The Knowledge Nation proposals announced in the ALP policy launch were warmly welcomed by the science and technology community.

Geneticists at Dartmouth Medical School have discovered a family of unusually small genes that act in the finely tuned yet remarkably versatile orchestration of development and behaviour, adding still another dimension to the diversity and complexity of the cell.

Brisbane-based Occupational & Medical Inventions, and other producers of retractable needles, received a boost when John Howard, prime minister, said a future coalition administration would set aside $27million to introduce retractable needles in Australia.

Led by researchers from the University of Michigan Health System scientists have found a gene for a rare leg-weakening nerve disease that slowly robs children of their ability to walk.

A poisonous fish, eaten as a delicacy in Japan, may hold the key to decoding the human genome, said MRC researchers in Cambridge, UK.

Extracting nitrogen from the air to make fertiliser is one of the biggest commercial chemical enterprises in the world, involving a complex process of heating dangerously combustible hydrogen under very high pressures.

Senator Nick Minchin, Minister for Industry, Science and Resources, is going to debate science policy with Martyn Evans MP, ALP spokesperson for Science and Resources.

Parthenogenesis is the use of chemicals to duplicate chromosomes in a human egg, which starts cell division.

'Monitoring Australia's Scientific Research', written by Linda Butler, has just been released from the Research Evaluation and Policy Project at the Australian National University. It presents an analysis of the current state of Australian scientific research.

Researchers at Harvard Medical School have just published the first results of a drug designed to neutralise the toxin that makes anthrax infection lethal.

Naturally occurring soil bacteria contain enzymes which can reduce toxic chemicals to harmless compounds.

A simple blood test may soon be able to detect whether a patient is developing cancer, following work at the John Curtin School of Medical Research.

Researchers at Yale have developed a molecule they call icon, that targets blood vessels in tumours for destruction by the immune system without harming vessels in normal tissues.

The CSIRO staff association has issued a caution about funding levels.

Another study, this time in the Journal of the American Medical Association, has found no statistical link between mobile phone use and brain cancer.