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This talk centered on Hamming's observations and research on the question "Why do so few scientists make significant contributions and so many are forgotten in the long run?" From his more than forty years of experience, thirty of which were at Bell Laboratories, he has made a number of direct observations, asked very pointed questions of scientists about what, how, and why they did things, studied the lives of great scientists and great contributions, and has done introspection and studied theories of creativity. The talk is about what he has learned in terms of the properties of the individual scientists, their abilities, traits, working habits, attitudes, and philosophy.

An ingenious new tool triggers a cascade of new insights. In this special section, Science's news reporters and editors mark the end of the current decade by stepping back from weekly reporting to take a broader look at 10 insights that have changed science since the dawn of the new millennium.

In 2002, the European Space Agency began a program called Don Quijote to find out how best to perform such a deflection.

Now, Stephen Wolters at the Open University in the UK and a few friends have published a new analysis of the mission saying that measuring the change in orbit is not enough. Instead, the spacecraft needs to characterise the impact in detail, determining the density of the material near the asteroid's surface, the size of the surface grains as well as the mass and speed distribution of the impact ejecta.

Ref: arxiv.org/abs/1107.4229: Measurement Requirements For A Near-Earth Asteroid Impact Mitigation Demonstration Mission