Everybody loves penguins – but how much do you know about them?It is World Penguin Day, so what better way to celebrate than to test your knowledge of penguins, and their appearances in history and popular culture, while also looking at pictures of penguins? You might even learn something along the way. Continue reading...
Male conference organisers disproportionately choose men over women when assigning speaking slotsWomen get fewer chances than men to speak about their work at scientific conferences, largely because those in the upper echelons of academia are male, research has revealed.While speaking at conferences is a key part of academic life, not only raising the profile of researchers but helping them to share ideas and find job and funding opportunities, the latest study confirms what many scientists have long suspected to be true: men give more talks than women. Continue reading...
Malcolm Robinson, scientist and founder of charity Harvey’s Gang, named overall winner at Advancing Healthcare awardsA biomedical scientist has scooped top honours in the annual awards for therapists and health scientists for his idea of giving child patients VIP tours of the laboratories where their blood samples are analysed.
Technology has revolutionised science but it can’t beat good eyes for finding fossilsScience and technology go hand in hand, spurring each other on with new insights and techniques. Palaeontology has benefitted too with everything from scanning electron microscopes and XROMM videos to 3D printing and photogrammetric models playing a role in uncovering the secrets of the past. But the most fundamental aspect of palaeontology – finding fossils, remains remarkably, laughably, low tech.Even the most well-funded expeditions run by experienced researchers basically rely on having boots on the ground and people looking for fossils. That’s pretty much it, you walk around and look. Continue reading...
A writer dives into at-home dog DNA testing to learn all she can about her pooch – and so that know-it-alls will stop pestering her at the dog parkEveryone thinks my dog is a puppy. His large, wide-set eyes; small, soft body; and playful demeanor belie his maturity and emotional depth – attributes that become obvious once you get to know him. The truth is he’s about four, though the exact date of his birth, like that of many rescue dogs, is lost. He looks, to my eye, like some sort of a labrador-terrier mix, with a soulful amber gaze, spunky little foldy ears, and an itty-bitty little nosey. He is my friend and I love him.Until recently, though, his age and breed were up for debate. This was evidenced by an apparent dog expert at the local dog park on a recent morning. “No,†he said, shaking his head, after asking for the details of my dog. “My dog looked like that when she was a puppy, and now she looks like this.†He gestured to his large pit-bull-looking sweetie who, though beautiful, looked nothing like my little labrador-looking sweetie whom I love so much and for whom I would die. “Well … he’s about four,†I told him, hiding my annoyance well as I am extremely calm. “No. I don’t think so,†he said. Continue reading...
by Presented by Richard Lea, Claire Armitstead and Si on (#3NH2P)
In her furious new book, Also Human, psychologist Caroline Elton exposes the crisis among doctors in the UK, who spend their lives caring for others without receiving any support themselves. She explains why she felt she had to go public about her counselling work with overstressed pillars of the medical profession.Plus, Claire, Richard and Sian examine the literature of consulting room and operating theatre, discuss the vogue for medical memoirs and place bets on the winner of this year’s Wellcome prize for fiction and nonfiction on a medical theme. Continue reading...
Is time real or simply a useful measurement of change? The author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics takes us to the limits of our understanding with clarity and styleIn Hitler’s Germany, a handful of physicists bristled at the mere mention of quantum theory. The troubling uncertainties of Einsteinian relativity and other physical exotica were viewed as “Jewish science†inimical to German nationhood and the Newtonian mechanics of Deutsche Physik. “German physics†(sometimes called “Aryan physicsâ€) failed to make inroads in 1930s Germany because its champions were so plainly deluded. To forward-looking German physicists such as Max Planck and Werner Heisenberg, the idea that relativity was a “Jewish fraud†was manifest nonsense. Albert Einstein was indeed Jewish, but had he masterminded a “world crisis†in physics, as the anti-relativity lobby insisted? Hardly.Nobody said that relativity theory was easy. Einstein’s notion that time and space are essentially one (the concept of curved “spacetimeâ€) is the stuff of abstract poetry. Fortunately, the Italian physicist Carlo Rovelli writes of “warped time†and other tentative physics with incisive clarity. Known for his work on loop quantum gravity theory and the pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Anaximander, Rovelli is one of our great scientific explicators. His poetic essay collection Seven Brief Lessons on Physics sold more than a million copies in English translation in 2017 and remains one of the fastest-selling science books ever. Continue reading...
