The discovery of DNA Did you know t

The discovery of DNA

Did you know that a tiny piece of your hair gives us information about...?
- who you are related to
- which career you could be successful in
- any crimes you have committed
- what illnesses you could get
- how and when you could die

This is possible thanks to the information in DNA (or deoxyribonucleic acid). Your hair and every cell in your body contains your own unique DNA. It can tell you a lot about your family, health, and personality.

DNA was discovered by a German scientist, Friedrich Miescher, in 1869, but nobody realized its importance then. Other scientists thought that it was too simple to countain the map of how we are made! In 1953, a group of British scientists at Cambridge University finally discovered the structure of DNA and how it worked. They were given the Nobel Prize for Medecine in 1962.

Gradually, scientists learned to 'read' more and more of the information in DNA. In 1986, for the first time DNA testing eas used by the police. Some DNA is usually left by a criminal at the place where he crime was committed. This can be matched with DNA from suspect. The test shows if the suspect is guilty.

In 1990 the Human Genome Project was begun. Scientists wanted to make a map of the 3 billion chemical letters in human DNA. Over 1,000 scientists all over the world worked on the project, and it took 10 years. With this information, it is possible that a cure for many diseases will be found in the future. But it also brings with it many questions. Do we want to be able to choose what our babies will look like, or pick the best person for a job with DNA tests?

The invention og GOOGLE

'How many common English words were invented by Shakespeare?'
How long did it take people to find the answer to this question 15 years ago? And now? You can google it find the answer immediately!

Google is the most popular Internet search engine in the world . It was invented by two students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin. They met in 1995, when they were both studying computer science at Stanford University, USA. They were also both fans of the science fiction TV programme Star Trek, and they loved the spaceship computer. They dreamed of producting something that could also answer any question on seconds.

Internet search engines at the time were slow and gave many websites that weren't useful. In January 1996, Page and Brin decided to make a better and faster search engine. They thought the results should be based on the popularity of each website - the most popular ones have the highest number of 'weblinks' (links to other websites).

Nobody would give them money for their project, so the used their credit cards and bought as much computer memory ass possible. They also borrowed money from family and friends. Then, in 1998, they were given a cheque for $100,000 and they started their own company. Their first office was in a friend's garage! The company name Google comes from mathematics. A 'googlol' is a very high number - 1 followed by a hundred zeros.

The Google search engine was soon used by thousands of people worldwide because it was fast, easy and accurate. By 2002 it was the biggest searsh engine on the Internet. Now, more questions have been answered by Google that any other Internet service, from sport to science, and from music to medicine. Google hopes that in the future all the world's information will be put on the Internet, so that everybody can find everything