Viewing sensory films of people tapping, crinkling paper and scratching beards can trigger brain tingles that are relaxing – and advertisers hope will entice you to buyIt all started when people discovered that softly-spoken instructional videos on YouTube – often including tapping, brushing and stroking sounds – gave them a curious head-tingling sensation and an almost euphoric feeling of calm.This autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) has since become a global phenomenon and a new self-help book, Brain Tingles, is hoping to encourage more of us to experience it in our everyday lives. Continue reading...

Alessandro Strumia hits back at petition sparked by claim physics was built by menMore than 1,600 scientists have backed a campaign condemning the Italian researcher who claimed physics was “invented and built by men”.They have signed a petition in response to comments made by Prof Alessandro Strumia, of Pisa University, who said male scientists were being discriminated against because of ideology. Continue reading...

Mourou and a colleague shown dancing in a lab surrounded by female students, some of whom do a stripteaseWhen Donna Strickland was announced this week as physics’ first female Nobel laureate in 55 years, it appeared progress was afoot in the field. But a bizarre video that has resurfaced on YouTube featuring another of this year’s physics laureates, Gérard Mourou, suggests enlightenment may be yet to reach all corners of the laser physics community.The clip, titled “Have you seen ELI”, was made in 2013, apparently with the aim of promoting Extreme Light Infrastructure (ELI), a €850m EU project led by Mourou. The soundtrack, an upbeat reggae song, lists the exciting goals of the laser facility: “reversing nuclear waste, understanding the universe and wait guys, even heal cancer”. Continue reading...

Biotherapeutics are a great leap forward. Now proper funding is needed to fulfil their potentialTheresa May’s announcement this week of a renewed NHS focus on diagnosing cancers earlier was warmly welcomed here at Cancer Research UK. Early detection and diagnosis is a key priority for us. A clear government ambition that within a decade 75% of cancer patients should be diagnosed at an early stage, when they still have options that can cure, would be great progress from where we are today.But should this ambition be realised, all patients still need treating – and, unfortunately, cancer can often evolve a stubborn resistance to the best therapies we currently have. Continue reading...

On 16 November, scientists vote on whether to update the way we measure the kilogram. This week, Ian Sample investigates the history of the metric system, and finds out how universal constants might now make it more robustOn 16 November, scientists will vote on whether or not to update the way we measure the kilogram and three other base units. Currently the kilogram is defined by a cylinder of platinum-iridium, locked in a vault in a suburb of Paris. But few have access to it, and the international copies are ever so slightly shifting their weight relative to it.The hope now is to move away from this unstable, physical artefact and instead base our definition of mass on a fundamental constant of nature – Planck’s constant. If this goes through, the whole metric system will for the first time be derivable from natural phenomena. Continue reading...

Saga Nevecek discovers 1,500-year-old sword while skimming stonesAn eight-year-old girl has pulled a 1,500-year-old sword from a lake in southern Sweden.“I felt something with my hand and at first I thought it was a stick,” Saga Nevecek told the local Värnamo Nyheter newspaper. “Then it had a handle that looked like it was a sword, and then I lifted it up and shouted: ‘Daddy, I found a sword!’” Continue reading...

The easy way to cut emissions – closing coal power stations – is exhausted. Now the public has to be convinced to make sacrificesThree years after world leaders signed the Paris climate agreement, we’re about to better understand what that deal means for how we live our lives. On Monday, a major report from the UN’s climate science panel will set out what it will take to limit global warming to 1.5C, the key Paris target.There are reasons to think the world is, finally, getting to grips with climate change. Carbon emissions are still rising but more slowly than before, and in many countries they’re falling. The UK has slashed its emissions to 19th-century levels, and we’re not alone – plenty of other countries, including the US, are making progress as well. Crucially, that’s happened without many people noticing, suggesting the world might be able to deal with the problem without having to persuade the public to change their polluting lifestyles. Continue reading...

