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Top Scientific Breakthroughs of 2009

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the still-can't-cure-stupid dept.

Wired has posted their favorite scientific breakthroughs of the past year. The feats include things like the confirmation of element 114, a cancer-detecting breathalyzer, the power of jellyfish and more. What other discoveries should have made the list and what might we look forward to in 2010? "Also this year, researchers at the University of Washington cured two adult monkeys of colorblindness by giving them injections of a gene that produces pigments necessary for color vision. After the treatment, the animals scored higher on a computerized color blindness test. In the coming years, gene therapy will be tested as a remedy for all sorts of inherited diseases, cancer, viral infections and even high cholesterol."

8 of 57 comments (clear)

  1. Non-reversing mirrors! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16585-gallery-the-next-generation-of-mirrors.html

    1. Re:Non-reversing mirrors! by Feminist-Mom · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The non-reversing mirror is cute, but the driver-side mirror with no blindspot actually has applications. I'd buy one now if they were selling them.

    2. Re:Non-reversing mirrors! by h4rm0ny · · Score: 4, Interesting


      According to the article, he can't sell the wing-mirror in the USA because leglislation bans curved wing-mirrors, so he's going to have to try selling them in the EU instead. Why is there such legislation, anyone?

      --

      Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
    3. Re:Non-reversing mirrors! by Bluesman · · Score: 3, Informative

      I don't know the original intention of the legislation, but I use the driver side mirror for its intended purpose -- to remove the blind spot when changing lanes or turning right. I position it so that if a car is passing me on the left, I can see it leave the view of the rear-view mirror and enter the driver side mirror, until I can see it with peripheral vision. I usually have the driver side mirror angled way out.

      There isn't a reason (to me) to see more with that mirror; if I could see cars further to the left of me, it would only be confusing when trying to switch lanes quickly. (Is that car immediately left of me, or is it two lanes over?)

      --
      If moderation could change anything, it would be illegal.
  2. What an amazing breakthrough! by rbcd · · Score: 3, Funny

    Who'd have guessed that element 114 would turn out to be a cancer-detecting breathalyzer?

    1. Re:What an amazing breakthrough! by h4rm0ny · · Score: 3, Funny


      Well the Fifth Element was love. I guess by the 115th we're down to, I don't know, petulance or something.

      --

      Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
  3. Normal mirrors do not reverse! by Kupfernigk · · Score: 5, Informative
    Mirrors do not reverse left-right as was explained most clearly by Richard Feynman. If you turn a book round and then look at it in a mirror, the actual text you see in the mirror is the same way round as it currently is in the book (you can prove this very easily - write in felt tip on a plastic bag and try that. You will see that the mirror writing, and the writing seen through the back of the bag are exactly the same way round

    The answer to the question, why do mirrors reverse left/right and not up/down is simple: they do neither. A few seconds of ray tracing show that they reverse front to back.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
  4. Prebiotic Ribonucleotides by drooling-dog · · Score: 5, Interesting

    With all due respect to the achievements heralded in the Wired article, the scientific paper that most blew me away in 2009 was Synthesis of activated pyrimidine ribonucleotides in prebiotically plausible conditions by Powner et.al. in the 14 May 2009 issue of Nature. The authors demonstrated an efficient synthesis of a phosphorylated ribonucleotide under mild conditions using only a small number of simple molecules likely to have been present in the "pre-biotic soup" of early Earth. The reaction is so facile that it would be surprising if it didn't occur given the presence of these molecules (cyanimide, cyanoacetylene, glycolaldehyde, glyceraldehyde, and inorganic phosphate). Because the products are activated ribonucleotides, they would have readily polymerized into something like RNA and quite probably the first self-replicating molecule.

    To me this was one of the biggest "missing links" in the story of how life might have arisen from simple organic molecules, and that scenario now seems like a slam-dunk. The rest, as they say, is history...