Three smashing puzzlesUPDATE: To read the solutions click hereThe peculiarities of tennis throw up some nice problems. When better to ponder them than on the opening day of Wimbledon?1) Ashleigh Barty and Naomi Osaka are playing a set of tennis. In the last eight points, Barty has served seven aces and Osaka has served one. What’s the score? Continue reading...
Scientists searching the universe for aliens to conduct survey of the public for views on first contactScientists wrestling with the delicate issue of how to respond should humanity ever be contacted by an alien civilisation have hit on a radical idea: a survey that asks what the public would do.Members of the UK Seti Research Network (UKSRN) are to launch what they believe will be the largest ever survey of public attitudes towards alien contact on Monday at the Royal Society’s summer science exhibition. Continue reading...
To mark the 50th anniversary of the moon landings, an interactive collection of the sounds of space and the history of space travel has been launched by global sound project Cities and Memory. The project, called Space is the Place, combines 80 recordings from Nasa and the European Space Agency for the first time with reimagined, remixed interpretations of those space sounds, all designed to answer the question 'what does space travel sound like?' Continue reading...
After a total solar eclipse visible in South America, the end of the week will deliver a treatTowards the end of the week and moving into the weekend, look out for a young crescent moon in the western sky just after sunset. Having passed directly in front of the sun on 2 July to create a total solar eclipse visible from parts of South America, the moon will then become visible in the evening sky. Continue reading...
Hidebound views on subjects such as the climate crisis and Brexit are the norm – but the appliance of science may sway stubborn opinions“I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters of religion and politics a man’s reasoning powers are not above the monkey’s,†wrote Mark Twain.Having written a book about our most common reasoning errors, I would argue that Twain was being rather uncharitable – to monkeys. Whether we are discussing Trump, Brexit, or the Tory leadership, we have all come across people who appear to have next to no understanding of world events – but who talk with the utmost confidence and conviction. And the latest psychological research can now help us to understand why. Continue reading...
Composed entirely of archive footage, this documentary invests the historic mission with a tense immediacyGiven that we all know how the mission turned out, this documentary about the Apollo 11 lunar landing shouldn’t be as nervily tense as it is. But the archive-only approach – unlike the 2007 picture In the Shadow of the Moon, there are no contemporary interviews, just material recorded at the time – lends the film an immersive sense of urgency. Like the rows of crew-cut, clench-jawed scientists staring fixedly at banks of grainy screens 50 years before, we almost forget to breathe as Armstrong manoeuvres a rickety little capsule that looks like it’s held together with duct tape and faith.There is no shortage of factual films that explore this moment. But a combination of superb research – behind-the-scenes footage is augmented by newsreel shots of crowds camped out in the car park of a JC Penney department store, craning to catch a glimpse of history – and first-rate editing makes this lift off. A celebration of human endeavour, and of a rare moment of global unity. Continue reading...
Following last week’s discovery of the remains of a giant bird, we look at some of the most formidable beasts on recordLast week, researchers published a paper about the remains of a giant flightless bird found in a Crimean cave. Pachystruthio dmanisensis is believed to be from a family of prehistoric birds with powerful legs and large beaks, present across North America, Asia and Europe. The gigantic creature could grow to 3.5 metres in height and weigh about 450kg. By contrast, the ostrich is the largest living flightless bird and can reach 2.7 metres and weigh 150kg. The exact reason for Pachystruthio’s extinction is unknown, though it may have been due to some of the deadliest predators of the last ice age. Continue reading...
A drop of breast milk – enough to feed a kitten – fed one mother’s twins, but formal support for donations is under-fundedI wanted to donate breast milk even before I had my now four-month-old daughter, Gallia, whose birth has made it possible. It is she, I suppose, who is performing the act of generosity, sharing her dinner with those not born so lucky. Gallia has recently acquired what I believe to be her fourth chin, and so she is in a position to be charitable. If that sounds smug, it isn’t. I am grateful beyond measure that I have been able to feed her. It wasn’t always thus.Gallia’s older sisters, my identical twin girls, Raffaella and Celeste, now aged three, were born 10 weeks early. They needed oxygen to breathe, an incubator to regulate their temperature, intravenous nutritional support and a nasal-gastric tube that dripped breast milk directly into their unready stomachs to sustain them in place of their lost umbilical cord. They weighed just a shade over 2lb each and they would spend 56 days in hospital before they were well enough to come home. Continue reading...
