July 27, 1995

Researchers have discovered what they hope will be a magic bullet for obesity, or at least the forerunner of major new therapies: a hormone that makes overweight animals rapidly lose body fat. The hormone is particularly impressive because it can make even lean animals shed almost all of what little fat they have. The finding, which will be published tomorrow in three papers in the journal Science, has been greeted with great enthusiasm by scientists who see it as presenting a powerful new approach to treating obesity.

Deal on Tobacco Two Congressmen have proposed a plan that they say could curtail teen-age smoking without additional Federal regulation of tobacco. Page A16. U.S. Shuns Trade Pact Japan and South Korea agreed to join a global pact to liberalize trade in financial services, allowing it to go into effect without the U.S. Page D1. Sex Zoning Plan Under Fire Across the city emotions are flaring over a zoning plan for X-rated shops that some fear only moves the problem to their own backyard. Page B1. Germless in Japan The obsession with cleaniness is such that pens and pencils are now impregnated with an antiseptic chemical to kill bacteria. Page A4. George Romney Dies The automobile executive who became Governor of Michigan, a Republican Presidential candidate and a Nixon Cabinet member, died at the age of 88. Page D22.

Fearful that his majority might desert him on upcoming floor votes on two of the most important spending bills in the House, Speaker Newt Gingrich today struck deals with three discontented factions: moderates, conservatives and petulant freshmen. Freshman Republicans and conservative Democrats who sought to hold his feet to the fire on balancing the budget won public agreement from Mr. Gingrich to support a so-called "lock box" amendment to the bill that finances the Departments of Education, Labor and Health and Human Services, the largest of the 13 appropriations bills. The provision is intended to insure that savings from future spending cuts would be used to reduce the Federal deficit, thus putting into law the promise of the budget resolution agreed to by the House and Senate earlier this year.

At least 13,000 New Jersey youths run away from home each year, a private nonprofit group said yesterday. Yet because the state only has nine shelters that will accept runaways without referrals from other agencies, many of these young people never get help, said Linda Kelly, executive director of the Garden State Coalition for Youth and Family Concerns.

CURLED up in the morning light on one of her many sofas and smiling through her searing Caribbean-blue cat eyes, Judy Collins says she just felt like doing something different for a change, having fun with a new form. So she spent the last eight years writing a novel called "Shameless," published this month by Pocket Books ($23). "Shameless"? From the soulful troubadour of the 1960's and 70's, the avatar of correct political causes?