May 6, 2003

Prior to first known cases of AIDS in US, health experts believed treatments and vaccines had eliminated threat of infectious diseases; AIDS discovery, slow reaction to control spread of infection and lack of coordinated cooperation between countries, agencies and scientists all contributed to today's worldwide AIDS epidemic and more recently and positively contributed to improved containment for SARS; SARS and AIDS are contrasted and compared; World Health Organization's contribution to SARS containment and continued research is enumerated; photos, graph (L)

Miami University considers move from Big East Conference to Atlantic Coast Conference, causing other Big East schools to explore moving with Miami, in hopes of staying in same conference as revenue-building powerhouse athletic program; photos (M)

Dan Bricklin, entrepreneurial small-businessman and innovator in personal computer industry, helps small business owners make technological plunge into Web sites as chief technology officer of Interland; photos (special section, Small Business) (M)

Vincent Gauci, managing director of Australian-based coal and copper producer MIM, is resisting $3 billion takeover bid made Switzerland's Xstrata despite approval of its other board members; photo (S)

Relentless barrage of 80 tornadoes that tears through nation's belly on May 4 kills 39 people, including woman whose wood-frame house is snatched off its foundation in Cherokee County, Kan, and dumped in pasture quarter-mile away; it topples emergency tower in Jackson, Tenn, and damages concrete fountain there memorializing seven victims of 1999 twister; it rips roof off church near Battlefield, Mo, as 35 parishioners huddle in basement praying; 'devastation' is word most used to describe what experts say were worst tornadoes in decades; hundreds of buildings are smashed, and water and power are kocked out for thousands in eight states; death toll is at 39; dozens of people in Pierce City, Mo, take shelter in National Guard Armory; maps showing path of detruction (L)