Health chiefs reinstate UK patients’ access to fertility treatment as minister says postcode lottery is unacceptableAfter years of savage rationing of IVF treatment, NHS bodies in England are again making it available to childless women, raising fertility campaigners’ hopes of an end to a “heartless†policy.The NHS clinical commissioning groups in Herts Valley and South Norfolk reinstated patients’ access to IVF in April and this week Cambridgeshire and Peterborough CCG may follow suit. Continue reading...
What changes have the experts made to their own lives to tackle the climate emergency?‘We need to reduce our capacity and urge to consume’ Continue reading...
Worldwide panel says it cannot recommend healthy people take ‘memory supplements’Dietary supplements such as vitamins do nothing to boost brain health and are simply a waste of money for healthy people, experts have said.According to figures from the US, sales of so-called “memory supplements†doubled between 2006 and 2015, reaching a value of $643m, while more than a quarter of adults over the age of 50 in the US regularly take supplements in an attempt to keep their brain in good health. Continue reading...
Solar Foods hopes wheat flour-like product will hit target in supermarkets within two yearsA Finnish company that makes food from electricity, water and air has said it plans to have 50m meals’ worth of its product sold in supermarkets within two years.Solar Foods is also working with the European Space Agency to supply astronauts on a mission to Mars after devising a method it says creates a protein-heavy product that looks and tastes like wheat flour at a cost of €5 (£4.50) per kilo. Continue reading...
by Miranda Bryant in New York and agency on (#4J4P9)
Tapes identified in 2008 as the only surviving original recording of the first moon landing in 1969 are to go up for auction in JulyWhen Gary George bought a truckload of videotapes for $218 from a US government surplus auction more than 40 years ago, he planned to sell them to television stations – to record over.Fortunately, he decided to hold on to the three tapes labelled “Apollo 11 EVAâ€, which have since been identified as the only surviving original recording of the first moon landing, in 1969. Continue reading...
Featuring previously unseen footage, this electrifying documentary marks 50 years since the first moon landingSometimes gush is the only appropriate response and the amazingness never gets any less amazing. The 50-year anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon launch has now been marked by this fascinating documentary, which presents newly discovered colour footage of the build-up with the buzzcut wholesomeness of the astronauts’ goodnaturedly trustful faces in closeup, the electrifying launch, the touchdown and the return to Earth.Somehow, it doesn’t look like something that happened 50 years ago – but rather an extraordinarily detailed futurist fantasy of what might happen in the years to come, if we could only evolve to some higher degree of verve and hope. And, to my amateur eye, the design of the Apollo rockets is incomparably superior to the Nasa spacecraft that came afterwards or to anything in any sci-fi movie or TV show ever. Continue reading...
by Presented by Ian Sample and produced by Graihagh J on (#4J3N2)
String theory gained traction 35 years ago but scientists have not found any evidence to suggest it is correct. Does this matter? And should it be tested? Ian Sample debates this with Eleanor Knox, David Berman and Peter Woit Continue reading...
Fossilised jaw of baby diprotodon, a type of megafauna extinct for millennia, extracted in NSW by Australian MuseumA “giant wombat†fossil has been discovered by local council workers in the Monaro region of southern New South Wales.Two Snowy Monaro regional council employees found the fossilised jaw of a baby diprotodon last Friday at an undisclosed location that is known for such paleontological findings. Continue reading...
Visitors flock to see volcanic phenomenon that threatens to engulf property in RotoruaWhen Rotorua resident Susan Gedye was awoken at 2am by “a lot of shaking and jolting†she thought it was an earthquake.But then she headed downstairs at her suburban home and saw that her kitchen windows had steamed up and a large mud geyser had appeared in her garden. Continue reading...
Spacecraft will travel to an as-yet unidentified comet and map it in three dimensionsThe European Space Agency (ESA) has selected a comet interceptor for the first of its new class of “fast†missions.These must launch within eight years of selection and weigh less than 1,000kg so they can hitchhike into space on an already scheduled launch. Continue reading...
I’m delighted that, in a slew of cultural projects, discussion of vulvas takes centre stageAre vulvas having a moment? It’s a ridiculous question, I know, given that more than half of us have them. It’s like asking if bicycles are finally fashionable, or if fingernails are now a thing. But in these supposedly enlightened times, our lady-parts continue to be overlooked, misunderstood, bossed about and violated. Still, it’s been heartening of late to see vulvas (or vaginas, or fannies, or foofs – let each woman decide what she calls what’s in her pants) discussed more openly, shown off in museums and celebrated on television and in books. This isn’t about the vulva-shaped soaps and cushions flooding gift shops, or Gwyneth Paltrow and her daft vaginal eggs. I’m talking about cultural conversations and artefacts that illuminate and educate us all on matters that, by rights, should be common knowledge.Earlier this year, Channel 4 aired 100 Vaginas, a joyful, taboo-busting documentary in which Laura Dodsworth interviewed 100 women and photographed their vulvas. The series highlighted how little the issues that have most impact on women’s lives, from sexual violence to childbirth, infertility and menopause, are openly discussed. This spring, the pop-up Vagina Museum – the first of its kind in the world – opened in Camden, north London, with the hope of breaking the stigma surrounding women’s bodies and sexuality, and has since launched a crowdfunding campaign in order to secure a permanent home. Continue reading...
