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Your boyfriend can lose weight just by giving up desserts for a week, while nothing you do will budge that extra ten pounds. Researchers have discovered that different genes are responsible for obesity in different groups of mice, so they assume it must be true for humans as well. This means there needs to be different ways to lose weight. Some people may have a hormone problems, while others have flawed hunger message signals or emotional reasons to overeat. Pre-diabetic people have an especially hard time dropping more than a few pounds, since their bodies are programmed to grab onto extra weight.
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Killer clothes may soon be available, with tiny molecular daggers that latch onto fibers and stab and destroy microbes. Image socks that cure athlete’s foot, underwear that cures jock itch, or suits that repel SARS. Military uniforms could even kill anthrax. And due to public protest, Benetton is backing out of installing microscopic tracking devices on all their clothing.

Scientist Robert Engel has designed molecular daggers that can coat fabrics. Each one is only a few atoms long and attracts bacteria and fungus. For these nasty germs, “It’s like resting on a bed of nails,” says co-inventor JaimeLee Iolani.
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While the U.S. is relieved to be winning the Iraq war, we’re all quaking at the thought of possible terrorist retaliation. Now scientists have created a drug called HE2100 that can protect people from the effects of a nuclear attack. Hollis-Eden Pharmaceuticals says it will protect most people outside the immediate area of where the bomb hits.

High levels of radiation destroy white blood cells, which protect the body against infection. Death can also be caused by bleeding, since radiation also destroys the ability of blood clots to form. HE2100 helps the body to produce white blood cells much more quickly than normal. After further tests, the company will apply to the FDA for permission to sell the drug.
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