HE’S more influential than ABBA,

more famous than Bjorn Borg.

On 23 May, Sweden will celebrate

the 300th birthday of its most

illustrious son: Carolus Linnaeus.

The naturalist practically

created modern taxonomy –

including the Latin genus/species

system used to label all living

organisms – and to

commemorate him, Sweden

is throwing a party. His old

university, Uppsala, is awarding

honorary Linnaeus doctorates to

notable scientists such as

primatologist Jane Goodall and

DNA co-discoverer James Watson.

London’s Chelsea Flower Show

next week will feature a Linnaeus

tribute garden, including his

signature flower, Linnaea borealis.

All the while, however,

taxonomy is seeing profound

changes. Online databases based

on DNA “barcodes” are poised to

revolutionise classification.

Robert Hanner of the Canadian

Barcode of Life Network based at

the University of Guelph, Ontario,

says museums should make more

use of their resources. “Natural

history museums need to

preserve not just a bug on a pin or

a skeleton, they also need to be

banking DNA in parallel to

voucher specimens,” he says.

IT MAKES for uncomfortable

reading, but a review of

900 studies involving humans

and rodents has produced a

comprehensive list of chemicals

in our food, air and water that

may cause breast cancer.

At least 29 of them are

produced in the US in large

amounts, and while many of

these chemicals have been

examined in the past, we still

know relatively little about their

effects, says Ruthann Rudell

of the Silent Spring Institute

in Newton, Massachusetts,

who led the research. Of the

216 chemicals identified, 73 have

been documented in consumer

products or as contaminants

in food, and a further 10 were

registered with the US Food and

Drug Administration (FDA) as

food additives. Thirty five are

air pollutants.

Some of the most common

compounds cited include:

acrylamide, formed when starchy

foods, such as french fries, are

heated to high-temperatures;

perfluorooctanoic acid, used in

non-stick and stain-resistant

coatings on rugs, furniture,

“Linnaeus practically invented modern taxonomy, including the genus/species system”

“The screening of potential carcinogens needs to be made less expensive”

IT IS the oldest fossil yet found,

by quite some margin: a star born

just after the dawn of time.

Anna Frebel of the University

of Texas at Austin and colleagues

used a technique similar to

radioactive carbon dating in

archaeology to calculate the age

of the star HE 1523-0901, on the

outskirts of the Milky Way. “This

is tricky because it’s rare to find

stars with enough radioactive

material,” says Frebel.

Using the Very Large Telescope

in Chile, the team measured

the amount of six radioactive

elements in the star. Then, using

estimates of the amounts of these

elements the star should have had

at birth, they calculated that the

star was born 13.2 billion years ago.

The universe is thought

to be 13.7 billion years old, so the

star formed soon after the big

bang (The Astrophysical Journal, vol 660, p L117).

STUD

IO EY

E/CO

RBIS

clothes and cookware; and

malachite green, a textile dye

also used as a cheap antifungal

agent in fish hatcheries.

The authors say that the

screening of potential carcinogens

needs to be made less expensive

and time-consuming. “If methods

were more efficient, a higher

proportion of chemicals in use

could be evaluated,” they write in

Cancer (vol 109, p 2397).

DAVI

D M

CNEW

/GET

TY IM

AGES

–Carcinogens with your French fries?–

–West Niled–

60 SECONDS

Irish badger brouhaha

Culling badgers to stop cattle getting

tuberculosis doesn’t work, according

to a report by the UK’s Badger Trust and

Badgerwatch Ireland. Farmers have

argued that cows catch TB from

badgers , but the report says cattle TB is

rife in the Republic of Ireland despite

“virtual extermination” of badgers in

some areas. The UK’s National Farmers’

Union disputes the claims.

Stumbling on lunar soil

None of the four teams that took part

in NASA’s Regolith Excavation Challenge

on 12 May won the $125,000 prize on

offer. To win, they had to scoop up

150 kilograms of mock lunar soil and

dump it into a bin, using no more than

30 watts of power.

Atlantis ready for launch

The shuttle Atlantis, with its fuel tank

newly repaired, is ready to return to

the launch pad for an 8 June launch,

NASA said on 11 May. The tank was

damaged by a hail storm in February,

and technicians had to patch about

4200 spots with fresh foam.

Refugees rising

As many as a billion people could

be homeless by 2050 through the

combined effects of war and climate

change, warns the UK charity Christian

Aid in a report released on Monday

based on the latest UN population and

climate change figures. The impact of

climate change is the great, frightening

unknown, it says, noting that at

present 155 million people are living

uprooted by conflict, natural disasters

and construction projects.

Allergies overestimated

Many children who are told they

are allergic to peanuts may not be.

Researchers at Sydney Children’s

Hospital in Australia studied 84 children

who recorded a positive result to the

standard skin-prick peanut test and

found that only 67 per cent proved to

be allergic when given peanuts to eat

under hospital supervision (Pediatric Allergy and Immunology, vol 18, p 231).

www.newscientist.com 19 May 2007 | NewScientist | 5

A classy occasion

Killer compounds

Oldest star by far

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