Huge thigh bone in Crimean cave belonged to largest bird found in northern hemisphereGiant flightless birds that dwarfed modern ostriches and weighed nearly half a tonne roamed Europe when the first archaic humans arrived from Africa, scientists say.Researchers unearthed the fossilised thigh bone of one of the feathered beasts while excavating a cave on the Crimean peninsula on the northern coast of the Black Sea. It is the first time such a massive bird has been found in the northern hemisphere. Continue reading...
Study shows vaccine has greatly reduced infections among girls and young womenElimination of cervical cancer in wealthy countries such as the UK may be possible within decades, say experts, following a major study showing the success of the HPV jab in protecting women.Human papilloma virus, which is sexually transmitted, can cause cervical cancer as well as anogenital warts. Data from high-income countries shows vaccination has led to an 83% reduction in HPV infections in 15- to 19-year-old girls over five to eight years. Among women aged 20 to 24, infections are down 66%. Continue reading...
Research shows key proteins in disease can spread from gastrointestinal tract to brainEvidence that Parkinson’s disease may start off in the gut is mounting, according to new research showing proteins thought to play a key role in the disease can spread from the gastrointestinal tract to the brain.The human body naturally forms a protein called alpha-synuclein which is found, among other places, in the brain in the endings of nerve cells. However, misfolded forms of this protein that clump together are linked to damage to nerve cells, a deterioration of the dopamine system and the development of problems with movement and speech – hallmarks of Parkinson’s disease. Continue reading...
The news media is society’s alarm clock – it needs to wake us upThis past Saturday, I was among hundreds of activists with the group Extinction Rebellion NYC who protested outside the New York Times headquarters in midtown Manhattan to demand better coverage of the climate crisis. Protesters lay down on Eighth Avenue, staging a “die-in†to block traffic. We draped a banner the length of the Times building that declared, “Climate Emergency = Mass Murderâ€. Sixty-seven of us got arrested.Somewhat to our surprise, our protest received a good deal of news coverage. CBS, CNN, the Guardian, and the Associated Press ran stories. The Times even published one, a Reuters dispatch that quoted a Times spokesperson defending the newspaper’s coverage. “There is no national news organization that devotes more time, staff or resources to producing deeply reported coverage to help readers understand climate change than the New York Times,†the spokesperson said. Continue reading...
Results suggest environmental factors could play a role in female reproductive healthAir pollution has been linked to a drop in activity of a woman’s ovaries, researchers have revealed.Experts say the findings suggest the female reproductive system is affected by environmental factors, although the study does not look specifically at the impact of air pollution on fertility. Continue reading...
The discovery that frozen sperm can survive space flight opens up tantalising possibilities. But there’s no guarantee of utopiaIf you’re a woman who has despaired over the past week, as you’ve observed the questionable conduct of jowly white men in positions of power and subsequently seen it defended by both men and women – take heart. The good news is that when our species eventually abandons this burned-out, used-up planet for a brave new world elsewhere in the universe, we can leave the men behind too. According to new research by scientists in Barcelona, frozen sperm can survive zero gravity conditions without deterioration, meaning that it will be far more economical to transport only women and sperm banks to populate our new intergalactic home, just as soon as we find a viable alternative planet.Related: Political violence against women tracked for first time as attacks soar Continue reading...
Simple therapies such as CBT can be only partly effective. We need to rein in an industry that unscrupulously targets vulnerable young peopleAlmost half a million children in England and Wales are gambling regularly, with about 55,000 estimated to have a serious problem. Suicide rates for gambling addicts are high, and gambling-related problems cause stress for individuals and families. In response, the NHS has opened its first children’s gambling clinic, offering face-to-face treatment – mostly cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).Out-of-control gambling is linked to complex individual and social problems – including stress, anxiety and other mental health issues such as bipolar disorder. CBT attempts to tackle the behaviour by dismantling some of the common beliefs and attitudes around it. Gamblers may be encouraged to set themselves realistic limits, fulfil their financial obligations before spending on betting, and to think of gambling as a form of entertainment as opposed to a means of making money. Continue reading...