Biggest ever review of evidence recommends the government ditch its advice to take them throughout winterVitamin D supplements do nothing for bone health and the government should ditch its advice that everyone should take them throughout the winter months, according to the authors of the biggest review of the evidence ever carried out.The findings challenge the established view of vitamin D and will dismay the many people who believe a daily dose of it is doing them good. But the large meta-analysis, the authors of which compiled 81 separate studies to come to the most robust possible conclusions, found there was no evidence to justify taking vitamin D supplements for bone health, except for those at high risk of a few rare conditions. Continue reading...

In the weak gravity, it took the Mascot lander 20 minutes to fall 51 metres to the surface – taking photos and readingsA German-French lander has arrived safely on the surface of the asteroid Ryugu, 300m kilometres from Earth. The Mobile Asteroid Surface Scout (Mascot) is about the size of a shoebox and weighs 9kg. It was developed by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and built in cooperation with the National Centre for Space Studies (CNES) in France. It was carried to the asteroid by Hayabusa2, a spacecraft built by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).Related: Spacewatch: Ryugu, an asteroid under close inspection Continue reading...

Program says it will use virus-carrying insects to engineer crops, but some worry it’s a way to develop biological agents

Repository would store ‘friendly’ germs from the intestines of people in remote communities for future medical treatmentsScientists have put forward plans for a microbial “Noah’s ark” to preserve beneficial bugs found in the guts of people living in some of the most remote communities on Earth.The move to save the microbes is driven by concerns that modern lifestyles are wiping out organisms that have colonised human intestines for millennia and are vital for good health. Continue reading...

Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music | Sports Personality of the Year | Inequality and lack of empathy | Nuclear threat | Tequila brand ambassadorMy abiding memory of the Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music of 1970 (Letters, 3 October), to give it its full title, was Pink Floyd coming on stage in the early hours with a local women’s choir to perform Atom Heart Mother, not to mention Led Zeppelin headlining on the Sunday night. It was a fantastic lineup and, as a Glasto regular gearing up for the ticket sale this Sunday, I am so glad that Michael Eavis was there with us at the Shepton Mallet showground that weekend 48 years ago.

Anna Eavis of English Heritage on efforts to get more blue plaques commemorating women; Hilary Caldicott on the suspended Cern professor Alessandro Strumia; Jean Rogers on men writing about feminism, and Sandy Balfour of Wikimedia on the gender bias of WikipediaAnna Kessel makes some valuable points on the lack of blue plaques to women – not least that inaction will only lead to the worsening of this imbalance (Shortcuts, G2, 3 October). With this in mind, in 2016, English Heritage appealed for more female nominations for our London blue plaques scheme. The many suggestions we received means that now, for the first time, more women than men are being shortlisted for plaques. And far from being ignored, Noor Inayat Khan and Gertrude Bell will both be awarded plaques, subject to permission from the relevant buildings’ owners. But we need more proposals, which can be made via our website.

Researchers say font, which slants to the left and has gaps in each letter, can aid recall

Nasa said ruling out defects doesn’t mean ‘hole was created intentionally’ after Russian agency said it was investigating the possibilityNasa has expressed doubts over a Russian theory that a tiny hole that caused an air leak on the International Space Station (ISS) was the result of sabotage.Related: 'All is calm': Russian cosmonaut shows space station hole Continue reading...

Neptune-sized body would be the first known moon outside solar system and the largest moon yet discoveredAstronomers believe they have discovered the first known moon beyond our solar system, in orbit around a gigantic planet 8,000 light years away.The so-called exomoon, which is estimated to be the size of Neptune, would also be the biggest known moon, far exceeding anything known to exist in our own solar system. The team behind the apparent discovery said it needed further confirmation but that they had failed to find any other convincing explanation for their data. Continue reading...

Site moderator rejected submission for Donna Strickland, the first female physics winner in 55 years, in MarchWhen the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm announced the Nobel prize for physics this week, anyone wanting to find out more about one of the three winners would have drawn a blank on Wikipedia.Related: Physics Nobel prize won by Arthur Ashkin, Gérard Mourou and Donna Strickland Continue reading...

