The second, more recent example of poor communication is provided by the recent buzz that accompanied the publication in Science by researchers from the NASA astrobiology institute and the US geological survey of the existence of bacteria that can integrate arsenic under certain conditions – a discovery that clearly expands the view of what it takes for living things to survive. The purpose here is not to discuss the validity of the presented science (others have done it better) but the way the information was handled and passed to general public. A few days before the official publication of the article, I found on the web page of a swiss popular journal an intriguing title about a discovery that “will impact the search for evidence of extraterrestrial life”, and was quite excited to see what it was about. Then came the proper article in Science. Although the research was quite interesting, I had some difficulties to see the direct link with extraterrestrial life. This is the first fact that is disturbing to me and, I imagine, to the general public: the press release promises E.T. and the finding turns out to be a bacterium… not so impressive at first sight! The second disturbing fact is the way the involved research team treated the (sometimes quite harsh) criticism that burgeoned soon after the release of the Science article: at first, they refused to address any type of criticism (see here), claiming that any further debate should be peer-reviewed as the article had been. It is perfectly understandable that they were not going to reply to every random blog commenting about their findings, but as they did start the fanfare with the initial press conference, they were expected to take their responsibilities when questions would come.

In retrospect, one of the very visible and damaging consequences of both cases appeared in recent interviews of the protagonists: Phil Jones for the infamous climategate at the University of East Anglia, and Felisa Wolfe-Simon for the bacterium isolated in California: both were unprepared to media exposure and went through extremely hard, exhausting times. This is at most partially their fault: scientists have been cloistered for a too long time in their ‘ivory towers’, and now that they are increasingly confronted to media and the public, they lack skills on how to deal with sudden broad exposure. I even know some professors who simply don’t see the point of talking to the public – there also exist good examples of scientists communicating to the public! – and I would strongly advocate a proper training for scientists in communication, particularly when it comes to speak to broader audiences or under particularly pressuring circumstances.

In order to keep credibility and respect, scientists must communicate to the general public in a way that is both honest and clearly understandable. This results in a general interest for research, as well as a better understanding of money spending by tax payers, who are in most places the first sponsor of science.

On the live webcast visible on the Nobelprize website, the Prize announcement was followed by a live phone interview with Prof. Negishi. He let the audience know he was awaken at 5 in the morning by the phone call announcing him the good news, and that he just had time for a coffee before the interview took place. I imagine this was but the beginning of a very long day for him! Quite amusing was when a journalist asked Negishi about the impact of his discoveries for the human beings. At that, Negishi responded something like ‘Do you have any knowledge of Grignard chemistry?’ The journalist laughed before admitting that he had no clue about it, and Negishi explained the impact of carbon cross couplings in much simpler terms.

* Andre Geim is probably the first researcher to detain a Nobel Prize together with a Ig Nobel Prize, obtained in 2000 for levitating a frog with magnets.

Of course, I am not critisizing the recipients‘ work (anyway, I couldn’t since I am a chemist and don’t know lots of things about ribosomes, apart from their double-potato shape they always have in basic biology textbooks) nor the fact that it deserves recognition, but the point is that the Nobel prize in chemistry went to people who actually do chemistry, say, five times in the last 10 years (2000: conductive polymers, 2001: catalysis, 2002: mass spec and NMR, 2003: cell membranes, 2004: ubiquitin and protein degradation, 2005: metathesis, 2006: eukaryotic transcription, 2007: chemistry on surfaces, 2008: GFP and 2009: ribosomes). So, what about creating a Nobel Prize in biology? They did it for Economics in the 60s…

Well now we just have to wait for next year – and hope that people working with molecules lighter than 50 kDa will be recognized as chemists. I’m quite sure there are hosts of guys working in organic synthesis, catalysis, nanotechnology or physical chemistry – to mention a few – who deserve to get the next Nobels. And regarding Grätzel… I keep my celebrating post for next year!

A first of three features, written by Richard Monastersky, explains how keeping carbon dioxide beneath dangerous levels is tougher than one previously thought. The basic question is: how much can the CO₂ concentration in the atmosphere increase before reaching a point of non-return? The pre-industrial level was roughly 250 parts per million (ppm), we are now reaching 400 ppm. It was long thought that a concentration of 450 ppm was a target to avoid, but new studies seems to indicate that a threshold of 350 ppm would have been more reasonable. This raises many questions on how to deal with the ever increasing carbon dioxide level. Studies performed at the University of Bern show that even if all CO₂ emissions stopped when its concentration is 450 ppm, it would take more than 1000 years to reach pre-industrial levels, and 3000 years would be necessary to see global temperatures slightly decrease. Other studies give even more frightening results: if CO₂ concentration reached 550 ppm (not unlikely at all) before all emission stopped, the temperatures would keep increasing for at least a century. Even if the studies are based on unperfect models, they point out the fact that climate will need a long time to recover, essentially due to the thermal inertia of the oceans (they slow up the climate warming now, they’ll delay its cooling in the future) and to the rate at which carbon sinks can absorb CO₂ from the atmosphere.

This rather pessimistic (I sould say, apocalyptic) view is counterbalanced by the two next articles, written by Nicola Jones and Oliver Morton, respectively, who discuss potential solutions to increased CO₂ concentration and global warming. At first sight the proposed ideas look weird: absorbing CO₂ into a solution of NaOH to produce sodium carbonate, that can be converted in calcium carbonate (by addition of calcium hydroxyde), and finally into pure CO₂ (that sould be stored, frozen, sent to space, etc.). Although this works on lab-scale, one may remember that, if the current emission rate is maintained, 650 gigatons of CO₂ will have to be removed from the air by 2100 in order not to reach 450 ppm… a serious scale-up will be required there! Another approach, involving geoengineering, aims at brightening clouds to increase reflexion of sunlight. Some researchers think about ships vaporizing water droplets to form clouds over the oceans, which should in turn cool earth’s atmosphere ! We’re not so far from reaching a good sci-fi novel scenario where a giant shield would be built between earth and sun, protecting us from sunlight until the global temperature has reasonably decreased…

But, if the last news are not good at all, and if we are facing a tremendous challenge, scientists are coming with ideas, trying new concepts and models, that can one day help us and the earth to survive our reckless carbon consumption. Whatever path we chose, it is certain that a compromise will have to be found between the sacrifices we’re ready to make to reduce our carbon emissions, and the consequences (at a climatic, economic, or social level) we agree to suffer. The earlier this compromise is established, the better!