Animal charities say it’s teaching the wrong lessons – but schools argue it inspires children to learn about the natural worldWatching duck eggs hatch in a classroom was a “wow†experience that brought the topic to life, says Sarah Holmes, teacher in Derby High School’s primary department. “It was a fantastic opportunity for the children to learn about the life cycle, see the ducklings grow and learn to swim. They also learned to take responsibility for looking after them.â€Classrooms across the UK house a wide range of school pets: hamsters, fish, guinea pigs and even tortoises. But though they teach children about nature it is not always a happy story, animal charities say, and it might be teaching children the wrong lessons. Continue reading...
Housing, immigration, health – there’s no policy area that won’t be touched by the climate crisis. The Democratic candidates should embrace the challenge
It’s a myth that environmental regulations stifle economic productivity. Harmful chemicals cost the US $340bn a yearThe Trump administration has argued that environmental regulations hold back economic productivity. Yet history suggests that the opposite is the case.Look at phasing out lead in gasoline. To this day, the US receives a $200bn annual economic stimulus package each year because lead levels in children plummeted when the US Environmental Protection Agency moved to protect children. Continue reading...
Royal Society for Public Health says need to expose children to germs is ‘dangerous myth’The notion that too much cleanliness can be bad for your health and that children need to be exposed to germs is a dangerous myth, according to a public health body.The Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) said the hygiene hypothesis – that allergies are caused by too much cleanliness, by killing off the bugs we need to challenge our immune systems – has entered the public imagination and is being misinterpreted. Continue reading...
Curiosity’s record-breaking measurement fuels speculation it is from microbial MartiansNasa’s Curiosity rover has detected its largest belch of methane on Mars so far, fuelling speculation that the robot may have trundled through a cloud of waste gas released by microbial Martians buried deep under the surface.Mission scientists announced on Monday that Curiosity had measured a record-breaking 21 parts per billion (ppb) of methane in the air in Gale crater, the rover’s landing site and area of exploration. The level is substantially more than the 5.8ppb it sensed on 16 June 2013. Continue reading...
Research has found that frozen sperm can survive in microgravity, paving the way for man-free missionsName: Interplanetary matriarchy.Appearance: Highly efficient. Continue reading...
Scientists say certain species are more abundant in marathon runners after raceFrom go-faster stripes to energy gels, athletes have long sought ways to boost their performance. Now researchers say bacteria might also offer a helping hand.Scientists say they have found that certain species of bacteria in the gut appear to be more abundant in marathon runners after a race. They also claim that when such bacteria were transferred into mice, the creatures showed an enhanced athletic performance. Continue reading...
US researchers planted ‘lost’ wallets around the world to see what would happen. I’m conducting my own honesty studyStatistically, people are quite kind. The University of Michigan just spent £472,000 proving this by planting 17,303 “lost†wallets in public places in 40 countries around the world and asking strangers to help return them to their owner. If the wallet contained a small amount of money, 51% of people returned it, with the figure rising to 72% if the wallet contained a substantial amount of money.Which is all well and good, but how honest are you? Obviously I don’t trust you with actual money – I’ve read some of your comments – so here’s an entirely hypothetical Choose Your Own Adventure-stye simulation instead. Continue reading...
The pilot broke astronaut training records in the 1960s before being told a woman’s place is not in orbit. Sixty years on, she is still pursuing her dreamWhen Wally Funk was barely a year old, she discovered aeroplanes. Her parents took her to an airport near where they lived in New Mexico and she got up close to a Douglas DC-3, an early airliner. “I go right to the wheel and I try to turn the nut,†she says. “Mother said: ‘She’s going to fly.’†Just over 20 years later, in 1961, Funk’s mother dropped her off at a clinic in Albuquerque, where she became the youngest participant in a programme to test whether the US’s best female pilots could become astronauts. She didn’t make it into space, but, nearly six decades on, she is still trying.We meet at the home of Funk’s friend, the journalist Sue Nelson, who has written a wonderful book about her. Funk is 80, straight-backed and sparkling. She is dressed in a black shirt embroidered with “Wally†on one side and the logo from the organisation Women in Aviation International on the other, neatly tucked into black trousers on which she has sewn a patch for SpaceShipTwo – Virgin Galactic’s suborbital plane. Funk spent $200,000 on a ticket in 2010 and is still waiting for the opportunity to use it. She talks energetically and loudly, and you have to speak up if you want her to hear you, thanks to a lifetime spent near plane engines. She is unlike anyone I have ever met. Continue reading...