Poor sleep and high blood pressure are also more common in women with experience of assault or harassment, research showsWomen who have experienced sexual assault or harassment are more likely to suffer from poor sleep, anxiety, high blood pressure and symptoms of depression, new research has revealed.While the study cannot prove that the events are behind the greater likelihood of such health problems, researchers say it highlights an important link. Continue reading...

Briton and two Americans honoured for using evolutionary principles to develop proteins that have been used in new drugs and medical treatments

Americans Frances H Arnold and George P Smith and Briton Gregory P Winter will share the prize of 9m Swedish kronor (£770,000)

It’s the only evidence-based explanation of life on Earth, yet some countries are turning their backs on it

After Australia cynically releases its catastrophic climate data the day before grand final weekend, Ian the Climate Denialist Potato holds a press conference

Working with older people, I know what’s in store for me as I enter another decade. I just hope I’ll know when I need to let goEighty, eh, so how does it feel?” It’s a question to which I have had to reply too often since “that” birthday. I have now lived two years longer than my father, eight years longer than my mother, a full decade longer than the good book anticipated and if the demographic pundits are to be believed, as a resident of the soft south I have another 4.7 years to go.Related: 'A new way to stretch yourself': the older people realising their acting dreams Continue reading...

Defining this continent is a slippery undertaking, but it is revealing to look at its evolution over the last 100 million yearsHow was Europe formed? How was its extraordinary history discovered? And why did Europe come to be so important in the world? For those, such as me, seeking answers, it is fortunate that Europe has a great abundance of bones – layer upon layer of them, buried in rocks and sediments that extend all the way back to the beginning of bony animals. It is where the investigation of the deep past began. The first geological map, the first palaeobiological studies, and the first reconstructions of dinosaurs were all made in Europe.This history begins around 100 million years ago, at the moment of Europe’s conception – the moment when the first distinctively European organisms evolved. Earth’s crust is composed of tectonic plates that move imperceptibly slowly across the globe, and upon which the continents ride. Most continents originated in the splitting of ancient supercontinents. But Europe began as an island archipelago, and its conception involved the geological interactions of three continental “parents” – Asia, North America and Africa. Together, those continents comprise about two-thirds of the land on Earth, and because Europe has acted as a bridge between these landmasses, it has functioned as the most significant seat of exchange in the history of our planet. Continue reading...

London conference pushes uses ranging from reducing pain to increasing orgasms

The Cern physicist who claimed women have made no contribution to research could be an isolated misogynist, but there’s something deeper going on

Existing guidance that symptoms are minimal leads to misdiagnosis and ‘harmful long-term prescribing’Half of all those taking antidepressants experience withdrawal problems when they try to give them up and for millions of people in England, these are severe, according to a new review of the evidence commissioned by MPs.Guidance from the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (Nice), which says withdrawal symptoms “are usually mild and self-limiting over about one week” urgently needs to be changed, say the review authors. Continue reading...

Massively elongated orbit suggests object is influenced by theoretical giant Planet Nine in Oort Cloud regionAn extremely distant dwarf planet, named The Goblin, has been discovered in observations that are redefining the outer reaches of the solar system.Astronomers made the discovery while hunting for a hypothetical massive planet, known as Planet Nine, that is suspected to be in orbit far beyond Pluto in a mysterious region known as the Oort Cloud. Planet Nine has not yet been seen directly, but The Goblin appears to be under the gravitational influence of a giant unseen object, adding to astronomers’ certainty that it is out there. Continue reading...

American Arthur Ashkin, Frenchman Gérard Mourou and Canadian Donna Strickland share annual award for advances in laser physics• Arthur Ashkin, Gérard Mourou and Donna Strickland win physics Nobel12.34pm BSTThanks for joining us for the live coverage of the 2018 Nobel prize for physics. Don’t forget to come back tomorrow to find out who has scooped the prize for chemistry.The last thoughts on today’s award are from Dr Amelle Zaïr from King’s College London, who is a lecturer in advanced photonics and Dr Seirian Sumner, a behavioural ecologist and co-founder of Soapbox Science, an outreach platform to promote women in science.12.31pm BSTAccording to an interview from a few years ago, Ashkin felt a bit miffed that he had previously missed out on the Nobel prize when it was awarded in 1997 to a trio of scientists including Steven Chu, one of Ashkin’s colleagues, “for development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light.”Perhaps today’s news is some consolation… Continue reading...

