Magazine
January-February 1998
January-February 1998
Volume: 86 Number: 1
A wistful gleam appears on the face of an elderly woman when she is asked how life has changed since she was a young girl. Ninety years old and still working in her field when the photograph was made in the 1970s, she was an expert on local medicinal plants. We do not know whether she is still alive. In "Confronting the Boundaries of Human Longevity," S. Jay Olshansky, Bruce A. Carnes and Douglas Grahn explore the relation between modern medicine and the biological limits of the human lifespan. (Detail of photograph by Alex Harris from The Old Ones of New Mexico (revised edition), published by the University of New Mexico Press.)
In This Issue
- Art
- Astronomy
- Biology
- Chemistry
- Communications
- Computer
- Economics
- Engineering
- Environment
- Evolution
- Mathematics
- Medicine
- Physics
- Psychology
- Technology
Confronting the Boundaries of Human Longevity
Bruce Carnes, Douglas Grahn
Anthropology Evolution Medicine
Many people now live beyond their natural lifespans through the intervention of medical technology and improved lifestyles—a form of "manufactured time"
Sinkholes in Evaporite Rocks
Joseph Martinez, Kenneth Johnson, James Neal
Chemistry Physics
Surface subsidence can develop within a matter of days when highly soluble rocks dissolve because of either natural or human causes
The Molecular Anatomy of an Ancient Adaptive Event
Antony Dean
Biology Evolution
Protein engineering identifies the structural basis of a 3.5 billion-year-old adaptation
Physiology of Helping in Florida Scrub-Jays
Stephan Schoech
Biology Chemistry Evolution
When these birds are young, they delay reproduction and help others raise their offspring. The hormone prolactin may influence that cooperation