Between 5% and 10% of those with the virus will develop a rapidly fatal form of leukaemiaHuman T-lymphotropic virus type 1 is spread through contaminated blood, unprotected sex and breastmilk. Like HIV, there is no cure. Like HIV, the virus causes potentially fatal complications but unlike HIV it takes much longer for symptoms to appear. Some people may carry the virus for 30 years before chronic complications appear. Continue reading...
Potentially deadly bacteria thriving in huge clots of waste in sewers, Channel 4 study showsFatbergs, the congealed mass of fat and discarded items that are increasingly blocking Britain’s sewers, are the consequence of the plastic crisis in Britain and contain potentially deadly antibiotic-resistant bacteria, tests show.A study by Channel 4 in conjunction with Thames Water has analysed the contents of one supersize fatberg discovered underneath the streets of South Bank in central London. Continue reading...
Oversharing may be better than the dreadful silence that once surrounded ‘the big C’, but many patients might prefer more practical adviceIt is astonishing that “cancer diaries†(Why I live in dread of another cancer confessional, 18 April) have proliferated to the extent that some of your correspondents (As a cancer patient, I needed distraction, Letters, Anne Hay, 23 April) can describe them as cliches or tediously omnipresent.Perhaps there has been a trend towards “oversharingâ€, but on the whole this is surely a corrective to the dreadful mandatory silence that surrounded cancer not so long ago. Continue reading...
Exclusive: In an open letter, the scientists say the proposed Ellis institute is essential to avoid brain drain to big tech firmsLeading scientists have drawn up plans for a vast multinational European institute devoted to world-class artificial intelligence (AI) research in a desperate bid to nurture and retain top talent in Europe.The new institute would be set up for similar reasons as Cern, the particle physics lab near Geneva, which was created after the second world war to rebuild European physics and reverse the brain drain of the brightest and best scientists to the US. Continue reading...
The solutions to today’s puzzlesOn my puzzle blog earlier today, I set you the following puzzles:1) What is numerically interesting about April 25, 1849 - the date of birth of the German mathematician Felix Klein - and why is this year’s anniversary particularly noteworthy? Continue reading...
Shouldn’t policy be based on evidence – not the other way around?The future seems rosy for Jeremy Hunt. In his newest letter to social media firms, he envisions a future where every child gets a state-imposed and universal social media limit, similar to the alcohol units recommended by government. After a child surpasses a set cutoff point, their social media access is stopped for the day. Hunt makes it seem easy, practical, and better for children and parents alike.There is just one glaring problem. This drastic policy still needs the scientific evidence to back it up. Hunt announced yesterday that his chief medical officer will be taking charge of this. Well, as a scientist working in this area, I can tell Dame Sally Davies now: the evidence this policy needs doesn’t exist. If she is not willing to ignore large parts of the scientific literature or exaggerate a minority of low-quality studies, her job to find the amount of “science†to back up such significant state intervention will be impossible. And, to insert an important side-question, shouldn’t policy be based on evidence – not the other way around? Continue reading...
A one-sided storyUPDATE: The solutions are now up hereHi guzzlers,Today’s puzzles are in honour of the German mathematician Felix Klein, who was born this week 169 years ago, on April 25, 1849. Continue reading...
Fertile breeding conditions caused by hottest summer since records began leads to surge of rats and miceA record-breaking long, hot summer has led to a tenfold explosion in New Zealand’s rodent population, with the country’s urban areas worst hit.The 2017-2018 summer in New Zealand was the hottest since records began, and fertile breeding conditions have led to a surge in rat and mice numbers. Continue reading...
The constellation Leo dominates the southern sky, with Regulus its brightest starOne of the most prominent constellations in the spring sky is Leo. During the winter, it has climbed out of the eastern sky and now dominates the south. The constellation is one of the oldest to be recognised in its current form. The Mesopotamians recognised this grouping of stars about 4,000 years ago. Continue reading...
