DECEMBER 2002 PREDICTIONS

Sorrow is the bowl life carves out of us so that we may hold joy and know its meaning.

[YOUR FUTURE - INVENTIONS THAT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE]
The days when your voice could replace your computer login and your home keys may not be that far off.

An ongoing study suggests that robot pets may be as good as the real thing in helping the elderly overcome loneliness.

A tiny technology company has developed a laptop with dual screens.

A new organic technology that promises brighter, thinner, more energy-efficient display screens may soon light up products ranging from televisions and computer screens to camera displays.

A sonic fridge that uses sound to chill food has been developed by scientists in the US.

An Italian company is using high-tech smarts to create air bags for motorcycles.

Shielding a city from terrorists - Cell phone towers may soon be able to detect a chemical, biological or radiological attack.

Scientists studying the flight mechanics of red admiral butterflies say we are getting closer to the dream of tiny air vehicles.

Future Christmas - Christmas in 2050 will be a hi-tech affair with synthetic turkeys and robot helpers to take the stress out of the festive season.

[HOT TRENDS]
New electronic billboards tailor messages to passing consumers.

Marketers use MRI's to get intoconsumer's heads - A new marketing tool catching on in the United States is magnetic resonance imaging, the same MRI used in hospitals to create images of the brain.

Growing trend of using things only once - Disposable products are on the rise in the United States, and environmentalists are worried.

Several international airlines will begin offering high-speed Internet access via satellite while in flight.


[ASTRONOMICAL EVENTS]
Samples of bacteria which some scientists believe may have come from space have been coaxed "back to life" by researchers. It adds weight to a controversial theory which suggests that Earth could have been "seeded" by extraterrestrial micro-organisms.

A powerful new telescope instrument at the South Pole has provided fresh evidence that the universe is accelerating outwards and is dominated by a strange form of matter nobody knows anything about. Only five per cent of the energy in the universe takes the form of familiar matter like that which makes up planets and stars.

[BIOLOGY PREDICTIONS]
2,800 year-old microbes from a salty, frozen lake in Antarctica have been thawed and brought back to life after gradual melting, researchers say.

A technique used to analyze embryos for disease helps parents choose babies' genders. Critics say it paves the way for "designer babies," for whom parents choose traits like hair and eye color.

New research shows low levels of sarin nerve gas can affect behaviour and organ functions in laboratory animals at least a month after exposure - offering a possible clue to the mysterious illnesses of Gulf War veterans.

Scientists encounter unexpected success using a vaccine of immune cells to counter an HIV-like virus in monkeys.

A panel of North American experts has met to debate plans to join up human and mouse cells to create an embryonic "chimera".

[HEALTH PREDICTIONS]
The Ebola virus closely resembles several bird viruses, researchers have found. They say the findings suggest birds may be able to spread the deadly virus to humans.

Doctors have managed to make cells taken from human embryos grow into fully-functional kidneys in a mouse.

Is it possible to skip sleep and barely feel it? The military is seeking radical new ways of getting around one of life's most basic needs.

A chemical found in cocoa and chocolate appears to suppress coughs and could potentially be developed into an effective treatment, according to the results of a small new study. But don't try to self-medicate; it could take up to 25 candy bars to get the dose used in the study.

New research finds that eating oily fish regularly reduces the risk of asthma. Previous research has also linked a fishy diet to protection from heart disease, arthritis and other ailments.

Scientists have treated cancer by removing an entire organ, administering radiotherapy and re-implanting it back into the body.

British researchers find that the emotional upset triggered by watching your favorite team lose an important game — especially those which involve a penalty shoot-out — can literally stop your heart from beating and trigger a heart attack.

Predicting breast cancer survival - Genetic researchers have developed what may be the most accurate method yet for answering a woman's scariest question about breast cancer: Will it spread and kill me?

A U.S. strategic forecasting firm says that Russia's population could fall to 77 million by 2050 unless a cure for HIV is discovered. This would mark the sharpest peacetime population decline anywhere since the plague ravaged Europe in the 1300s, and it would hurt Russia as a key player on the global scene. Russia has one of the world's fastest growing HIV epidemics and within 6 years, 5% of the population may be infected. Russia now has less than half the population of the U.S. and only 33% of it's newborns and 10% of its teens are healthy.

Silicone implants, which were yanked off the market 10 years ago, could be making a comeback. Tests are underway for a new type of silicone implant that researchers say is less likely to leak.

Metabolic syndrome can predict heart failure - " If you're a man who's a little overweight you may not be all that bothered by it. The extra weight is probably only around your stomach. No problem, you say. But that may be the only visible sign of a little-known but potentially deadly disorder called metabolic syndrome." Men and women with metabolic syndrome are at significantly greater risk of dying from a heart attack.

Early results of a small study suggest that an inhaled hormone treatment may offer women at high risk of breast cancer an alternative to losing their breasts or ovaries.

A common chemical used to preserve cosmetics and fragrances may cause damage to sperm in adult men.

Babies born during the summer months have a greater chance of developing the digestive disorder coeliac disease, research suggests.

The tropical zebrafish's ability to "grow a new heart" may help scientists find a way of aiding the recovery of human patients.

Researchers have grown teeth in a lab - Researchers take cells from a young tooth and persuade them to grow over a scaffold into a complete tooth.

