Scanning the Research Horizon

• Closing in on cancer. Will there ever be a simple, globally effective cure for cancer? In 1997, the standard answer--"No"--may be up for revision. Already, researchers working in experimental systems have foiled many cancers with broadly targeted strategies such as boosting killer T cells, designing a virus to kill cancer cells, and thwarting the growth of blood vessels that feed metastatic tumors.

• Just the place for a squark! As the Large Electron-Positron Collider at CERN gradually ramps up in energy, many particle theorists are echoing the Bellman in Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark: They believe that elusive supersymmetric particles--which would complete the Standard Model of the universe and which have names like squarks and selectrons--are sure to turn up at CERN.

• Breaking the code(s). This year, cryptographers testing their handiwork breached computer security codes of all descriptions, from public-key systems that protect smart cards to a secret-key code banks use to swap data. Expect to hear the sound of more codes cracking in 1997, thanks to wider application of the powerful strategy, called a systemic attack, behind the breaches.

• Carbo loading. Carbohydrates, seemingly simple molecules made from collections of sugars, somehow help cells recognize each other and stick together, but the details have been a mystery. Advances in artificial synthesis and in probing carbo's role in cell-cell interactions may pave the way for synthetic carbohydrates tailored as drugs fighting everything from infection to inflammation.

• The smallest mistakes. Computers based on quantum mechanics promise undreamt-of speed, but it was thought that correcting the inevitable errors required invoking the blundering, macroscopic world, destroying the quantum advantage. Such worries may have been unfounded: If 1996's theoretical progress in quantum error correction continues, the field may leap ahead in 1997.

• X-ray visions. After 15 years and nearly $1 billion in the making, the Advanced Photon Source is finally online at Illinois's Argonne National Laboratory. Expect the 70 beamlines using the world's most brilliant source of high-energy x-rays to reveal the dynamics of chemical reactions as they happen, the structure of complex proteins, and more.

ADDITIONAL READING

• J. R. Bischoff et al., "An Adenovirus Mutant That Replicates Selectively in p53-Deficient Human Tumor Cells," Science, 18 October 1996, p. 373.
• D. R. Leach, M. F. Krummel, J. P. Allison, "Enhancement of Antitumor Immunity by CTLA-4 Blockade," Science, 22 March 1996, p. 1734.
• M. S. O'Reilly, L. Holmgren, C. Chen, J. Folkman, "Angiostatin Induces and Sustains Dormancy of Human Primary Tumors in Mice," Nature Medicine 2, 689 (June 1996).
• C.-Y. Wang, M. W. Mayo, A. S. Baldwin Jr., "TNF- and Cancer Therapy-Induced Apoptosis: Potentiation by Inhibition of NF-kB," Science, 1 November 1996, p. 784.

• J. Glanz, "Year of Strange Events Leaves Standard Theory Unscathed," Science, 11 October 1996, p. 179.
• G. Taubes, "Rare Sightings Beguile Physicists," Science, 26 April 1996, p. 474.

• C. Seife, "New Attacks Breach Computer Codes," Science, 1 November 1996, p. 716.

• Jumping-off point for sites on carbohydrate chemistry

Quantum Error Correction:

• B. Cipra, "Error-Correcting Code Keeps Quantum Computers on Track," Science, 12 April 1996, p. 199.
• A. Ekert and C. Macchiavello, Physical Review Letters, 16 September 1996, p. 2585.