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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (April 4, 2000)
SCIENC ECHNOLOGY ay, April 4,2000 THE JBATTAHON Page 7 Science Briefs four A the \Jom\t Comet Zero gravity experiments test movement in space Tuesday, 12:30 p.m.. Rumours Coffeehouse Dr. Jim Wild, Texas A&M Dept, of Biochemistry & Biophysics "Bioethical Issues in a Changing World" Wednesday, 12:30 p.m.. Rumours Coffeehouse Dr. John Howard, CEO, ProdiGene, Inc. Dr. Susanna Priest, Texas A&M Dept, of Journalism "Genetically-Modified Foods: Fears and Facts" Thursday, 5:00 p.m., Rumours Coffeehouse Community religious leaders "Biotechnology and our Religious Faith" Friday, 5:00 p.m., Wehner 159 (Ray Auditorium) Dr. Glenn McGee, University of Pennsylvania and Editor-in-chief, American Journal of Bioethics "A Little Prozac, a Fat Vacuum, and I Will Be Beautiful: Is it Ethical to Enhance Human Beings?" . BY BETH AHLQUIST The Battalion Al Forum raises bioethics awareness iThe Texas A&M Bioethics Forum Jsponsoring "Bioethics Aware- less Week,” through Friday, with -iStores and debates on topics Ich as cloning, genetically modi- liri foods, gene therapy and the ge- ifitic enhancement of humans. [■Spencer Davis, president of the Hum and a junior genetics major, id the group encourages open dis- sion of ethical questions pertaining to genetics research. “We avoid en dorsing any particular viewpoint on these issues,” Davis said. The Forum is also planning a two-day conference for Fall 2000 to look at religious perspectives about biotechnology issues. “It will examine arguments presented by major religious faiths against certain areas of biotechnology,” Davis said. Nobelist to speak on ozone loss H Dr. Shen/vood Rowland, a chemist 11 ■m the University of California- Irvine, [■ speak about "Ozone Depletion and Global Warming in the 21st Centu- guy rogers im Bw fy,' at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, as part of the Texas A&M Distinguished ido. This area, most lecture Series. Tica International ws in Brief escapes unty jail si j — A pattern s6\ at Dallas County J ind time in eightdaf oaped from the jail’s aa. R. Lyles walked throng k Chill Facility early Sunt: c th incarcerated pers: rom the area in the epartment officials e escaped inmates ii? ressed that the so-cal low-security inmates: jail escapees, erving time for evadings :ing indictment on of service. The escai re than a week after&i ns, 20, walked away# / on March 25. ■ The lecture, which is free and open to the public, will be held in the Presidential Conference Cen ter at the Bush School. Tickets are available at the Rudder Box Office. ■ Rowland and two other scien- jtilts shared the 1995 Nobel Prize in chemistry for their research on the deterioration of the stratos pheric ozone layer and its role in global warming. The stratospheric ozone layer pro tects the earth from solar rays by ab sorbing ultraviolet radiation before it reaches the ground. In the 70s, Rowland and his col leagues showed that chlorofluoro- carbons (CFOs), chemicals used for decades in refrigerators as a coolant and in aerosol cans as a propellant, destroy ozone molecules. As a result, “ozone holes” developed that allowed more radiation to reach and warm the earth’s surface. nned with powdered donuts to prevent nausea, three Texas .A&M students recently stepped aboard NASA’s Vomit Comet. The KC-135 airplane, used to sim ulate the zero-gravity conditions of space flight, earned its nickname for causing motion sickness in many of its passengers. Last month, Susan Ramsey, a se nior biomedical engineering major. Bo Beeman, a senior industrial engineer ing major, and Bowie Hand, a senior industrial engineering major, rode the KC-135 as part of the NASA Reduced Gravity program, in which they per formed zero-gravity experiments. Ramsey, Beeman and Hand per formed tests of Fitts’ law, which de scribes the amount of time it takes a person to make a specific movement. Movement time is affected by both distance from a target object and the Susan Ramsey, a senior biomedical engineering ma jor, and Bo Beeman, a senior industrial engineering major, on board a NASA KC-135 airplane preparing the cockpit. size of the object. Hand said. But the team wanted to find out if movements are slower or faster in zero gravity. Fitts’ law has been tested before, but not in a zero-gravity environment, Ramsey said. To test the law, the students creat ed a cockpit with 20 buttons of vari ous sizes. They measured the time it took for the test subject’s hand to leave a start button and touch the tar get button. They took the cockpit aboard the KC-135, which flew in a specific wave pattern to create the feeling of weightlessness. The flight on the Vomit Comet was the culmination of months of work. Ramsey, Beeman and Hand submitted a 50-page proposal detailing their plans for the project. Hand said stu dents from all over the country sub mitted proposals, but only 48 spots were available. The team’s project also had to get past A&M’s Institutional Review Board to ensure no one would be harmed during the experiment. “Even though we are our own subjects, they wanted to be sure it would be safe for us to do this,” Beeman said. Once past the review board, the team confronted a challenge fac ing many scien tists. They had to raise enough mon ey to finance the cockpit’s con struction. PHOTO COURTESY OF NASA And then they had to build it. The cockpit contains a display screen to show the test subject which button to push, target buttons and a chair for the tester to sit in. Ramsey, Beeman and Hand travelled to Houston in February to prepare for the flight. Beeman and Hand had to undergo physiologi cal preparations to get their bodies used to the zero-gravity environ ment of the KC-135, Beeman said. Ramsey co-oped at NASA last year, so she was able to bypass the training. Their cockpit also underwent last-minute readiness tests to be sure no one would be injured if someone bumped it during the flight, and NASA en gineers scrutinized the electronics to make sure everything was functioning correctly. The team flew on March 10 and 11 with Ramsey and Beeman flying the first day, and Ramsey and Hand the second day. Ramsey and her teammates said their experiment may impact astro naut training by helping to describe the way zero-gravity affects astro nauts’ movements. Most pilot research is done by the Air Force, and little information per taining to astronauts is available, she said. Training might be more effec- PHOTO COURTESY OF NASA Susan Ramsey holds on to the cockpit where Bo Beeman performs an experiment to com pare movements at zero gravity. tive if scientists knew how astro nauts are affected when they go into space. Ramsey stressed their study will not be definitive. But she said they expect their study of movement in zero-gravity will aid other researchers — with more time and money — to contin ue this line of research to enhance astronaut training. >- lillp % : w w % With the passing of the Rec Sports Fee Referendum, students once again showed laifll i4d US kutt j 7NK5K1 mtw toNCONKWHCSCfl [cuKruswamm rbafa wsmreffs I an Body Piercinf ill Passes $ on a Budget snture Holidays it Travel Products their commitment to recreation, leisure and healthy lifestyles. We thank you for your commitment and want you to know that we, the Department of Recreational Sports, are committed to you. We will use the money raised through the Recreational Sports Fee to maintain and operate the Student Recreation Center, all Rec Sports facilities, and our pro grams including fitness, outdoors, intramu rals, sport clubs and golf in the same high quality and accessible manner that you enjoy today. Because of you, future Aggies will be able to recreate, socialize and be exposed to healthy lifestyles in well-main tained and beautiful surroundings. recsports.tamu.edu