American, Frenchman and Canadian share 9m Swedish kronor (£770,000) prize for work in laser physics• Nobel physics prize awarded – as it happenedThree scientists have been awarded the 2018 Nobel prize in physics for creating groundbreaking tools from beams of light.The American physicist Arthur Ashkin, Gérard Mourou from France, and Donna Strickland in Canada will share the 9m Swedish kronor (£770,000) prize announced by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm on Tuesday. Strickland is the first female physics laureate for 55 years. Continue reading...

Third of men and one in two women aged 45 are likely to go on to be diagnosed with one of the conditions, study saysOne in two women will develop dementia or Parkinson’s disease, or have a stroke, in their lifetime, new research suggests.About a third of men aged 45 and half of women of the same age are likely to go on to be diagnosed with one of the conditions, according to a study of more than 12,000 people. Continue reading...

Italian professor’s presentation deemed ‘unacceptable’ by Geneva research centreA senior Italian scientist has been suspended after he sparked fury during a presentation at Cern, the European nuclear research centre in Geneva, when he said physics was “invented and built by men, it’s not by invitation”.Prof Alessandro Strumia of Pisa University claimed during a seminar on gender issues in physics that male scientists were being discriminated against because of ideology. Continue reading...

Inventing Ourselves by Sarah-Jayne Blakemore wins £25,000 prize with investigation praised by judges as ‘truly a book that everyone should read’A radical reframing of our understanding of the teenage mind, that explains typically ridiculed behaviours such as risk-taking, emotional instability and heightened self-consciousness as outward signs of great transformation, has won the prestigious Royal Society prize for science book of the year.Two thousand years since Socrates said that teenagers have “bad manners, contempt for authority, show disrespect for elders and love chatter in the place of exercise”, Inventing Ourselves: The Secret Life of the Teenage Brain by neuroscientist Professor Sarah-Jayne Blakemore has scooped the £25,000 prize on Monday night. Blakemore is the fourth woman to win the prize over its 30-year history, and also the fourth in a row, following Cordelia Fine for her book Testosterone Rex last year, Andrea Wulf in 2016 for The Invention of Nature and Gaia Vince for Adventures in the Anthropocene in 2015. Continue reading...

Jefferson airplane | Crosswords | Male slutsAdam Sweeting references the three classic US rock festivals of the 1960s at which Jefferson Airplane performed (Marty Balin obituary, 1 October). JA also played at the Bath Festival of 1970, progenitor of the Glastonbury series, at which they were famously rained off halfway through their planned set.

American and Japanese immunologists win 2018 award for their work on cancer therapy

Two immunologists, American James P Allison and Japanese Tasuku Honjo, win annual award for work on a new approach to cancer treatment

These days new social norms can be swift and profound. It could be our saving graceAfter smoking and drink-driving, could climate change provide the next big behaviour-change challenge? The latest science tells us that nothing short of rapid, transformative change in our infrastructure and behaviour can prevent the loss of the climate we depend on – yet the message is only now being officially endorsed at the highest scientific level, because the implications are terrifying for today’s political and economic gatekeepers. It means real change, which incumbents always fear.But are we better at society-wide changes in attitude and behaviour than we give ourselves credit for? And do recent cultural shifts relating to everything from diet to plastics, sexism and attitudes to gender and identity suggest that we might be entering a phase in which more rapid behavioural changes are possible? Research in a new report for a soon-to-be launched international alliance of concerned groups suggests so. Continue reading...

The Earth isn’t solid – which makes it hard to predict how the submerging of our coastlines will unfoldBetter scientific understanding of global warming makes the discussion about its geopolitical consequences increasingly urgent. Put simply, there are going to be winners and losers: hotter places and colder places; wetter places and drier places; and, yes, places that disappear under the sea. But the reality is a bit more complicated. In particular, are sea levels going up or down? The answer seems clear when you consider that Antarctica has lost 3 trillion tonnes of ice in the last 25 years.Related: The speed of #MeToo gives me hope – we can still stop climate change | Andrew Simms Continue reading...

