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Journal Science
selects top 10 scientific breakthroughs of 2006
December 22, 2006. Source:
Journal
Science Online, AAAS
The
Poincare Conjecture, a famous mathematics problem which has been
finally solved, was honored as the Breakthrough of the Year,
according to a statement released Thursday by the U.S. journal
Science and its publisher AAAS, the nonprofit society.
The journal has chosen top 10 breakthroughs from the numerous
research advances of 2006.
The statement said that in 2006, researchers closed a major
chapter in mathematics, reaching a consensus that the elusive
Poincare Conjecture, which deals with abstract shapes in three-
dimensional space, had finally been solved.
"So we salute this development as the Breakthrough of the Year,
" it said.
The
conjecture, proposed in 1904 by Henri Poincare, describes a test
for showing that a space is equivalent to a "hypersphere," the
three-dimensional surface of a four-dimensional ball.
A century later, researchers were
still trying to prove the conjecture. In 2002, Russian
mathematician Grigori Perelman posted on the Internet the first
of three papers that outlined a proof of Poincare's conjecture.
By 2006, three separate teams wrote
papers that filled in key missing details of Perelman's proof,
and there was little doubt among his colleagues that he had
solved the famous problem.
The other
achievements on the Science's Top 10 list
Journal Science also gave props to
nine other of the year's most significant scientific
accomplishments in no particular order:
-
Pulling DNA out of Fossils:
Using new techniques for decoding and analyzing DNA,
researchers captured genetic information from Neanderthal
and mammoth fossils.
-
Shrinking Ice Sheets:
Researchers documented a disturbing trend this year. The
Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are losing ice, at an
ever faster rate, to the oceans.
-
Fishy First Steps: The discovery
of a fossil fish with sturdy, jointed fins made a big splash
in 2006. The fish is the closest known kin to limbed
vertebrates and provides a window into how life left the
oceans and ventured onto terra firma.
-
The Science of Invisibility:
Though it looks nothing like Harry Potter's magical cape,
the invisibility "cloak" that scientists developed this year
is the first rudimentary device for shielding objects from
view. The device guides incoming microwaves in such a way
that they produce neither a reflection nor a shadow.
-
Hope for Macular Degeneration
Patients: Researchers who study the form of vision loss
known as age-related macular degeneration showed that the
drug ranibizumab improves vision in some patient and
identifying several genes that influence a person's
susceptibility to the disease.
-
How Biodiversity Happens: From
beach mice, to fruit flies, to butterflies, a variety of
animals helped scientists uncover genetic changes that lead
to the evolution of a new species.
-
New Frontiers in Microscopy:
This year, biologists used new microscopy techniques that
enabled them to see details smaller than about 200
nanometers, giving them a clearer view of the fine structure
of cells and proteins.
-
Making Memories: Several
discoveries in 2006 brought neuroscientists closer to
understanding how the brain records new memories. The
so-called "long-term potentiation" process that strengthens
connections between neurons now seems even more likely to be
the basis for remembering.
-
New Class of Small RNAs:
Scientists discovered a new class of small RNA molecules
that shut down gene expression, called " Piwi-interacting
RNAs."
In the meantime, Science's predictions for hot fields and topics
in the upcoming year include whole-genome association studies,
optical lattices, the search for Earthlike planets around other
stars, and comparisons of primate genomes.
Science also selected the Breakdown of the Year: The extent of
the fraud committed by stem cell researcher Woo Suk Hwang and
his colleagues, who published two key papers in Science, came to
light in 2006, as did several other incidents.
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