Re: Article] Scientists Take DNA's Temperature

"Robert Karl Stonjek" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> Scientists Take DNA's Temperature
> 
> The temperature most often associated with human life is 98.6 degrees
> Fahrenheit, that of a healthy person. Now scientists have succeeded in
> taking a different measurement, one they've dubbed the "heat of life:" the
> energies involved in DNA replication and synthesis.
[snip]
> The thermal detection system, which is accurate to a millionth of a calorie,
> determined the amount of heat given off when a base pair was inserted into
> the DNA strand.
[snip]
> Comment:
> The latest science?  Then why do they use a scale that was originally the
> measure of a King's stride (yard) foot (foot) or manliness (inch)??  Why not
> use the centigrade scale (Celsius) like the rest of the non-monarchical
> world (or do you Americans still check imperial measures against, say, the
> latest president's dimensions?)
> 
> Kind Regards,
> Robert Karl Stonjek.

It is interesting that the number 98.6, which every American school child
learns, is a direct conversion from the Celsius estimate of 37 degrees that
was set back in the 19th century by a German researcher.  I suspect that
Americans probably relied on an Oxbridge trained Englishman to do the
arithmetic of the conversion - an American would have rounded to 99 degrees
(and incidentally have come closer to the truth).

Of course, Americans are familiar with some metric scales - notice that the
heat measurement was in calories.  Perhaps Scientific American should have
converted that to BTU...  ;-)