Best of 1991

1. BUCKYBALLS

They are the best thing to happen to pure carbon since the diamond: 60-atom molecules that are neither pyramid shape (like diamonds) nor hexagonal (like graphite) but spherical, like soccer balls. Captured for the first time in 1991 in computer-generated "snapshots" (seen here with cesium-based handles -- the rabbit ears on top), these namesakes of Buckminster Fuller might someday be fashioned into tiny ball bearings, featherweight batteries or even superconducting wires that are just one molecule thick.

2. PCR

The polymerase chain reaction, a deceptively simple process with an ungainly name, may turn out to be the most important tool for genetics research since Mendel's peas. PCR takes a snippet of DNA and in a matter of hours clones up to a billion perfect copies. In the past year it has proved invaluable in everything from making prenatal diagnoses of genetic diseases to identifying rape suspects from a single sperm cell.

3. CHEAP SOLAR CELLS

This was a particularly bright year for photovoltaics, the technology for converting sunlight into electricity. First Texas Instruments and Southern California Edison developed a silicon solar collector they claim will halve the cost of squeezing juice from the sun. Then a pair of researchers in Switzerland came up with an efficient photovoltaic device fashioned after the greatest solar cells of all: the chlorophyll molecules in plants.

4. RECONSTITUTED FDA

For years, the Food and Drug Administration was a federal backwater best known for being slow to approve potentially life-saving drugs. The agency gained some respect in 1991 as new commissioner David Kessler took aim at the food industry, insisting that nutritional claims on labels be based on scientific fact. The FDA seized brand-name products like Procter & Gamble's Citrus Hill Fresh Choice orange juice that failed to meet strict standards.

5. MASSIVELY PARALLEL SUPERCOMPUTERS

This was the year it became clear that supercomputers of the future will have not one or two or even dozens but thousands of processors working in concert. One company, Thinking Machines of Cambridge, Mass., introduced a gymnasium- size number cruncher that can perform up to 2 trillion operations a second. Now the firm just needs to find customers willing to fork over $200 million.

6. PEN-BASED PORTABLES

At the other end of the computer spectrum were the new clipboard-style models designed to be operated with the flick of a pen. Why fumble with a keyboard or an electronic mouse when you can point and draw directly on your computer screen? The machines can even be taught to read your handwriting, provided you ever learn to make that scrawl legible.

7. GULF WAR TECHNOLOGY

For years, American weapons technology was the butt of bitter jokes, taxpayer complaints and congressional investigations. That was before the world watched video footage of U.S. smart bombs threading the eye of Iraq's military needle.

8. THE 4,600-YEAR-OLD MAN

It was a stunning archaeological find -- and the best ad yet for cryogenics. Not only did this Late Stone Age mountain climber emerge in remarkably good shape from his icy tomb in the Italian Alps, but his tools and some of his clothing were intact -- a treasure trove scientists will be mining for years.

9. CROP CIRCLES DEMYSTIFIED

It was a victory of skeptical scientific inquiry over tabloid headlines. For 13 years people had been concocting increasingly bizarre explanations for those mysterious circles and lines pressed into the grain fields of southern England. Were they the landing sites of UFOs? No, the crop circles -- or at least some of them -- were the handiwork of a pair of elderly British landscape painters who engineered the elaborate hoax (with string and planks) "for a bit of a laugh."

AND THE WORST. . .

No one challenged his science -- or his personal honesty -- but David Baltimore, one of the world's leading biologists, signed his name over a co- author's research that federal investigators later determined was faked. His mistake might have been forgiven, but not his prideful refusal to re- examine the data. Instead he belittled the whistle-blowers and decried the government's "witch-hunt." The controversy helped bring about his resignation as president of Rockefeller University.