Look south-east this week to see the fifth brightest object in our sky twinkling as it rises in the early hoursEarly risers this week will be rewarded with a stunning sight in the south-east. Sirius, the brightest star in the sky, will be rising in the hours before dawn. The chart shows the view to the south-east at 04:00BST. Overall, Sirius is the fifth brightest object in the sky. It is outshone only by the Sun, the Moon, and the planets Venus and Jupiter. This week, Sirius should be unmistakable because of its brightness, but if a further signpost is needed, then look for the three stars in Orion’s belt. They sit half way between the red star Betelgeuse and the blue star Rigel, and they point in a straight line diagonally down to Sirius. Another characteristic of Sirius is that it twinkles. This rapid flashing of colour and brightness is caused by the star’s light being refracted in the layers of Earth’s atmosphere. It is most pronounced when Sirius is low and so its light is travelling through more atmosphere to reach our eyes. As it rises higher into the sky, the twinkling diminishes. All stars twinkle, it is just more noticeable with Sirius because it is so bright. Continue reading...

It is the ultimate accolade, but critics claim the award is now out of step with modern collaborative research methodsA small group of scientists will achieve international stardom this week. They will learn they have won Nobel prizes in physiology, chemistry and physics, and their lives will be transformed. Each will win hundreds of thousands of pounds and they will be feted as infallible sages on science – and other topics outside their expertise.But many now question this deification of scientists and believe Nobel prizes are dangerously out of kilter with the processes of modern research. By stressing individual achievements, they say, Nobels encourage competition at the expense of cooperation. They want the system to be changed. Continue reading...

In this fast-moving technological world, lines of poetry can be food for the soul and help people with mental illnessHow can learning poetry by heart help us to be more grounded, happy, calm people? “Let me count the ways,” says Rachel Kelly, who has suffered from anxiety. Whenever she’s feeling wobbly, she finds reciting lines of poetry is grounding, validating and connects her to others who have felt as she is feeling in this moment. And it’s something we can all do: poetry we’ve learned to recite means we have another voice inside us that’s always there, a kind of on-board first responder in times of psychological need.There’s also a certainty and stability about being able to conjure those words: they’re a crutch, we can lean on them, they can even do the thinking for us. Kelly describes how two lines from Invictus by WE Henley can make all the difference to what happens to her next: “I am the master of my fate/I am the captain of my soul.” When all she can hear in her head are negative voices, she can drown them out by repeating, over and over, positive lines from poetry: they’re substitutions, life-giving mantras rather than life-sapping ones. Continue reading...

Wellcome’s director offers a stark warning about the trust’s future in the UKEvery year, about 100 babies in the UK are diagnosed with rare, soft-tissue cancers. Treating young babies with chemotherapy and surgery is difficult and dangerous, but a new way of understanding these tumours using genomics offers hope. Researcher Sam Behjati devotes his work to decoding the DNA of rare childhood cancers. Recently, Behjati and his co-researchers revealed the genetic changes that cause a group of tumours to grow on babies’ kidneys. Now better targeted treatment using existing medicines is a possibility.This week, the NHS becomes the first in the world to offer patients routine access to cutting-edge genomic medicine. This huge advance is in no small part because science in the UK has been at the forefront of the genomic revolution. Continue reading...

In a new book likely to rekindle fierce controversy, psychologist Robert Plomin argues that genes largely shape our personalities and that the latest science is too compelling to ignoreThere are few areas of science more fiercely contested than the issue of what makes us who we are. Are we products of our environments or the embodiment of our genes? Is nature the governing force behind our behaviour or is it nurture? While almost everyone agrees that it’s a mixture of both, there has been no end of disagreement about which is the dominant influence.And it’s a disagreement that has been made yet more fraught by the political concerns that often underlie it. Traditionally, those on the left have tended to see the environment as the critical factor because it ties in with notions of egalitarianism. Thus inequalities, viewed from this perspective, are explained not by inherent differences but by social conditions. Continue reading...

