PREDICTIONS FROM THE MONTH OF NOVEMBER 2001

[YOUR FUTURE - INVENTIONS THAT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE]
A company is developing a new bendable battery that can be printed onto paper, plastic or other flexible material.

Scientists at the Georgia Tech Research Institute's Center for Emergency Response Technology, Instruction, and Policy (CERTIP) in Atlanta have developed a low-cost portable toxin detector that could help put a jittery nation more at ease. The inventors say their toxin detector is so easy to use that they plan to market the device as a PDA plug-in. That would allow a person armed with a handheld to enter a suspected "hot zone," plug in the detector, take a sample, and get an immediate readout.

Researchers have developed a fence that is smart enough to pinpoint intruders before they break through.

Night cycling could be made safer by a new bicycle that glows in the dark.

Artifical noses to snift out land mines. Researchers experiment with building devices that can sniff out explosives more easily.

[HOT TRENDS]
Comfort purchases - Americans are seeking consolation in shopping for feel-good items, like teddy bears and puppies.

'Noiseload' causing high blood pressure - Researchers are now saying all noises are taking a toll on people's health. Everything from loud music to leaf blowers could be having an effect on blood pressure and on children's ability to learn.

Elite fashion designers are embracing the American flag like never before - the latest trends in red, white and blue.

Living under a flight path drives up blood pressure - New research has found a possible link between high blood pressure and living close to a flight path.


[ASTRONOMICAL EVENTS]
Prepare for space tourism - get ready for recreational rocket rides. Surveys show there are 10,000 to 50,000 people willing to pay $100,000 to $300,000 each to go to space, making extraterrestrial tourism a billion-dollar market.

[BIOLOGY PREDICTIONS]
Sheep can remember up to 50 different sheep faces for more than two years, say researchers in Britain, raising the possibility of sheep emotions and even sheep consciousness.

Musicians' brains are uniquely wired for sound - Neuroscientists, using brain-scanning MRI machines to peer inside the minds of professional German violinists, found they could hear the music simply by thinking about it, a skill amateurs in the study were unable to match.

[BOOKS]


Free shipping with purchase of two books, CDs or videos.

[HEALTH PREDICTIONS]
Two new studies add to the rapidly growing body of evidence that inflammation in the bloodstream can be a powerful predictor of heart disease. The findings could help explain why people with no known risk factors such as high cholesterol or high blood pressure can still have heart attacks.

How dreams can help traumatized Americans - The Sept. 11 events have seared the American psyche and entered our dreams. Here's how that may help us.

More than 1 million New Yorkers may need mental health help due to Sept. 11.

[LONG-TERM CLIMATE PREDICTIONS]
Carbon sinks won't keep absorbing carbon dioxide at their current rate, warn scientists. They say their report could have implications for global warming.

If any country knows the meaning of climate change, it's Morocco. Morocco's limited forests are dwindling, its desert is encroaching on more villages and drought is becoming more frequent. A North African country, Morocco is playing host to the latest conference in the world's most ambitious effort to curtail the man-made greenhouse gases blamed for unnaturally heating Earth's atmosphere. The weather in Morocco has been unusually dry. It should be the height of the rainy season. Droughts have become more common over the last two decades. Four of the 11 droughts in the last century occurred in the decade from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s. Areas of Morocco now suffer from a four-year drought that has depleted water tables, browned the landscape and wreaked havoc on farmers. Hydroelectric plants, one of the country's few homegrown sources of energy, are operating at a fraction of capacity because of lower water levels. Studies indicate that the average temperature in Morocco will rise 41 degrees by 2100. Water resources are expected to decline by 10-15 percent by 2020.

[POLITICAL PREDICTIONS]
The UN is warning that the world's population will skyrocket to 10.9 billion people from its current 6.1 billion by 2050 unless women get better access to reproductive health care and education. People are plundering the planet at an unprecedented and unsustainable rate that needs to be curbed quickly to avoid worldwide disaster.

Americans wary of future attack - Americans are losing confidence that the government can prevent future terrorist attacks and are reconsidering support for military action if it comes with heavy U.S. casualties, a new poll suggests.

Is there a nuclear terrorist threat? Experts say it is unlikely, but not impossible.

[SEASONAL WEATHER PREDICTIONS]
Hope you liked last winter - meteorologists say the coming season will bring much of the same. Last winter was cooler than normal for most areas, but the warmest on record for Alaska. It rained more than usual in the central United States, but the drought continued in Florida and on the West Coast. There were near-record cold spells from the Rocky Mountains to the East Coast, and record snowfall was reported as far south as Amarillo, Texas.

CALIFORNIA - OVER 500 EARTHQUAKES THE LAST WEEK OF OCTOBER - fueling concerns that the state may be at the end of a period of seismic slumber. Building and gas experts hope California is ready for the next big one.

WASHINGTON - More than 40 small quakes have been felt in the Spokane area since a magnitude 3.4 quake on June 25 signaled the apparent awakening of an ancient fault running beneath the city.

[SPIRITUAL PREDICTIONS]
Just two months and a day after the Sept. 11 attacks, another plane crashed in New York City, deepening the wounds of Americans desperate to heal. How many emotional blows can Americans endure? What is the tipping point?

[STOCK MARKET PREDICTIONS]
Amid a world of worry, there's one class of people who may be able to guide our society into the future. Can entrepreneurs save the world?