The former prime minister’s laziness, Boris Johnson’s hubris and Michael Gove’s disloyalty: so much hinged on personality failingsThe usual view of history for left-leaning liberals is that the character of the leading protagonists is secondary. The real drivers of history are socio-economic forces. Marxist views of history, which I imbibed as an undergraduate, take this further: history is determined by material conditions – wages, working conditions, social relations. But in moments of crisis, such as the EU referendum and its consequences, personality flaws really do matter. When events are finely balanced, what this or that individual does can make all the difference.Related: We need a mature Brexit debate – we’re not getting it from Michael Gove | Jonathan Portes Continue reading...

Every day millions of internet users ask Google life’s most difficult questions, big and small. Our writers answer some of the most common queriesIs my face attractive? Don’t answer that. Not because I’m ducking out of this, but because you can’t. Attractiveness is subjective, perhaps the most subjective question of all; that we outsource the answer to Google (and we do, in our droves) is ironic since it depends on a bias that is impossible to unpack. Yet in searching the internet for an answer, it also reveals the question to be one of the great existential tensions of our time. Because, as we all know, being attractive is absolutely 100% the A-road to happiness.If you are Googling to rate your attractiveness, then you are probably working on the assumption that you aren’t. You’re also, possibly, more vulnerable and susceptible to being told that you aren’t. In short, you’re a sitting duck, someone who had a sore throat and who asked good old Dr Google for advice only to be told it was cancer. Continue reading...

Our team of palaeontologists pick their favourite fossil discoveries of the year, from dinosaur tails in amber to smelly squid.

Are we biologically primed to fear outsiders? And can science help us bridge the divide when conflicts arise?Subscribe & Review on iTunes, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud & AcastIn this rebroadcast from earlier in the year, Ian Sample is joined in the studio by social psychologist Professor Miles Hewstone and primatologist Dr Kit Opie to discuss group behaviour and the divisions that define us as human. In light of everything that’s happened in 2016, the topics covered are as pertinent now as they were when we originally recorded them. Continue reading...

Allendale, Northumberland The lights dance and shift, fading or intensifying, undulating in curtains of colourAs I open the back door, the path shows up in a rectangle of light, the gravel sparkling like golden sugar. My breath shows in pale mists that billow and dissipate in the air. The owls that called repeatedly at dusk are now silent, hunting for voles across the frozen haugh. There’s the sharp smell of cold, and the river seems much louder than it does by day.

Scientist from Philadelphia helped find powerful evidence of dark matter by discovering galaxies don’t quite rotate in the way they were predictedVera Rubin, a pioneering astronomer who helped find powerful evidence of dark matter, has died aged 88, her son said on Monday.She died on Sunday night of natural causes, Allan Rubin told the Associated Press. The professor of geosciences at Princeton University said his mother, a Philadelphia native, had been living in the Princeton area. Continue reading...

Ground-breaking genetic analysis shows native trees may be more resistant than Danish ones to the deadly fungus that has spread across EuropeBritish ash trees seem to have better resistance against a deadly fungus which is devastating trees across Europe, according to research which has decoded the DNA of the species for the first time.The ash dieback fungus has spread rapidly since it first arrived in England in 2012 and the latest data shows it is now found in more than half of the country. It has already affected 90% of trees in Denmark and threatens to all but wipe out ash trees, one of Europe’s most common trees. Continue reading...

Being black or minority ethnic bigger barrier to employment than any other factor finds Royal Academy of EngineeringBlack engineering graduates are less likely to find jobs than white students with lower second or third class degrees, according to a report that reveals stark inequalities within the profession.The review, by the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng), found that being black or minority ethnic was a bigger obstacle to employment than any other factor considered, including degree classification, attending a less prestigious university or gender. Continue reading...

Contest winner Hussain Manawer says it was not an ambition to go to space, he just wanted to be taken more seriouslyFor most people who go into space it is a dream come true, but for the man set to be the UK’s first Muslim astronaut his priority is making the world a better place.Hussain Manawer, 25, from Ilford, Essex, is due to blast off in 2018 after seeing off thousands of other entrants from more than 90 countries in a competition. Continue reading...

