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PAGE 10 29 ADVANCING HAIR CARE QUOTE NEWS OF THE WEEK Specialty chemical firms make new ingredients to OF THE WEEK 5 BUILDING A BIONIC EAR meet the demands of a growing market. “Science opens Tissue engineering and electronics combine to doors for foreign surpass normal human sound perception. GOVERNMENT & POLICY policy objectives 6 FINDING BREAKTHROUGH THERAPIES 33 CONCENTRATES that aren’t New FDA process might speed drug testing and 34 SCIENTIFIC DIPLOMACY necessarily shut, approval, but details are scarce. U.S. State Department uses more science in but you would 6 FLAME RETARDANT PHASEOUT outreach, policy-making. have to use a Nations that are party to the Stockholm 38 U.S., ACS TAKE JOB SKILLS OVERSEAS crowbar to get Convention agree to ban BOOST initiative brings ACS career development them open.” hexabromocyclododecane. trainers to Malaysia and Indonesia. JONATHAN MARGOLIS, 7 DRUG DELIVERY IN A SNAP ACTING DEPUTY Breakable polymeric chains can incorporate SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY ASSISTANT SECRETARY, medicines for on-demand controlled dosing. 40 CONCENTRATES U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 7 ACCOUNTING FOR POLLUTION 42 TAILOR-MADE NANOSTRUCTURES BUREAU OF OCEANS Activists are suing EPA over claims that the Techniques for creating molecule-sized & INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL agency underestimates toxic air emissions. structures can lead to better catalysts, batteries. & SCIENTIFIC 8 LANGER RECEIVES WOLF PRIZE 45 ELUSIVE DRUG TARGET CRYSTALLIZED AFFAIRS PAGE 34 Celebrated MIT chemical engineer Robert S. X-ray structure allows scientists to propose Langer adds to his list of accolades. mechanism for growth-signaling enzyme mTOR. 8 AWARD FOR INNOVATIVE TOOLS Advances in mass spectrometry net Purdue EDUCATION University’s R. Graham Cooks the 2013 Dreyfus 46 CHEMISTRY FOR RELUCTANT STUDENTS Prize. Innovative lab lessons inspire nonmajors and 9 BIG VINYL VENTURE IN EUROPE their instructors. Solvay and Ineos join forces in polyvinyl chloride venture despite a troubled European marketplace. THE DEPARTMENTS 9 ASTRAZENECA FACILITY REPURPOSED 2 LETTERS 50 MEETINGS Former R&D center in England will become 3 EDITOR’S PAGE 52 CLASSIFIEDS multicompany biotech campus. 48 PEOPLE 56 NEWSCRIPTS BUSINESS 24 CONCENTRATES COVER: Melissa Hogan’s son Case, who has Hunter 26 TOP 50 U.S. CHEMICAL COMPANIES syndrome, is in an enzyme replacement clinical study. His Financial results for 2012 reflect economic missing enzyme is delivered directly into his cerebrospinal 46 challenges, but rising stock prices are promising. fluid. Lisa Jarvis/C&EN CENEAR 91 (19) 1–56 • ISSN 0009-2347 LETTERS THIS WEEK ONLINE Going a little further back, it would be nice ATTRIBUTING to revive the mammoths, which seem to Orphan Drug Renaissance UNDUE SIGNIFICANCE have been hunted to extinction. (The last Children with rare diseases have re- known mammoth died in South America ceived scant help from drug companies HAVING RECENTLY BECOME a 50-year around A.D. 600.) Revival of the two ex- that could not profit from small patient populations. Now changes in business member of the American Chemical Society, tinct species of dodo and the Rodrigues models, science, and Food & Drug Ad- I am embarrassed to see that C&EN has solitaire would be desirable, although they ministration regulations have sparked become a propaganda machine attempting would probably have to be kept in zoos; new treatments (see page 10). Online, to brainwash ACS members. Strong claim, their native habitat is now teeming with hear parent advocates describe chil- you say? too many predators for them to survive in dren’s therapies, watch a slide show The cover of the March 25 issue points the wild. Other species would be nice to of young patients, and read about a pharma scientist trying to kick-start to the article about ocean acidification revive, although we might not notice the new research efforts. with the words: “Shellfish die-off threat- difference. Audubon’s bighorn sheep were http://cenm.ag/rare ens Pacific Northwest” ( C&EN, March 25, not that different from their Rocky Moun- page 36 ). The article says: “Over the past tain cousins. Analyzing Fingerprints 250 years, the average upper-ocean pH has However, there are some species we With A Dash Of Turmeric decreased by about 0.1 units, from about would not want to see revived, such as the Turmeric has a long history as a 8.2 to 8.1.” This is the only quantitative passenger pigeon. If we brought it back, we kitchen spice, dye, and tra- data, relative to ocean acidification, in this would probably lose all cereal grain farm- ditional medicine. two-page article. ing east of the Mississippi to vast flocks of Now researchers But 250 years ago an acid was a sub- feathered locusts. Another example is the have cooked stance that tasted sour, and a base was a Antillean giant rice rat, whose name speaks up a new substance that tasted bitter. Fritz Haber for itself. Let sleeping pests lie. use for the gold-colored and Zygmunt Klemensiewicz constructed James M. Castro powder: Its the first glass pH electrode in 1906. So the Helena , Mont. main ingredi- pH scale did not exist before 1909. In 1934 ent, curcumin, Arnold Beckman began marketing his com- could help forensic mercial pH meter, the first manufactured HOW TO REACH US scientists analyze the molecular in the U.S. constituents of fingerprints using mass CHEMICAL & ENGINEERING NEWS spectrometry. The convention taught in chemistry was LETTERS TO THE EDITOR http://cenm.ag/anl91 that the right-most digit of a quantitative ◾ Our e-mail address is [email protected]. SHUTTERSTOCK measurement was uncertain; it could be ◾ Our fax number is (202) 872-8727. ◾ Chemical Safety Roundup at least one or two units greater or lesser. Or you can send your letter to: Therefore, the data cited in the article C&EN Editor-in-Chief C&EN Senior Editor Jyllian Kemsley should not be interpreted as if any change 1155—16th St., N.W. recaps the latest news about chemical Washington, DC 20036 health and safety, including updates on has occurred. ◾ Letters should generally be 400 words or the investigation of the April 17 explo- Relative to a shellfish die-off threatening fewer and should include the writer’s full name, sion at a fertilizer facility in West, Texas. the Pacific Northwest, near the end of the address, and home telephone; letters may The National Council for Occupational article it says: “In recent years, the tribe’s be edited for purposes of clarity and space. Safety & Health released a report on natural resources have been threatened by Because of the heavy volume of mail received preventing workplace fatalities. And oil spills, overharvesting, and illegal poach- at C&EN, writers are limited to one letter in a in Florida, a high school student was six-month period. expelled for combining aluminum foil ers supplying the Asian seafood market.” and toilet bowl cleaner in a water bottle, Maybe it is these three factors, instead of REPRINTS AND PERMISSIONS causing it to explode. ocean acidification, that threaten Pacific ◾ Information on obtaining permission for http://cenm.ag/blg139 Northwest shellfish. copying articles is available at pubs.acs.org/ Jerry L. Krause cen/copyright.html. ◾ Bionic Ear Listens Salem , Ore. For quotes and information on ordering bulk To Beethoven reprints, e-mail [email protected]. Using a three-dimensional print- ADVERTISING er, researchers fabricated a bionic ear THOUGHTS ON DE-EXTINCTION ◾ For advertising rates and our editorial cal- that can detect sounds outside the endar, contact ACS Publications’ Advertising normal range of human hearing (see “REVIVING THE DEAD” brings up some Sales Group, 480 East Swedesford Rd., Suite page 5). In a video, C&EN Senior Editor fascinating possibilities ( C&EN, April 8, 220, Wayne, PA 19087; telephone (610) 964- Celia Arnaud explains how researchers 8061; or fax (610) 964-8071. integrated tissue engineering with elec- page 34 ). For the moment, let’s avoid any tronics to make the device and demon- “Jurassic Park”-type scenarios and con- ACS INFORMATION strates the ear’s response to the musi- fine ourselves to plant and animal species ◾ For more information about American cal strains of Beethoven’s “Für Elise” that have gone extinct during the past few Chemical Society activities and departments, broadcast through radio frequencies.