Scientists find frozen sperm exposed to zero-g could go where no man has gone beforeAll-female astronaut crews could reproduce in space without the help of accompanying men, new research suggests.The study found that frozen samples of sperm exposed to microgravity retained similar characteristics to sperm samples kept on the ground, raising hopes that a sperm bank could one day be set up in space to help populate new worlds. Continue reading...
Draco is one of the fainter constellations, but can be seen this week in the eastern skyAnother fainter constellation that rides high in the summer sky for northern observers is Draco, the dragon. Like so many of the northern constellations, it is one of the original 48 star patterns listed by astronomer Ptolemy in the 2nd century. In myth, Draco was killed by the goddess Minerva, who then threw the body away into the sky. The constellation’s meandering shape is said to be because the body twisted as it was flung into the heavens. The two most obvious stars of the constellation are Rastaban and Eltanin in the head of the dragon. The chart shows the view at midnight BST on 25 June. The easiest way to find the head of the dragon is to locate the bright white star of Vega in the constellation Lyra. It will lie in the south-east. Look upwards and slightly east, and Rastaban and Eltanin should stand out as the brightest pair of stars in an otherwise undistinguished star field. Then see if you can trace the sinuous body of even fainter stars. Continue reading...
Babies were once not uncommon at the festival, and some couples perhaps planned a summer solstice birth, writes Dr Chris Howes, while Hugh Levinson poins out that the earliest sunrise and latest sunset do not occur on the solsticeI was interested to read the piece about Heidi Wesson, whose baby was delivered in our medical centre at the 2013 Glastonbury festival and was delighted to see the picture of her with her beautiful daughter Emelia (I gave birth at Glastonbury festival, Weekend, 22 June). Heidi is mistaken, however, in her belief that nobody else has had a baby on site.We have provided medical services at Glastonbury for 40 years and in our early days festival babies were not uncommon. In total, there must have been 10 or a dozen babies born on the site. It used to be said that some couples deliberately planned conception with a solstice birth in mind. One birth I particularly remember took place in a caravan one misty morning before dawn; I think the baby may have been named Worthy. Continue reading...
When Tim Halliday joined us in the biology department (as it was then called) at the Open University in 1977, he brought with him not only his love of all things amphibian but also a passionate commitment to teaching. His courses introduced thousands of OU students, many tackling science for the first time, to current thinking in evolution, animal behaviour and ecology, combining rigorous thinking with accessibility – a rare skill. Continue reading...
Turning 63, the writer looks back over highs and lows and asks, how can I sum it up?Ever since I read John Updike’s Rabbit tetralogy, I have felt that the ultimate test of a writer is to capture a single life from beginning to end in the pages of a novel.The idea of a single life captured through different points in time was behind the TV documentary series 63 Up (I am also 63). Partly for research into my next novel and partly out of curiosity, I find myself asking, who was I at 7, at 14, at 21, and so on? Does looking back on an entire life help us shape who we want to be from now on? Am I still the same person – or someone entirely different? After all, every life has two distinct aspects: the external and the internal. Continue reading...
Aliens are unlikely to be impressed by the likes of Annunziata Rees-Mogg and the Conservative partyAfter three years of training telescopes on 1,327 stars within 160 light years of Earth as part of the Breakthrough Listen project, astronomers have been met with silence, having failed to detect any signals that resemble intelligent life elsewhere. And yet many scientists still believe such life must exist. Even if they don’t accept the premise of the 1961 Drake equation, written by the US astrophysicist Frank Drake, that there are 100m worlds where life has been created through evolution, they still reckon the probability of extraterrestrial civilisations has to be above zero. So what are we doing wrong? The most likely explanation is that either we are looking in the wrong places or we are looking for the wrong things and that our equipment is not quite up to the job. But is it also possible that other civilisations are rather more sophisticated than our own and deliberately maintain radio silence to stop us getting in contact with them? That they’ve known about us for hundreds – if not thousands – of years and there is an international extraterrestrial alliance hellbent on blanking us out. They’ve taken a good look at us and concluded we are not intelligent enough to be worth bothering with. Just give us a couple of hundred years more and we’ll have probably destroyed the entire planet and ceased to exist, so why make the effort of trying to get to know us? Continue reading...
by Presented by Nicola Davis and produced by Graihagh on (#4HMGF)
Nicola Davis invites Prof Brigitte Van Tiggelen and Dr Peter Wothers on to the podcast to look at how the periodic table took shape and asks whether it might now be in jeopardy Continue reading...