Consumers fuelling demand for high-protein products unlikely to see any benefits as people already eat more protein than they need, say dietitiansThe UK’s rocketing demand for high-protein products is being fuelled by consumers buying foods unlikely to deliver the benefits they are seeking, experts have said.Weetabix, Shreddies, Mars, Snickers and Batchelors Cup a Soup were among the brands that launched enhanced protein versions this year as the trend hit the mainstream. Continue reading...

Online maths company has partnered with scientists to identify what makes lessons successful - and to see if AI can be used to improve teachingAmbar presses her hand to her forehead, nose crinkled in concentration as she considers the question on her screen: how many sevens in 91? The ten-year-old has been grappling with it for about a minute when she smiles: “13!”.Her tutor responds by posting a large smiley cat picture on her screen – the virtual equivalent of a pat on the back. He is sitting on the other side of the world in an online tutoring centre in India. Continue reading...

LSE study led by Labour peer found that failed relationships and physical and mental illness were bigger causes of misery than povertyClinical psychologists have raised the alarm over a controversial piece of research led by a Labour peer, with one saying it “lets austerity off the hook” as a cause of mental health problems.The London School of Economics study led by Lord Richard Layard, published in early December, found that failed relationships and physical and mental illness were bigger causes of misery than poverty. Continue reading...

The highs and lows of a year which continued the trend towards mild stormy wintersThe first half of 2016 was unsettled and quite wet. The winter of 2015-16 was the equal mildest on record in England and Wales and it continued the recent trend to mild, quite stormy winters. June was notably dull and wet in southern Britain. The second half of the year saw more settled weather, especially in the south where a sequence of dry months lasted from July to October. Autumn was often fine with quiet “blocked” weather. The year as a whole was mild with rainfall close to average. Continue reading...

Educationalists, psychologists and authors also call for a minister for children to try to address ‘toxic’ nature of childhood

From the discovery of gravitational waves to a promising male contraceptive, it was a groundbreaking year for scienceIt came from beyond the Large Magellanic Cloud. The signal, a mere 20 milliseconds long, captured the moment when two black holes slammed together – a cataclysm that sent ripples through spacetime and onwards to Earth, where they made instruments chirp and scientists cheer. “We have detected gravitational waves,” said David Reitze of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (Ligo). “We did it.”The announcement ranked as the physics discovery of the year, confirming Einstein’s century-old theory of gravity and putting the Ligo team on course for a Nobel. But the real excitement is yet to come. For the first quarter of a million years, the cosmos was hidden from astronomers. Now scientists can build gravitational wave observatories and, with them, look back to the birth of the universe. We can study the moment of creation. Continue reading...

British-born Sellers, who featured in Leonardo DiCaprio’s climate change film, lauded as ‘a strident defender and eloquent spokesperson for our home planet’Piers Sellers, a climate scientist and former astronaut who gained fame late in life for his eloquent commentary about the earth’s fragility and his own cancer diagnosis, has died. He was 61.British-born Sellers, who flew on three space shuttle missions between 2002 and 2010, died on Friday morning in Houston, Texas, of pancreatic cancer, Nasa said in a statement. Continue reading...

Elon Musk says the likelihood that we are not actually all living in a simulated world is ‘one in billions’. In this episode of Chips with Everything, philosopher and cognitive scientist Dr David Chalmers weighs in to explore those oddsWhat if our ability to develop technology becomes – or, in theory, already became – so advanced that we are living in a computer simulation that more technologically-capable humans have constructed for us? For tech mogul Elon Musk and a flurry of high-profile scientists and philosophers, that theory is very much plausible. Continue reading...

My friend and colleague Jon McQuilken was a geochemist and highly accomplished petroleum systems geoscientist with British Gas and then BG Group, an exploration organisation that was once part of the public utility. He presented at many international conferences, published widely on the petroleum systems of North Africa, and became a chartered geologist in 2014. He had retired from BG Group only four days before his sudden death, from a heart attack, aged 59.Born at RAF Halton, Aylesbury, son of Norma (nee Hargreaves) and Thomas McQuilken, Jon had a varied and interesting life as a youngster as the family followed his father’s RAF assignments as a warrant officer. This included postings in locations ranging from Uxbridge, west London, to Changi, Singapore, before they finally settled in Beverley, east Yorkshire, where Jon completed his schooling at Longcroft comprehensive. Continue reading...