Thanks to a genetically engineered enzyme, a bug that eats plastic bottles developed a much bigger appetite for our rubbish. It is a hopeful signEvolution never sleeps. Before 1970 there can have been no significant bacteria that ate plastic, because there was not enough of that plastic in the world to sustain a population. But in 2016 a group of Japanese scientists discovered a new species, Ideonella sakaiensis, in the samples they were sifting from a bottle-recycling plant, that was able to attack and eat PET, the plastic used in most bottles, almost all of which ends up in landfill or dumped at sea, where it may last for centuries. Everything that rots in nature does so because it is being eaten by bacteria. Most plastics – among them PET – were considered totally impervious to bacterial attack, making them almost indestructible unless burned or crushed. So a bacterium that can consume even one kind of plastic could become a desperately needed ally in the struggle to stop the oceans being choked with plastic waste.What has captured the imagination of the world is that a subsequent group of scientists, who were trying to understand on a molecular level how I sakaiensis breaks down and digests plastic bottles, found the enzymes that it uses and made a slightly different version of one to see what would happen. The new enzyme is much more efficient than the version found in nature, and works on more kinds of plastic. This kind of molecular tweaking of substances, already found in nature, is at the root of another recent scientific breakthrough, the Crispr-Cas9 technique for genetic engineering. It offers some hope that we can use technology to moderate and even to some extent to reverse the impacts that earlier technologies, such as those that make it easy to manufacture billions of tons of plastic, have had on the world around us. Continue reading...
If you live long enough, you get cancer. But without our mutating, blundering cells, we’d never have made it out of the primordial soup…Bob Weinberg of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has been one of the world’s foremost experts on cancer for nearly five decades. Back when I was a wee graduate student, I lunched with Dr Weinberg at a conference and he told me something that stuck with me: “If you live long enough, you will get cancer.â€The inevitability of cancer has made itself painfully clear over the past century. As mortality from almost all other causes has plummeted, cancer rates have skyrocketed. While there is good reason to believe that some aspects of modern lifestyle and diet also contribute, the bulk of the rise in cancer is simply because we are no longer dying from so many other things. Continue reading...
My father, David Bailin, who has died aged 79, was a physicist who was ahead of his time. His best known work was on superconductivity and superfluidity in relativistic fermion systems, inspired by his former Sussex colleague Tony Leggett’s Nobel prizewinning work on superfluid Helium-3. It gained no citations for the first few years, until its importance for neutron stars was understood.His early research was on the weak interaction – the fundamental force behind certain kinds of radioactivity. He showed that the experimental data at the time required the existence of a heavy W boson particle, which was discovered 20 years later. Continue reading...
Pod of orcas spotted between Dunoon and Gourock, thought to be hunting seals or porpoisesA pod of killer whales has been spotted in the river Clyde apparently hunting seals or porpoises.Images and videos have been posted on social media over the weekend of about half a dozen killer whales, or orcas, between Dunoon and Gourock. Continue reading...
Ultrasound technique overcomes problems with current methods to diagnose the most common cancer in menScientists have announced the development of a highly accurate and reliable technique for diagnosing prostate cancer. The Dundee University-based team say they have used an ultrasound process called shear wave elastography (SWE) to detect prostate tumours. The method is non-invasive and cheaper than current detection techniques.Prostate cancer has become the most common cancer in men in the UK. One in eight men will develop the condition at some point in their lives with more than 47,000 new cases being diagnosed every year. Men aged 50 or over, men with a family history of prostate cancer, and black men are at greatest risk of developing the condition. Continue reading...
We think nothing of sharing personal information with tech giants so why are we so suspicious about our health records?Half of us born after 1960 will be told we have cancer at some point in our lives. Virtually no one will go through life untouched by the disease, whether as a sufferer, a survivor or supporter. So every year, millions of us lace up running shoes, bake cakes and cultivate moustaches in memory of loved ones to raise the cash needed for cancer research.But money is not the only critical ingredient in developing new cures. An important constraint on the pace of progress is the lack of large datasets that contain valuable information on how patients are responding to different types of treatment. Continue reading...
When author Elizabeth Day lost a baby and her marriage ended it was her friends who gave her the unconditional love she’d been seekingAs a child, I remember being pretty certain about a few things. I was sure I’d get married. I was convinced I’d write a book. Then I’d have children – two, of course, just like my parents. Preferably girls because they were better.When you’re younger, you assume life will turn out a particular way because you haven’t lived it yet. It sometimes strikes me that getting older is a gradual erasure of the nonchalant confidence that comes with that naivety. Continue reading...
