectious diseases, whilst Biomedical Engineering has vidual atoms or molecules or This collaboration will ena- nosing, preventing and treat- we carry out fundamental been given £3.4m by Advance where at least one dimension ble us to focus on combining ing disease and traumatic research into immunology. Nanotech, an American is on a scale of nanometres nanotechnology with other injury.” This fundamental research nanotechnology company, to (10–9m)’. powerful technologies such The Institute of Biomedical will also help to develop help develop the next genera- Professor Chris Toumazou, as tissue engineering to Engineering focuses on much more effective diag- tion of medical technology. Director of the Institute, said: make breakthroughs of great interdisciplinary research in nostics and treatment which Nanotechnology is defined “Given Imperial’s excellence social and commercial sig- emerging technologies for can be used for a variety of as ‘any fabrication technology in medicine and technology, nificance. human health and wellbeing. diseases.” Felix 2 www.felixonline.co.uk Thursday 11 November 2004 NEWS [email protected] Issue 1305 Editor Dave Edwards Four more years Business Editor Numaan Chaudhry Reading the newspapers so you don’t have to: Emily Gwyer looks at Science Editor Darius Nikbin how the national press responded to George W Bush’s victory Music Editor An entirely black page, with America and towards Europe, hell of a beating”. Andrew Sykes two words in small type in the with whom we have far more The Times took a more centre: ‘Oh, God’. in common than an electorate grown-up line on the elec- Nightlife Editor Thus The Guardian greet- who believe their country has tion than most of the other Simon Clark ed the biggest news story of been ‘chosen by God’. newspapers, with the leader the past year, yet alone the Some papers were pleased urging Mr Bush to use his tri- Arts Editor past week. “Once is an aber- with the result, however. The umph to push for peace in the Paola Smith ration. Now it is an era... he Telegraph thought that the Middle East, which most pun- will be no footnote to history; result would “strike fear into dits agree is the most urgent Books Editor instead he is making it” said all enemies of America and issue currently facing the Martin Smith the paper, who admitted that the West” now it is clear that President. Tony Blair joined they “don’t like it one bit”, Mr Bush has support from the in that chorus, stating in his Film Editor and in that they were not on American public to continue first speech after the election Alan Ng their own. his task in the war on terror. result that peace in Palestine Sub Editors The Daily Mirror devot- The paper urges Europeans was “the single most press- Zaina Nobeebux ed the entire front page ing political challenge in our Stephen Spain to one headline asking, “How can world; we must be relent- “How can 59,054,087 peo- less in our war against ter- With thanks to ple be so DUMB?” and The 59,054,087 people rorism and in resolving the Rupert Neate Independent had the same be so DUMB?” conditions and causes on sentiment, if a bit more tact- which the terrorists prey”. fully put, in their montage to attempt to understand the George Bush, however, did Felix of photos from Abu Ghraib, American people and there- not mention the Middle East Beit Quad Guantanamo Bay and Iraq. fore the President, and not in his acceptance speech. Prince Consort Road Many commentators were to become complacent: “The The Independent picked up London SW7 2BB surprised and shocked by the country he leads is diverging on this, suggesting that Mr Telephone: 020 7594 8072 emergence of ‘moral values’ from Europe: it is younger, Blair must be praying that Email: [email protected] as the most important issue more self-confident, more the President does not decide Web: www.felixonline.co.uk in the election; it seemed prosperous, more devout, to attack Iran, a situation that that voters ignored their more diligent, more demo- would be nearly impossible Registered newspaper misgivings about Iraq and cratic and, in short, more for Mr Blair to respond to ISSN 1040-0711 the economy to vote for the conservative. Europe must without outraging either the Copyright © Felix 2004 candidate who felt the same come to terms not only with Americans or his own parlia- Triumphant: George W Bush, who will serve another four way that they did about guns, Mr Bush, but with the nation mentary party. years as President of the United States Printed by Sharman and gays and God. Nearly all the that has elected him. This is Company, Peterborough papers also ran some sort of a president who really can article on the ‘Divided States speak for America”. of America’ – the electoral The Sun took a similar £1 Per Pint map showing Democrat coast line, put in the inimitable lines and solidly Republican words of Richard Littlejohn, Carlsberg + inland states, where it seems who ranted: “Michael that “apart from the fact that Moore, Osama bin Laden, Tetley they speak English and have Saddam Hussein, Jacques two legs apiece, it is hard to Chirac, Gerhard Schroeder, In dBs think of anything American Kofi Annan, Yasser Arafat, conservatives have in com- the BBC, Guardianistas, Till the mon with European liberals” Channel 4 News, Robin Cook, according