1. 宇宙是由什么构成？

2. 意识的生物学基础是什么？

3. 为什么人类基因会如此之少？

4. 遗传变异与人类健康的相关程度如何？

5. 物理定律能否统一？

6. 人类寿命到底可以延长多久？

7. 是什么控制着器官再生？

8. 皮肤细胞如何成为神经细胞？

9. 单个体细胞怎样成为整株植物？

10. 地球内部如何运行？

11. 地球人类在宇宙中是否独一无二？

12. 地球生命在何处产生、如何产生？

13. 什么决定了物种的多样性？

14. 什么基因的改变造就了独特的人类？

15. 记忆如何存储和恢复？

16. 人类合作行为如何发展？

17. 怎样从海量生物数据中产生大的可视图片？

18. 化学自组织的发展程度如何？

19. 什么是传统计算的极限？

20. 我们能否有选择地切断某些免疫反应？

21. 量子不确定性和非局部性背后是否有更深刻的原理？

22. 能否研制出有效的HTV疫苗？

23. 温室效应会使地球温度达到多高？

24. 什么时间用什么能源可以替代石油？

25. 地球到底能负担多少人口？

26. 宇宙是否唯一？

27. 是什么驱动宇宙膨胀？

28. 第一颗恒星与星系何时产生、怎样产生？

29. 超高能宇宙射线来自何处？

30. 是什么给类星体提供动力？

31. 黑洞的本质是什么？

32. 正物质为何多于反物质？

33. 质子会衰减吗？

34. 重力的本质是什么？

35. 时间为何不同于其他维度？

36. 是否存在比夸克更小的基本粒子？

37. 中微子是其自己的反粒子吗？

38. 是否有解释所有相关电子系统的统一理论？

39. 人类能够制造最强的激光吗？

40. 能否制造完美的光学透镜？

41. 是否可能制造出室温下的磁性半导体？

42. 什么是高温超导性之后的成对机制？

43. 能否发展关于湍流动力学和颗粒材料运动学的综合理论？

44. 是否存在稳定的高原子量元素？

45. 固体中是否有超流动性？如果有，如何解释？

46. 水的结构如何？

47. 玻璃态物质的本质是什么？

48. 是否存在合理化学合成的极限？

49. 光电电池的最终效率如何？

50. 核聚变将最终成为未来的能源吗？

51. 驱动太阳磁周期的原因是什么？

52. 行星怎样形成？

53. 是什么引发了冰期？

54. 使地球磁场逆转的原因是什么？

55. 是否存在有助于预报的地震先兆？

56. 太阳系的其他星球上现在和过去是否存在生命？

57. 自然界中手性原则的起源是什么？

58. 能否预测蛋白质折叠？

59. 人体中的蛋白质有多少存在方式？

60. 蛋白质如何发现其作用对象？

61. 细胞死亡有多少种形式？

62. 是什么保持了细胞内的通行顺畅？

63. 为什么细胞的成分可以独立于DNA而自行复制？

64. 基因组中功能不同于RNA的角色是什么？

65. 基因组中端粒和丝粒的作用是什么？

66. 为什么一些基因组很大，另一些又相当紧凑？

67. 基因组中的“垃圾”（“junk”）有何作用？

68. 新技术能使RNA测序的成本降低多少？

69. 器官核整个有机体如何了解停止生长的时间？

70. 除了继承突变，基因组如何改变？

71. 在胚胎期，不对称现象是如何确定的？

72. 翼、鳍核面孔如何发育进化？

73. 是什么引发了青春期？

74. 干细胞是否位于所有肿瘤的中心？

75. 肿瘤更容易通过免疫进行控制吗？

76. 肿瘤的控制比治愈是否更容易？

77. 炎症是所有慢性疾病的主要原因吗？

78. 疯牛病会怎样发展？

79. 脊椎动物在多大程度上依赖先天免疫系统来抵抗传染病？

80. 对抗原而言，免疫记忆需要延长暴露吗？

81. 为什么孕妇的免疫系统不拒绝其胎儿？

82. 什么与有机体的生物钟同步？

83. 迁徙生物怎样发现其迁移路线？

84. 为什么要睡眠？

85. 人类为什么会做梦？

86. 语言学习为什么存在临界期？

87. 信息素影响人类行为吗？

88. 一般麻醉剂如何发挥作用？

89. 导致精神分裂症的原因是什么？

90. 引发孤独症的原因是什么？

91. 阿兹海默症患者的生命能够延续多久？

92. 致瘾的生物学基础是什么？

93. 大脑如何建立道德观念？

94. 通过计算机进行学习的极限是什么？

95. 又多少个性源于遗传？

96. 性别倾向的生物学根源是什么？

97. 生命树是生命之间系统关系最好的表达方式吗？

98. 地球上又多少物种？

99. 什么是物种？

100. 横向转移为什么会发生在众多的物种中以及如何发生？

101. 谁是世界的共同祖先？

102. 植物的花朵如何进化？

103. 植物怎样制造细胞壁？

104. 如何控制植物生长？

105. 为什么所有的植物不能免疫一切疾病？

106. 外界压力环境下，植物的变异基础是什么？

107. 是什么引起物质消失？

108. 能否避免物种消亡？

109. 一些恐龙为什么如此庞大？

110. 生态系统对全球变暖的反应如何？

111. 至今共有多少人种，他们之间有何关联？

112. 是什么提升了现代人类的行为？

113. 什么是人类文化的根源？

114. 语言和音乐演化的根源是什么？

115. 什么是人种，人种如何进化？

116. 为什么一些国家向前发展，而有些国家的发展停滞？

117. 政府高额赤字对国家利益和经济增长速度有什么影响？

118. 政治与经济自有密切相关吗？