The US researcher – and sci-fi author – on how brain implants will drive the next turning point in human evolutionDr Eric C Leuthardt, 45, is a neurosurgeon at Washington University in St Louis. He is also the co-founder of NeuroLutions, a research laboratory developing direct interfaces between mind and computer. Leuthardt is pioneering the use of electrical brain implants to help restore motor function to the paralysed limbs of stroke victims. He is also helping to develop electrode systems that can directly decode the unspoken “inner voice†of the mind, and use it to direct external action; for example, Leuthardt’s subjects have been able to control the cursor of a Space Invaders video game just by thinking. He has published two science fiction novels aimed at “preparing society for the changes†that his work predicts. He believes that in the coming years neural implants that link the human brain directly to computers to enhance cognitive functions will be like pacemakers or tattoos, used with hardly a second thought. This interview was conducted by phone, when Leuthardt had just dropped off his children at school and was on his way to perform an operation to remove a brain tumour.A direct neural interface with machines has long been a science fiction dream. When did you first get involved in helping to make it happen?
Meet the startup hoping to colonise the final frontier, one zero-gravity 3D printer at a timeDuring the early weeks of his 167-day stint aboard the International Space Station in 2014, astronaut Barry “Butch†Wilmore noticed that a torque wrench was missing. “It’s not uncommon for things to disappear in space,†he tells me over the phone from the Johnson Space Center in Houston. “You just don’t have gravity keeping stuff in place.†Wilmore mentioned the missing tool to Nasa’s mission control as he was tending to a 3D printer, a microwave-sized box that extrudes heated plastic to build up objects layer by layer, which was being tested on the space station.About a week later, Wilmore opened the door to the 3D printer to find a perfect replica of his missing wrench. He was thrilled, a moment captured in a photo that was shared with the world’s media at the time. Until that point, the machine had produced only very simple objects. “This was a printed, all-inclusive wrench, with a ratchet mechanism, that worked,†Wilmore says.
by Presented by Ian Sample and produced by Sandra Fer on (#3N8KF)
This week, Ian Sample asks: why do humans fight? Can science tell us anything about what drives us to violence?Subscribe and review on Acast, Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom and Mixcloud. Join the discussion on Facebook and TwitterExperts have been fighting about fighting throughout the ages. While theories have emerged to explain why we fight, there isn’t a consensus in the research. In general, theories of war miss the mark for some. So why do we fight? And what can science tell us? Continue reading...
My father distrusted simple judgments, but he did say his novel was about the importance of the rule of law, and the complexity of human beings, says William Golding’s daughter Judy Golding CarverDavid Shariatmadari’s account of my father’s novel Lord of the Flies was a little sweeping when he declared: “William Golding sought to show that boys were, by their nature, little devils†(A real-life Lord of the Flies: the troubling legacy of the Robbers Cave experiment, 17 April) .The boys in Lord of the Flies make quite a good fist of creating a democratic society, at least to begin with. Ralph, the democratically elected leader, admonishes Jack to stick to “the rulesâ€, because “the rules are the only thing we’ve gotâ€. In an interview the author said that the novel was about the importance of the rule of law. It was also about the complexity of human beings. Continue reading...
Revelation astonishes experts, who thought the renowned bird lived out its life in London as a money-spinning curiosityWith its plump head and bulbous beak, the renowned remains of a dodo at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History have long captivated visitors, Lewis Carroll among them. Now researchers say they have uncovered how the dodo died – a discovery that makes the old bird’s past curiouser and curiouser.Researchers used a form of CT scanning and sophisticated software to probe the anatomy and habits of the Oxford dodo - the world’s best preserved specimen of the bird – and discovered the animal was shot in the back of the head and neck with lead pellets. Continue reading...
Space Rocks, an event celebrating astronomy and music, kicks off this Sunday. The twinned nature of the disciplines it celebrates stretch back millenniaSomehow music and astronomy seem to go together. The association was made in the 6th century BC by the philosopher Pythagoras, who suggested each planet made a different sound and that together these notes made up the musica universalis, the harmony of the spheres.Although we no longer think of the planets as singing, the fact that there is mathematical “harmony†in both music and the laws of physics means they remain partners. Continue reading...
