Following a year of mixed fortunes, in which stocks plummeted, European companies blossomed, and the media hype surrounding science spiraled out of control, Nature Biotechnology takes a quizzical look at the world of biotechnology. Answers provided on p. 91.

1. Fun finding funds. Which raised most through IPOs in 1998, European or North American companies? And who were the top three beneficiaries of what might be laughingly termed "investor largesse"?

2. Company tag lines. Which companies identify themselves with the following slogans?

(a) Excellerating evolution

(b) Food. Health. Hope.

(c) Innovation from biodiversity

(d) Leadership in commercializing

genetic drugs

(e) The diabetes biotechnology company

3. Jilted at the altar. Which corporate-betrothed twosome failed to tie the knot in 1998, not once but twice?

4. The long arm of DNA. Which European nation took what some regard as a step toward a police state with the creation of a central criminal DNA database? And what have muggers to fear from a product marketed by Apik (Melrose, FL)?

5. Casualty list. Name three biotechnology companies that were quoted on NASDAQ when Nature Biotechnology started (as Bio/Technology ) in March 1983 but didn't last long enough to celebrate the magazine's 15 year anniversary in March 1998.

6. Finding funding. Following a severe financial crisis, which country cut the equivalent of US$7 billon from its 1998 national budget expenditure, but pledged to maintain its $20 billion, 14-year commitment to biotechnology?

7. Mission mishmash. Some buffoon at the PR agency has mixed up the company mission statements again. Can you match the company with the mission statement? (a) DeveloGen is an innovator of small molecule inhibitors of the enzymes of the ubiquitin proteasome pathway (UPP) designed to treat cancer and inflammatory disease.  (b) Oxford GlycoScience is dedicated to improved products for the diagnosis, management, and cure of major diseases of the central nervous system.  (c) AngioGene (Montreal, Canada) [uses] its enabling proteomics, glycobiology and glycochemistry technology to discover, develop, and commercialize major therapeutic and diagnostic products both by internal development and external partnering.  (d) Proscript applies DNA technology to proliferative disorders.  (e) CeNes is inspired by the innovative idea that molecular genetics and developmental control genes can be used as therapeutic tools against diabetes, obesity, and pancreatic cancer.

8. Taking the Mickey. Researchers demonstrated that the production of human growth hormone by transgenic mice in January was no laughing matter. But in which fluid was the hormone produced?

9. Prefixes and suffixes. Not all biotechnology company names are entirely original. Can you see the common roots in the following groups?

(a) _smos (San Diego, CA), _Code (Reykjavik, Iceland), _ltagen (San Carlos, CA), _biopharma (Lausanne, Switzerland);

(b) _im Pharmaceuticals (San Diego, CA), _ygen (Santa Clara, CA);

(c) _gene (Munich, Germany), _nox (San Diego, CA);

(d) _zyme (Boulder, CO), _targets (Cambridge, UK), _Gene (Hayward, CA);

(e) _es (Cambridge, UK): _tocor (Malvern, PA)

(f) _gene (Strasbourg, France), _karyotic Therapies (Cambridge, MA): _cell Technologies (Monmouth Junction, NJ)

(g) _tera (Worcester, MA); _los (Lexington, MA): _topharm (Godmanchester, UK)

10. Sequence and order. Arrange the following genomes in chronological order of sequencing.

Treponema pallidum

Bacillus subtilis

Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Mycoplasma genitalium

Caenorhabditis elegans

Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Rickettsia prowazekii

Helicobacter pylori

Methanococcus jannaschii

11. High-impact biotechnology. What delivery technology, which made the news in March, connects transgenic onions and vaccine research?

12. 1998 approvals. What recombinant protein was finally produced in Frankfurt after 14 years and DM 100 million?

13. What's in a name? Which company's name: (a) was a Roman goddess of agriculture, grain, and the love a mother bears for her child  (b) takes part of SELEX and mixes it with other iterative technologies  (c) is linked with the German Christian theologian Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy  (d) is derived from the Latin for swiftness of motion or action?

14. Every time I open my mouth, some fool speaks.

(a) What prompted Barbara Walters, copresenter on the US television magazine 20/20, to predict that in 5–10 years time there will be "people who can live to be 150."

(b) Who in September declared that the UK government should "now, finally, impose an immediate moratorium on [transgenic] crops until detailed research can be completed" in response to a paper in Nature.

(c) What high profile project has "risks that are too high; a risk of privacy abuse that is too high; and a risk of piracy that is also high," and at the same time means that "Icelandic scientists have won the lottery."