119. 为什么改变撒哈拉地区贫困状态的努力几乎全部失败？

120. 有没有简单的方法确定椭圆曲线是否存在无穷多解？

121. 霍奇闭链是代数闭链的和吗？

122. 数学家将会最终给出Navier-Stokes方程的解吗？

123. 庞加莱实验能否确定4维空间的球？

124. 黎曼zeta函数的零解都有a+bi形式吗？

125. 对粒子物理标准模型的研究是否会停止在量子Yang-Mills理论上？

What we don't know: 125 questions

See Science vol.309, No.5731, 1 July 2005, pp.75-102 for Intro and 25 question. and link to remaining 100 questions. Details on the questions and the articles normally require online subscription to Science. It is available to any member of OSU community from campus, http://www.sciencemag.org/sciext/125th/). Currently the issue is free from anywhere; perhaps that will be true forever.

The guideline for selecting the questions: ``Scientists should have a good shot at answering the questions over the next 25 years, or they should at least know how to go about answering them.''

The first 25 questions were highlighted with individual short articles. The criteria for chosing them: ``how fundamental they are, how broad-ranging, and whether their solutions will impact othe scientific disciplines.'' These 25 highlighted questions are listed ``in no special order.'' The remaining 100 -- starting with ``Is ours the only universe?'' -- are grouped by discipline (physics & chemistry [broadly], life sciences [broadly], climatology, anthropology & sociology & economics, mathematics).

The 125 Questions

What Is the Universe Made Of?

What is the Biological Basis of Consciousness?

Why Do Humans Have So Few Genes?

To What Extent Are Genetic Variation and Personal Health Linked?

Can the Laws of Physics Be Unified?

How Much Can Human Life Span Be Extended?

What Controls Organ Regeneration?

How Can a Skin Cell Become a Nerve Cell?

How Does a Single Somatic Cell Become a Whole Plant?

How Does Earth's Interior Work?

Are We Alone in the Universe?

How and Where Did Life on Earth Arise?

What Determines Species Diversity?

What Genetic Changes Made Us Uniquely Human?

How Are Memories Stored and Retrieved?

How Did Cooperative Behavior Evolve?

How Will Big Pictures Emerge from a Sea of Biological Data?

How Far Can We Push Chemical Self-Assembly?

What Are the Limits of Conventional Computing?

Can We Selectively Shut Off Immune Responses?

Do Deeper Principles Underlie Quantum Uncertainty and Nonlocality?

Is an Effective HIV Vaccine Feasible?

How Hot Will the Greenhouse World Be?

What Can Replace Cheap Oil -- and When?

