sciencemag.org SCIENCEPHOTO: TAGIDE DECARVALHO/OLYMPUSNEWS | IN BRIEFIN FOCUS An image of a
tardigrade, a microscopic
animal known as a “water
bear,” won the Olympus Image
of the Year Global Life Science
Light Microscopy Award,
Americas division. Tardigrades
are mostly colorless, so Tagide
deCarvalho of the University
of Maryland, Baltimore
County, used fluorescent dyes
to highlight its organs and
stomach filled with food.wastewater into wells, much of which
flowed underground into a nearby ocean
reef. Maui county and the Trump admin-
istration argued the law didn’t apply to
groundwater. During oral arguments
in November 2019, Breyer signaled his
confidence in using science to track pol-
luted groundwater, noting that a brief
filed by scientists “really convinced me
they’re geniuses and they can trace all
kinds of things.”In memoriam: Donald Kennedy
LEADERSHIP | Don Kennedy would have
blushed at a colleague’s tribute as “very
close to being a Renaissance man.” But
it’s fitting for a person whose resume
included being president of Stanford
University, leading the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration (FDA), and serving as
editor-in-chief of Science magazine. “He
could talk on any level to people about
science, without condescending to them,”
says Tom Grumbly, a Washington, D.C.,
operative who first worked with Kennedy
at FDA. “And he could stand toe to toe with
the best scientists in the world.” The neuro-
biologist died 21 April of COVID-19 at the
age of 88. His 2008 advice to his successor
at Science also stands as an epitaph: “Be
as fair as you can, sympathize with anger,
confess institutional error when appropri-
ate, and be firm.”SpaceX plans satellite ‘Sun visor’
ASTRONOMY | SpaceX said last week it is
adapting internet satellites to be launched
this year to diminish their brightness
in orbit, which the company hopes will
reduce their interference with astronomi-
cal observations. The company launches
the satellites in batches of 60, and some
are blamed for creating light tracks in
images taken by ground-based telescopes.
Last year, astronomical societies asked
the company for remedies. SpaceX CEO
Elon Musk tweeted last week about add-
ing “a special dark foam that’s extremely
radio transparent” and does not block the
satellites’ phased array antennas. “Looks
a lot like a car sun visor,” he wrote. The
company will also try a separate darken-
ing measure, changing the alignment of
the satellites’ solar panels relative to Earth
while they are moving into their orbits,
Space News reported. The launch of the
upgraded satellites has not been sched-
uled, but would come after another launch
planned for May. SpaceX aims for an initial
constellation of about 1600 to bring inter-
net service worldwide, but has applied for
authorization to loft as many as 42,000.PALEONTOLOGYSociety wants ban on Myanmar papers
P
aleontologists should not apply their expertise to any amber fossils
that have recently emerged from Myanmar, the Society of Vertebrate
Paleontology (SVP) said last week. In a 21 April letter, SVP called on jour-
nal editors and publishers to stop publishing papers that involve amber
specimens purchased since 2017 from sources in Myanmar. That is when
the country’s military seized control of mining operations in a region that
has yielded stunning fossils of 100-million-year-old insects, snakes, birds, and
dinosaurs (Science, 24 May 2019, p. 722). The military’s takeover, in part spurred
by the amber riches, killed and displaced thousands of people in what the United
Nations has condemned as a crime against humanity, SVP leaders wrote. In the
same letter, the society also reminds journals that papers should only describe
fossils permanently deposited in a public repository. Even long-term loans of spec-
imens held by private collectors—a common situation with amber specimens—
are not enough to guarantee their availability for future research, SVP wrote.
Groundwater gets protections
LEGAL AFFAIRS | The U.S. Supreme Court
gave hydrologic science top billing in a
closely watched ruling last week affirming
that the federal Clean Water Act covers
groundwater pollution. In a six-to-three
decision, Justice Stephen Breyer wrotefor the majority that pollution starting in
groundwater could be subject to federal
regulations if it drains into protected riv-
ers, lakes, or oceans in a way that is the
“functional equivalent” of being poured
directly into surface waters. The case
revolved around a sewage treatment plant
on Maui in Hawaii that pumped treated454 1 MAY 2020 • VOL 368 ISSUE 6490