Actor whose career took second place to her vocation to help disturbed childrenThe actor Coral Atkins, who has died aged 80, found fame on television in the 1970s in A Family at War, which ran for 52 episodes and attracted audiences of more than 20 million. Her character, Sheila Ashton, was the downtrodden and neglected wife of a womanising RAF sergeant, David (played by Colin Campbell), and a heroine of the semi-autobiographical series created by John Finch.The ITV drama (1970-72) followed a lower-middle-class Liverpool family from 1938 to 1945, their emotional conflicts running parallel to the greater events taking place across Europe and then the world. Atkins found herself showered with flowers, receiving stacks of fan mail and forever being stopped in the streets by people shouting out to “our Sheila”. Continue reading...

Larger bubbles, about 3.4mm across, enhance the release of aerosols into the air above the glass, say expertsBigger bubbles could make your champagne taste better this Christmas, research has found.It was long thought that a steady stream of tiny bubbles in a glass of champagne was a sign of quality. But researchers in France’s Champagne-Ardenne region have found that larger bubbles may actually improve the way a sparkling wine tastes. Continue reading...

Before you settle down to festive fun and family fights, let’s get the last of this year’s science in your eyes! First up is a rather intriguing discovery that pregnancy appears to trigger long-term changes in brain structure. Scientists suggest that the transformations in the volume of grey matter in certain regions could boost a mother’s ability to care for her newborn baby. Researchers have also identified three genes which could explain why some people are obese and healthy while others develop diabetes and heart disease as a result of their weight. It’s not a reason to overdo the mince pies, but it opens up the possibility of personalised BMIs and targeted treatments in the future. And if all that just sounds too batty well, a group of scientists from Tel Aviv University have gone a bit further into that territory. Their recent study used machine learning algorithms to decode the squeaks that bats make. The scientists found that they could work out who was arguing with whom, what the squabble was about and could even predict the outcome of a disagreement – all from the bats’ calls. And finally, some rather heartwarming news. After scouring the genomes of 27 patients with debilitating movement disorders which had left doctors baffled, doctors have discovered a new genetic disorder. Treatment is now possible for these children - and some have now improved so much they can walk again unaided. Continue reading...

Do you ever get the feeling you and your relatives are actors trapped in the same old parts? Don’t worry – there are ways to break out of your rolesWhen your family get together at Christmas, do you find yourself feeling as though you are re-experiencing childhood dramas? Do you feel you’re taking on a role, reverting to Christmas past? You may even feel as though you are reading from an invisible script and repeating interactions with family members that leave you feeling frustrated and angry.We may consider ourselves to be autonomous adults who have carved out our own independent lives. But when the holidays loom, many find themselves dreading predictably damaging and repetitious scenarios with family. These unnerving interactions often include put-downs, competitiveness, control freakery and passive aggression. Continue reading...

New research shows that the rhythm of breathing directly impacts neural activity in a network of brain areas involved in smell, memory and emotionsThe rhythm of breathing co-ordinates electrical activity across a network of brain regions associated with smell, memory, and emotions, and can enhance their functioning, according to a new study by researchers at Northwestern University. The findings, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, suggest that breathing does not merely supply oxygen to the brain and body, but may also organise the activity of populations of cells within multiple brain regions to help orchestrate complex behaviours.Related: Your nose knows death is imminent | Mo Costandi Continue reading...

Our intrepid reporter Girl On The Net brings you this and other intriuging news from the International Congress on Love and Sex with RobotsAfter spending a fascinating two days at the International Congress on Love and Sex with Robots, where academics discussed everything from robot design to the ethics of programming lovers, I was surprised to learn from Gizmodo that “sex robots may literally f**k us to death.”How, I wondered, could these otherwise thoughtful researchers allow humanity to walk into such a dystopian nightmare?

