Word: nosing
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Memo to man's best friend: In a few years, you may be relieved of your police drug-sniffing duties, thanks to a pair of Georgia Tech scientists. They have developed a handheld electronic nose that detects the presence of cocaine and other narcotics better than your cold, wet snout ever could...
Though police dogs have played an important role in the $19 billion war on drugs, their noses simply aren't as keen as Hunt and Stubbs' creation, which can sniff out a few trillionths of a gram of an illegal substance. The two scientists say their device--which is still a prototype but will probably cost considerably less than the $80,000 worth of crime-lab equipment now being used for such tasks--makes economic sense. And because the artificial nose, according to Stubbs, "determines on the spot whether cocaine or other substances are present," it could also eliminate...
Most electronic noses have sensors that can detect the presence of a suspicious chemical by measuring the disturbance it causes in sound waves across a small quartz crystal. But just like a dog's nose, those electronic sniffers aren't able to determine whether the substance is cocaine or a compound with similarly sized molecules, such as caffeine. Stubbs addressed that problem by coating the sensor with an antibody that was similar in structure to cocaine. As a result, if cocaine were present in a room, it would attach to the antibody molecules and set off an electrical signal. Initial...
...Most Hong Kong thrushes are sweet vixens. Mui was different. Her large eyes, beaky nose and small, lurid gash of a mouth gave rise to another sobriquet: the Ugly Queen of Pop. That's a harsh way of saying that Mui was a throwback to chanteuse Bai Guang and other Shanghai "sour beauties" of the pre-Mao era. The sour beauty sang of love as a burden that made the sufferer superior. Mui was that survivor: battered but proud...
Karen Richardson has stuck with her new look and changed her eating and shopping habits accordingly. Karen, 44, an emergency-room nurse from Wilson, Ark., who hated her nose and always dreamed of going without glasses, corrected both problems, made some other fixes and arrived back at work newly cheerful and gregarious. Young patients who used to shy away from her because she looked permanently grouchy, she says, suddenly sought her company...