A major study of worker health in the aftermath of the Gulf oil blowout got underway months later than desirable and may be limited as a result, a public health specialist told the AAAS Forum on Science and Technology Policy.

Dr. Bernard D. Goldstein, interim director of the Center for Healthy Environments and Communities at the University of Pittsburgh, said the federal government was unprepared to quickly mount studies of the possible long-term health effects of the 20 April 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill.

By returning to traditional screening methods, researchers have identified an effective anti-malarial drug candidate, known as NITD609, which seems to kill the blood stages of the two major malaria parasites when administered orally, just once a day. This discovery is especially timely since researchers in Asia have begun to report a building resistance to artemisinin, the main ingredient in current malaria treatments for about 100 million patients each year.

Traditionally, cheating in sports through doping has been enabled mostly by advances in pharmacology. But as new methods of genetic modification emerge, both the scientific and the sports communities are becoming increasingly aware that gene therapy—the insertion of genes into an individual’s cells and tissues—will make its way onto the playing field.