Limusaurus fossils found in China suggest they started life eating insects before turning to plantsA small dinosaur that scampered across north-western China 160m years ago boasted a trait not seen in any other dinosaur or other prehistoric creature: it was born with teeth but became toothless by adulthood.Scientists said fossils of 19 individuals of a dinosaur called Limusaurus, ranging in age from under a year to 10 years, showed that juveniles had small, sharp teeth but adults developed a toothless beak. Continue reading...

Japanese investment in OneWeb offers hope of global internet equalityA US bid to use more than 600 satellites to provide cheap internet access across the world looks set to move forward thanks to a massive cash injection.Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank has announced that it is putting up a $1bn stake in OneWeb, an American company that includes Richard Branson on its board of directors. OneWeb’s plan is to launch a massive constellation of simple satellites to encircle the world and provide access to the internet from anywhere in a cost effective way. Continue reading...

My husband, John Stewart, who has died aged 73 from cancer, was reader emeritus in gravitational physics at Cambridge University, and a fellow of King’s College for more than 40 years.John was born and brought up in Pinner, at that time in Middlesex. His father, James Stewart, was a Glaswegian who had been apprenticed at John Brown’s shipyard but left Scotland in the 1930s and thereafter worked mainly for United Dairies as an engineer. His mother, Hilda (nee Hale), was a London-trained nurse from Merthyr Vale in south Wales. John was the eldest of their three sons. Continue reading...

A global summit on biodiversity has sparked debate over whether advances in the life sciences are encouraging biopiracyOutside the conference hall of the Moon Palace, a luxury Cancun resort, warm waves lapped white sands, bathed in a pink Mexican sunset. Inside, close to two hundred delegates to the United Nations’ 2016 biodiversity conference huddled around a doorway, desperate to get into a windowless room for the final evening’s negotiating session. In the end, most of the crowd made it into room, to witness twenty or so country delegates hammer out compromise text late into the night. This wasn’t what they had expected from a UN summit. But the issue under discussion – synthetic biology – is an unusual topic.Synthetic biology is often described as the application of engineering principles to biology. Some see it a fundamentally new approach to biology; others as the next stage of biotechnology; and others as simply an exercise in rebranding. As social scientists researching this field, we’ve seen the confusion of synthetic biologists as to why a treaty about biodiversity is attempting to govern their research. Continue reading...

Dating when our ancestors split from Neanderthals and other relatives has long been a puzzle, but DNA advances are making our evolutionary journey clearerAnthropologists and geneticists had a problem. And the farther back in time they looked, the bigger the problem became.For the past several years, there have been two main genetic methods to date evolutionary divergences - when our ancestors split from Neanderthals, chimpanzees, and other relatives. The problem was, the results of these methods differed by nearly two-fold. Continue reading...

Poison isn’t confined to Agatha Christie TV specials: many Christmas favourites harbour deadly secretsParacelsus, a sixteenth century German Swiss philosopher who brought a new approach to medical and toxicological theory famously wrote, “The dose makes the poison”; in essence, too much is too much. This may seem like stating the obvious, but it’s one of those things that needed saying to make people think about it properly. Just how much of something is too much? And, in the season of overindulgence, is there anything we should be concerned about?Obviously, overeating isn’t healthy in the first place, but who can resist that extra mince pie or the last roast potato? As the pile of empty sweet wrappers grew beside me, and the doors on my chocolate advent calendar told me I had apparently achieved time travel and I was living at least two weeks in the future, I started to worry. So, I sat down to have a think about Paracelsus and some of the more toxic treats available to us at Christmas. Continue reading...

Life-changing technology could become commonplace as first 10 people receive Argus II retina implant to restore sightThe NHS is to pay for 10 people to be implanted with a “bionic eye”, a pioneering technology that can restore some sight to those who have been blind for years.Only a handful of people have undergone surgery in trials so far to equip them to use Argus II, which employs a camera mounted in a pair of glasses and a tiny computer to relay signals directly to the nerves controlling sight. The decision to fund the first 10 NHS patients to be given the bionic eye could pave the way for the life-changing technology to enter the mainstream. Continue reading...