One hundred years ago Holst’s Planets suite was premiered, with the composer drawing on metaphors and myths to animate his planets. Today’s scientific realities are just as rich and powerful, writes the physicist and TV presenter.When The Planets was completed in 1916, little was known about the physical nature of the worlds represented musically by Gustav Holst, and he didn’t care. His focus was on the planets as metaphors for different facets of the psyche; War, Peace, Jollity, Old Age, Messenger, Magician and Mystic. Indeed, Holst wrote parts of the work as stand-alone pieces and co-opted them later.Today we have visited all the planets and our discoveries have replaced their ancient astrological characters. At first sight, this new knowledge might appear to jar with Holst’s work, but this would be a superficial conclusion to draw. The planets have histories far richer than Holst could have imagined and reality delivers more powerful metaphors than myth. Set against what we now know, Holst’s work catalyses new ideas and generates powerful intellectual challenges which enrich and inform important debates in progress today, as art with depth can and perhaps must do. Continue reading...

What can a materials scientist learn from artists? How do you make robotic trousers? And what should we do about plastics? Hannah Devlin sits down with Mark Miodownik to find outAs a teenager, Mark Miodownik was stabbed with a razor blade, which penetrated his leather jacket, his school blazer and shirt before slicing his skin. The silver lining was that this harrowing event sparked a life-long fascination with materials science and engineering. A fascination that now sees him as Professor of Materials and Society, and director of the Institute of Making at University College London.This week, Mark sits down in the studio with Hannah Devlin to walk us through his career, and why he thinks that his field now needs to open its doors to designers, architects and artists. He also shares the inspirations for his new book, Liquid, which takes a broad look at the fluids that permeate every aspect of our lives.

Rovers deployed by the unmanned Hayabusa2 spacecraft capture a 15-frame clip of the asteroid RyuguTwo Japanese robots have sent back their first video images from the surface of a moving asteroid as part of an unprecedented mission aimed at shedding light on the origins of the solar system.The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) released the 15-frame clip along with new photographs days after the unmanned spacecraft Hayabusa2 deployed the rovers on to the asteroid’s surface after a three-and-a-half year journey. Continue reading...

Hundreds of thousands of deaths a year are not being recognised in international estimates, research suggestsHundreds of thousands of babies who died in the womb could have been missed out of international estimates on stillbirths, research suggests.According to figures for 2015, an estimated 2.6 million babies a year worldwide are stillborn – dying at a point in pregnancy when most babies would survive outside the womb. Continue reading...

Zarah’s donated samples were used by researchers – many others should have the chance to do the sameLast week, sitting at my desk at work, I clicked on a newly arrived PDF with considerably more trepidation than usual. The draft expanded to fill my screen, and I nervously scrolled down past a list of authors’ names into a soup of acronyms and jargon. Is she in there? I wondered, my breath quickening.As part of a global effort to diagnose and treat cancer more effectively, every year researchers analyse millions of patient samples in different ways. Cancer’s inner secrets, and its inherently destructive nature, are being laid out in increasing detail. New avenues open up, new vulnerabilities are exposed. Consequently, step by step, survival stats creep ever upwards. Continue reading...

Researchers not sure apparent protective effect extends to progestin only products such as mini pill and implantsWomen who use modern forms of the combined pill are at a lower risk of developing ovarian cancer than women who don’t take hormonal contraception, research suggests.The study backs up previous findings for older forms of the combined pill – an oral contraceptive that contains artificial versions of both oestrogen and progesterone. Modern forms of the pill contain different doses of synthetic oestrogen and different types of progestins, and are sometimes taken continuously. Continue reading...

Are we heading for a sixth mass extinction? This is a journey into the past to evaluate our futureAs science journalist Peter Brannen points out, life is extremely fragile, a “thin glaze of interesting chemistry on an otherwise unremarkable, cooling ball of stone”. So fragile, in fact, that in the planet’s history there have been five mass extinctions, when nearly all life has been wiped out. The question hanging over this book is whether the current most dominant species on the planet is about to cause a sixth mass extinction. Continue reading...