World’s biggest sperm bank calls for fewer regulations to revive Europe’s childbirth ratesThe world’s biggest sperm bank has warned the EU that access to donor sperm must be improved to reinvigorate childbirth rates amid the continent’s slump in population growth.Sperm banks across Europe have closed after the enforcement of new EU regulations on staffing levels, executives at the Danish firm Cryos International told European commission officials in a private meeting. Continue reading...
by Antonio Regalado, for MIT Technology Review on (#3N7KJ)
People are copying pets to preserve a physical – and spiritual – connection to dead children. MIT Technology Review reports.When Barbra Streisand revealed to Variety magazine that she’d had her dog cloned for $50,000, many people learned for the first time that copying pets and other animals is a real business.That’s right: you can pay to clone a dog, a horse or a top beef bull and get a living copy back in a matter of months. Continue reading...
by Damian Carrington Environment editor on (#3N759)
Return of Great Caledonian forest speeded up with fungi spores to help saplings flourishThe return of the Great Caledonian forest that once covered much of Scotland’s highlands is being boosted with a special mix of mushroom spores that should help saplings survive better on the hills.Fungi living on the roots of trees play a vital role in the ecology, helping to break down nutrients in the soil. But trees were lost in much of the Highlands many years ago so the fungi vanished too. Continue reading...
Researchers examining extinction of large mammals as humans spread across the world see worrying trendThe cow could be left as the biggest land mammal on Earth in a few centuries, according to a new study that examines the extinction of large mammals as humans spread around the world.The spread of hominims – early humans and related species such as Neanderthals – from Africa thousands of years ago coincided with the extinction of megafauna such as the mammoth, the sabre-toothed tiger and the glyptodon, an armadillo-like creature the size of a car. Continue reading...
The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite will take an elliptical path around Earth to observe stars for evidence of exoplanetsNasa’s next planet-hunting mission has launched from Cape Canaveral air force station in Florida.The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (Tess) took to the skies at 23.51 BST (18.51 EDT). It was deployed into Earth orbit 49 minutes later, to start a series of manoeuvres that will get it into its operational orbit by mid-June. Continue reading...
Government finally acknowledges the ‘tragedy’ inflicted on thousands of women, and agrees mesh should only have been used as an extreme measureWomen have been exposed to unacceptable risks through the use of vaginal mesh surgery, the government has acknowledged for the first time, as fresh evidence has revealed that thousands of women have suffered traumatic complications.In a parliamentary debate on the use of the implants, Jackie Doyle-Price, junior minister at the Department of Health, said it was a “tragedy†that women who had put their trust in the medical establishment had “come out with the most debilitating injuriesâ€. Continue reading...
Challenging terms such as ‘natural’ is difficult, but the Real Bread Campaign’s win against the chain proves it can be doneWhen it comes to labelling, food retailers run rings around their customers, and mainly get away with it. They weave a lexicon of feelgood terms – “freshâ€, “handmadeâ€, “artisanâ€, “localâ€, “farmhouseâ€, “healthyâ€, “natural†– into their marketing messages, which just happens to encourage us to assume that two and two makes five, or even six or seven. It’s known as the halo effect: by highlighting one appealing selling point you erect a canopy of goodness around the entirety of the product, irrespective of whether it is merited.Challenging such terms is tough. Regulations covering them are sketchy and open to legal argument on a case-by-case basis, which makes the Real Bread Campaign’s latest victory against the Pret a Manger chain all the more impressive. Continue reading...
Scientists have uncovered the secrets of the Bajau people, long-famed for their ability to hold their breath for extraordinary lengths of timeThe secret behind the ability of a group of “sea nomads†in Southeast Asia to hold their breath for extraordinary periods of time while freediving to hunt fish has finally been revealed – and it’s down to evolution.The Bajau people are able to dive tens of metres underwater with no conventional diving aids. Instead they rely on weights, handmade wooden goggles – and a single breath of air. Continue reading...