A small number of farmers, shocked by the devastating effects of modern weedkillers and fertilisers, are turning their farms into havens for wild flowers – and for the birds who depend on the flowersModern farming has been devastating for most wild plants, from herbicides, fertilisers, drainage, and much more – but it doesn’t have to be that way. Mike and Nick Kettlewell farm some 400 acres in the Oxfordshire Cotswolds and have left wildflower margins beside fields and planted small copses.They have converted arable land to grassland to encourage wild flowers to return, such as bee orchids and cowslips. Hedges are cut every three years and grow tall, rich in flowers and fruit, and new hedges planted with traditional species such as wild pear and crab apple. Continue reading...

Penelope Stanford does her female ancestors a disservice in claiming that australopithecine “females [had] little agency in the selection of mates” (Polygynous apes may explain men of today, Letters, 20 December). A species in which female choice did not underpin mate selection, as it does in practically all animal species, would deteriorate rapidly under the enfeebling influence of mediocre male genes. She is right that polygynous species mean many males with no partners – our own genetic record shows far fewer fathers than mothers in any individual’s ancestry – and that males will fight each other for reproductive privileges.But any Palaeolithic proto-human female would never want her own offspring to end her genetic line – and feeble sons have little chance of gaining reproductive privileges against tougher males. Her solution is to choose males who prove themselves capable of dominating other males, so that her sons will do the same in the next generation. Polygamy is an excellent solution for females to the perennial problem of too few high-quality males. It may not be a nice ancestry, I agree, but would she say this explains a lot about the behaviour of some females nowadays? I would be surprised.

Being overweight is a risk factor for diabetes and other diseases; genes could explain why 15-20% of obese people seem to suffer no health consequencesScientists have offered a genetic explanation for why some people are obese and healthy while others develop diabetes and heart disease as a result of their weight.The study identified three genes, which appear to influence whether fat is compartmentalised and stored around the outside of the body or whether it spills into the circulatory system. Higher levels of fat in the blood supply increase the risk of type 2 diabetes and can lead to fatty deposits around the heart and liver. Continue reading...

Temperatures in parts of the Arctic are expected to rise above 0C for the second winter in a rowScientists are forecasting ice-melting temperatures in the middle of winter for some parts of the Arctic for the second year in a row. And analysis shows such recent record temperatures there would have been virtually impossible without human greenhouse emissions. Continue reading...

Far from being stuck in a stuffy past, the unifying message of modern archaeology is vital for steering us towards a positive futureIt’s nearly end-of-year “listicle” season, and 2016 has offered plenty of fascinating archaeological discoveries - my favourite is the Neanderthal-made stalagmite construction, which truly deserves the epithet “mysterious”. But let’s look beyond the past 12 months for a tale of hope amidst fear: the most important human origins discovery of the past three decades, and why it matters now more than ever.Test-tubes, not trowels, have provided the greatest advances in prehistoric research in the past 30 years. The “Oldest X”, or “Earliest Y” isn’t our most important discovery, instead it’s the profound connectedness of humanity we’ve discovered through genetics. Everyone alive today is deeply and closely related: we are more similar to each other than two groups of chimpanzees separated only by a river. Even more important, most of our differences in genetic terms are found within populations, not between them. Continue reading...

Rodrigues fruit bats and Amur tigers are among the species supported by WCS, which operates five wildlife parks in New York City and works to save wildlife and wild places in nearly 60 countries and all the world’s oceans Continue reading...

Christmas is full of festive fun for palaeontologists. After all, the Christmas tree in your living room would be at home with the dinosaursPalaeontologists have a slightly different take on the world, even at Christmas: Christmas dinner is the ceremonial dissection of an avian dinosaur, and there’s no finer joke than a half a billion year old arthropod named after Santa Claus. And so it is with Christmas trees: most people see them as the slightly pagan focal point of their festive decorations. I see this as the one time of year when people actually pay any attention to these mighty survivors from Mesozoic times.In the UK, the Norway Spruce Picea abies is the traditional species to be festooned with decorations of questionable taste. It exhibits all of the qualities associated with most modern conifers: it is an evergreen woody tree, bearing seeds in cones. It shows monopodial growth (it has one trunk), and strong apical dominance (it grows up more strongly than its branches grow out). It also produces resin, which protects the tree from fungal attack and from pests. It is long-lived (a group of clones in Sweden was carbon-dated at 9550 years old) and is relatively slow-growing: this year’s Trafalgar Square Christmas tree is 27 metres tall and was 95 years old when it was felled. Continue reading...