Will Malthus Continue to Be Wrong?

Is ours the only universe?

What drove cosmic inflation?

When and how did the first stars and galaxies form?

Where do ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays come from?

What powers quasars?

What is the nature of black holes?

Why is there more matter than antimatter?

Does the proton decay?

What is the nature of gravity?

Why is time different from other dimensions?

Are there smaller building blocks than quarks?

Are neutrinos their own antiparticles?

Is there a unified theory explaining all correlated electron systems?

What is the most powerful laser researchers can build?

Can researchers make a perfect optical lens?

Is it possible to create magnetic semiconductors that work at room temperature?

What is the pairing mechanism behind high-temperature superconductivity?

Can we develop a general theory of the dynamics of turbulent flows and the motion of granular materials?

Are there stable high-atomic-number elements?

Is superfluidity possible in a solid? If so, how?

What is the structure of water?

What is the nature of the glassy state?

Are there limits to rational chemical synthesis?

What is the ultimate efficiency of photovoltaic cells?

Will fusion always be the energy source of the future?

What drives the solar magnetic cycle?

How do planets form?

What causes ice ages?

What causes reversals in Earth's magnetic field?

Are there earthquake precursors that can lead to useful predictions?

Is there--or was there--life elsewhere in the solar system?

What is the origin of homochirality in nature?

Can we predict how proteins will fold?

How many proteins are there in humans?

How do proteins find their partners?

How many forms of cell death are there?

What keeps intracellular traffic running smoothly?

What enables cellular components to copy themselves independent of DNA?

What roles do different forms of RNA play in genome function?

What role do telomeres and centromeres play in genome function?

Why are some genomes really big and others quite compact?

What is all that "junk" doing in our genomes?

How much will new technologies lower the cost of sequencing?

How do organs and whole organisms know when to stop growing?

How can genome changes other than mutations be inherited?

How is asymmetry determined in the embryo?

How do limbs, fins, and faces develop and evolve?

What triggers puberty?

Are stem cells at the heart of all cancers?

Is cancer susceptible to immune control?

Can cancers be controlled rather than cured?

Is inflammation a major factor in all chronic diseases?

How do prion diseases work?

How much do vertebrates depend on the innate immune system to fight infection?

Does immunologic memory require chronic exposure to antigens?

Why doesn't a pregnant woman reject her fetus?

What synchronizes an organism's circadian clocks?

How do migrating organisms find their way?

Why do we sleep?

Why do we dream?

Why are there critical periods for language learning?

Do pheromones influence human behavior?

How do general anesthetics work?

What causes schizophrenia?

What causes autism?

To what extent can we stave off Alzheimer's?

What is the biological basis of addiction?

Is morality hardwired into the brain?

What are the limits of learning by machines?

How much of personality is genetic?

What is the biological root of sexual orientation?

Will there ever be a tree of life that systematists can agree on?

How many species are there on Earth?

What is a species?

Why does lateral transfer occur in so many species and how?

Who was LUCA (the last universal common ancestor)?

How did flowers evolve?

How do plants make cell walls?

How is plant growth controlled?

Why aren't all plants immune to all diseases?

What is the basis of variation in stress tolerance in plants?

What caused mass extinctions?

Can we prevent extinction?

Why were some dinosaurs so large?

How will ecosystems respond to global warming?

How many kinds of humans coexisted in the recent past, and how did they relate?

What gave rise to modern human behavior?

What are the roots of human culture?

What are the evolutionary roots of language and music?

What are human races, and how did they develop?

Why do some countries grow and others stagnate?

What impact do large government deficits have on a country's interest rates and economic growth rate?

Are political and economic freedom closely tied?

Why has poverty increased and life expectancy declined in sub-Saharan Africa?

Is there a simple test for determining whether an elliptic curve has an infinite number of rational solutions?

Can a Hodge cycle be written as a sum of algebraic cycles?

Will mathematicians unleash the power of the Navier-Stokes equations?

Does Poincar 's test identify spheres in four-dimensional space?

Do mathematically interesting zero-value solutions of the Riemann zeta function all have the form a + b i?

Does the Standard Model of particle physics rest on solid mathematical foundations?