The number of people infected by the human form of mad cow disease could be higher than previously thought, research suggests.

It is a grand idea - scientists will 'grow' entire organs from scratch, farming an unlimited supply of fresh hearts, kidneys and livers to meet the demands of an aging population.

[LONG-TERM CLIMATE PREDICTIONS]
Greenland is experiencing a warm spell unseen since the 1930s. Satellite data show the greatest area of melt across its mammoth ice sheet in 24 years of measurements occurred this year. Across the Arctic Ocean, the floating mantle of ice that covers it throughout much of the year shrank to record levels this summer and shrubs are spreading into the Alaskan tundra.

Surface melt on Greenland was the highest in recorded history - and extended to elevations previously untouched by melt - while the amount of Arctic sea ice also reached a record low. In total, the arctic warming is an unprecedented trend. "We're experiencing the most rapid increase in temperature in recorded history."

A new study links a tripling in the average glacial melt rate to the squishing of the planet and the subsequent changes in the gravity field. The gravity measurements suggest there is a big change in the Earth, both in its oceans and its ice. "One has to be concerned for the health of the planet."

[ODDITIES]
Rumors began three weeks ago in the south of Malawi, an impoverished nation in southeast Africa, and have intensified in recent days - horrifying stories of vampires attacking villagers in the dead of night and sucking their blood have forced Malawi's government to wage a massive public relations blitz to calm the public.

The infamous mummy's curse of Tutankhamen's tomb has little basis in hard science, research has found.

Galveston, Texas, residents are still trying to figure out what caused the skies over their coastal city to literally be filled with floating strands of wads that looked like spider webs. The webs were visible in the air for five hours, and poles were left wrapped with the sticky strands and fuzzy wads. The phenomenon has previously occurred in at least two other places.

A 60-acre spider web in British Columbia has scientists baffled.

The weather extremes in Canada in 2002 have experts puzzled. They are struggling to see if the wacky extremes show a change in the country's climate pattern.

First cloned baby may have been born - The Raelians said the girl was the first of five cloned babies and the births of the other four were imminent. The baby girl is named Eve. Claiming 55,000 followers worldwide, the Raelian sect believes life on Earth was established by extra-terrestrials who arrived in flying saucers 25,000 years ago, and that humans themselves were created by cloning. The movement's founder, Rael - the former French journalist Claude Vorilhon - lives in Quebec. He describes himself as a prophet and claims that cloning will enable humanity to attain eternal life.

[POLITICAL PREDICTIONS]
As the cycle of violence and retaliation accelerates in the Middle East, some see a culture of martyrdom solidifying among Palestinian children. "They say, 'I want to be a martyr,'" says a Palestinian who has studied the problem. "This is now the hero example. And this is very dangerous."

The U.S. will start deploying a missile defence system in 2004, even though the defence secretary admits the technology won't be fully developed by then.

The risk of internet collapse is rising - Simulated attacks on key internet hubs have shown how vulnerable the worldwide network is to disruption by disaster or terrorist action.

Are U.S. passenger airliners vulnerable to attack from surface-to-air missiles? They are easily available on the black market and can be effortlessly concealed. Now U.S. lawmakers are warning that unless something is done, there could be surface-to-air missile attacks on U.S. commercial planes.

War with Iraq would trigger World War III - global conflict unlike those fought in the 20th Century, a former senior UN official told BBC News Online.

A Boston-area computer software firm is suspected of having links to al Qaeda. The firm provided programs for government agencies, including the FBI and Department of Energy.

Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter warns that war only leads to more war.

Would it matter if Osama were dead? Killing Osama bin Laden may not change the war on terror.

A fourth of the world is in conflict - About a quarter of the world's countries struggled with armed conflict this year, mostly low-intensity battles against terrorists or guerrillas, according to a new report.

[SPIRITUAL PREDICTIONS]
People who are helpful to others, even as little as once a year, may have a dramatic reduction in their chance of dying than those who do not help others at all. Those that helped others had a 40 percent to 60 percent lower risk of mortality. Researchers also looked at emotional support between spouses and found that those who were able to make their spouse feel loved and cared for also lived longer than those who denied their emotional support.

Interpreting and predicting melodies - Why you can't get that melody out of your head- New research suggests the brain has and develops structures designed to perceive musical patterns and then remember them. Although the brain appears to tap several areas to hear music, the study determined its 'musical ear' is made up of set circuits, many of which connect to the rostromedial prefrontal cortex, a region located just behind the forehead. "As a piece of music fulfills or violates our expectations, it moves around in this space. And it's this violation of expectations that drives our underlying response to music."

A new study suggests color is no indicator of a person's ancestry - reinforcing the idea that race is a human invention. Physical characteristics associated with race - such as skin or hair colour - do not necessarily reflect a person's genetic ancestry, a new study suggests. A group of scientists have found that people who appear white may genetically be mainly African, while people who look black may genetically be European or Amerindian.

A fearful New Year - A poll finds Americans have grown sharply more fearful about the year ahead - both for their own personal outlook and the world's.

[STOCK MARKET PREDICTIONS]
The economy went from bad to worse this year, despite so many optimistic predictions from business experts. The five most foolish forecasts of 2002.