RESEARCH TRENDS:
Scorecard '97

Personalized prescriptions. Ever faster, cheaper DNA screening techniques have made so-called pharmacogenetics--tailoring drug treatment to patients' genetic makeup--all the rage. But although one breast cancer treatment now targets women with a particular genetic makeup, there's no real proof that such genotyping is yielding better therapies.

Forecasting future shocks. Score two for climate forecasters, who in 1998 pitched timely forecasts of both the weather effects of the 1997-98 El Niño and last spring's switch to the opposite condition, La Niña. In the new frontier of decadal predictions, researchers pinned down oscillations in the ocean-atmosphere system from the Arctic to the Pacific and the tropics.

The expanding universe. Last year when a few distant stellar explosions showed that cosmic expansion wasn't slowing as expected, Science predicted that more data would yield big news. In this case our crystal ball saw as clearly as the finest telescope: Results from dozens of explosions are the basis of 1998's Breakthrough of the Year (p. 2156). But we also got a surprise: The new data show that the cosmos isn't slowing at all but speeding up, with profound implications for physics and cosmology.

Ribosomal inspection. Parts of the massive protein-RNA complex called the ribosome, where proteins are made, were seen in higher resolution this year. Cell biologists can at last combine data from a variety of imaging techniques to determine how ribosomal proteins interact with nearby RNA. But a full reconstruction of the ribosome has yet to emerge.

Diversity debate. Biologists still suspect that the vast biodiversity in some habitats helps stabilize ecosystems, but evidence has been hard to come by. Ongoing studies suggest that a single key species can dominate the behavior of some ecosystems, while others seem to require more diversity.

Designer crops. In Europe, Science predicted a battle over transgenic crops, and indeed the fight has raged all year. At year's end, score 1 for the resistance, which includes environmentalists, consumer groups, and even Britain's Prince Charles. Britain has stalled the commercial release of such crops, and a recent report for the biotech giant Monsanto says that the company's recent ad campaign failed to persuade suspicious European consumers.