The ancient city was one of the first archaeological sites to be occupied by Islamic State. Now new photos are revealing the fate of this important site as archaeologists continue to count the cultural cost of IsisThree weeks ago, the Syrian antiquities directorate released new photos showing another devastated archaeological site. Outside Syria the news has received fairly limited press attention, except in France, where Mari, the site in question, is much better known. French archaeologists have been excavating at Mari since 1933, the most recent expedition running until 2010 when the Arab Spring and growing unrest made the site inaccessible. In light of the level of damage which is now evident, perhaps it’s worth sparing a moment to look at why Mari matters to archaeologists, historians and the cultural heritage of Syria.When Islamic State emerged, the part of Deir ez-Zor province in which Mari lies was one of the first areas to fall under its control in early 2014. Under IS, the site suffered an immediate explosion of looting; satellite images revealed the change from archaeological site to lunar landscape in a matter of months. More than 1,500 new looting pits were recorded at Mari between 2013 and 2015, likely representing the removal of a huge quantity of ancient objects, sold into the illegal antiquities market to fund Isis and its war. Continue reading...
Archaeologists in Champ-Durand, France, have found a cow skull with a small round hole cut into itA stone age cow skull boasting a hole the size of a biscuit has been hailed as a first by archeologists, who say the gouge is the earliest evidence of either a veterinary attempt or animal experimentation.Human skulls from around the world, some dating as far back as almost 10,000 years ago, have been found with very similar holes – evidence, say experts, of a cranial surgery called trepanation in which humans scraped away at the skull, or drilled it, to form an aperture. Continue reading...
Forensic science is nowhere near as robust and reliable as many people thinkWe all want to live in a world where there is justice; where wrongs are righted, where the system is trustworthy and just works. But we have seen a growing body of reports that raise questions about that system. I was particularly challenged when I started doing research that was based on a murder case tried in 2002, which centred on the presence of trace particles on the victim and in the suspect’s vehicle. In court, the jury heard that these particles were very rare and wouldn’t last on clothing for a very long time – just for a matter of minutes. This indicated that the victim must have made contact with the vehicle seat shortly before their body was deposited at the site where they were ultimately found. On this basis, the jury delivered a guilty verdict. When we started exploring and carrying out some experiments on these particles we discovered that they were in fact not rare, but abundant. And they lasted a long time on clothing – many hours rather than minutes. The significance of these particles in that case was completely changed by a series of experiments. Continue reading...
19 April 1955 One of the greatest and probably most original of the minds which have created modern science, dies at the age of 76We much regret to announce the death at Princeton, New Jersey, yesterday of Dr Albert Einstein. He was 76. Dr Einstein had entered hospital in Friday for treatment of arterio-sclerosis.Related: From the archive, 19 April 1955: Einstein as a man Continue reading...
Yorkshire’s Jurassic World, at the Yorkshire Museum, includes a pregnant ichthyosaur, a Mesozoic virtual reality experience, and a dinosaur called AlanIf you say the word Jurassic to people in the UK, the chances are that their first thoughts will be of a certain hugely successful film franchise. Most palaeontologists are fine with this, because it gives us an excuse to wheel out our well-honed “all the things that were wrong about the Jurassic Park film†material. If they mention anything else at all, it is likely to be the Jurassic coast, a fantastic piece of tourism branding which ensures that Dorset seaside towns receive a steady stream of fossil-mad families on holiday every summer.Other British Jurassic outcrops are available, however. In Scotland there are Jurassic outcrops up in the Highlands, and sites on the Inner Hebrides are yielding exciting new discoveries. The north coast of Somerset also has some productive areas, and just like the Jurassic coast rocks found at Lyme Regis, these are part of a swathe of Jurassic rocks running diagonally across the UK from the South coast all the way up to Yorkshire, where they are again seen in all their glory on the North-East coast. A new exhibition at the Yorkshire Museum in York, which was opened in March by David Attenborough, celebrates the fossils of the Yorkshire Jurassic. Continue reading...
Eight-year study finds pioneer of paediatrics assisted in Third Reich’s ‘euthanasia’ programmeThe Austrian doctor after whom Asperger syndrome is named was an active participant in the Nazi regime, assisting in the Third Reich’s so called euthanasia programme and supporting the concept of racial hygiene by deeming certain children unworthy to live, according to a study by a medical historian.Herwig Czech, from Vienna’s Medical University, has made the claim in an academic paper published in the open access journal Molecular Autism, following eight years of research into the paediatrician Hans Asperger. Continue reading...