Dr David Goodall will not have to work from home after Edith Cowan University backs downA 102-year-old Perth man who is also Australia’s oldest scientist will get to keep an office on campus after Edith Cowan University reversed a decision that would have forced him to work from home.Dr David Goodall was told in August that he had been deemed a health risk due to him taking about 90 minutes and four to five public transport changes to travel to the university’s northern suburban Joondalup campus. Continue reading...

Harrowbarrow, Tamar Valley Beehives are overlooked by the outline of the arsenic flue chimney, now a harmless relicMahonia flowers, fir and variegated holly garland the entrance to All Saints church – this year’s venue for Calstock parish’s Christmas tree festival. Inside the Victorian building with its tiled floor and vaulted ceiling, trees have been decorated by local schools, voluntary and community groups.Built during the mining boom the church was also used as a school on weekdays, with a roll of 164 pupils in 1876. In 1879 a new school, one that would appeal to the Nonconformists too, was built by Mr Hunn of Metherell for £904 on half an acre of land, bought by the Education Board for £40 from the lord of the manor (Mr Williams of Caerhayes Castle). Continue reading...

Grapes can completely plug a child’s airway, with research suggesting they are third most common cause of death in food-related incidentsGrapes are the third most common cause of death among children who die in food-related choking incidents, and doctors say a lack of awareness among parents, carers and health professionals could be leaving young children at risk.

Thoracic surgeon whose Heimlich manoeuvre has saved tens of thousands of people from choking to deathIn May 2016, the thoracic surgeon Henry Heimlich, who has died aged 96, attracted international attention when he saved the life of a woman sitting next to him at dinner in his retirement home. Patty Ris was choking on a piece of hamburger lodged in her windpipe; using a bear hug to apply abdominal thrusts, in what is known as the Heimlich manoeuvre, he dislodged the obstruction. “God put me in the seat next to him,” the 87-year-old Ris said and headlines claimed it was the first time the retired surgeon had actually used the procedure he invented in 1974. Although it emerged that Heimlich had previously used his technique successfully in 2003, the story remained a reminder of the many lives that were owed to his creativity.In 1972 Heimlich was struck by an article about America’s epidemic of death by choking. It was often called “beefsteak disease”, since among adults it usually involved swallowing large bites of meat that had not been thoroughly chewed, but the risk to children ingesting foreign objects was just as severe. Heimlich recognised that the standard technique of pounding the back often served to shift the object more firmly down the windpipe. Continue reading...

As attention turns to viruses including Zika and Ebola, the World Health Organisation warns diseases like diabetes will pose a bigger threat by 2030More people in Africa will die from diseases such as cancer, heart problems or diabetes than infectious diseases by 2030, according to the World Health Organisation, which found the continent recorded the highest prevalence rates of high blood pressure in the world.In a report published on Tuesday, the WHO warns that the number of deaths globally from non-communicable diseases (NCDs) is set to increase by at least 15% from the organisation’s 2010 estimates, and that 44 million people will die of NCDs over the decade up to 2020, 4 million of those in the African region. Continue reading...

A drug that can kill cancerous cells without the side-effects of radical surgery is causing massive excitement for good reasonProstate has long been the Cinderella of cancers, lagging behind others – in particular breast cancer – when it comes to diagnosis, treatment and the funding that goes into research.

Anthropologist fascinated by shamanism, myths and religious rites who strove to protect indigenous peoplesIn the early 1950s the anthropologist Francis Huxley, who has died aged 93, undertook pioneering fieldwork among the Urubu people of the Amazon basin. The resulting book, Affable Savages (1956), adopted a new, “reflexive” approach to the study of culture in which the author’s encounters with the “other” are reflected as much in personal reactions as in objective descriptions.Francis was a pioneer of this form of anthropological writing – a style that much suited his lifelong interest in shamanism and the altered states of consciousness often experienced by religious healers. While this novelesque way of writing was largely shunned by his contemporaries, eventually it became commonplace. Continue reading...

Second world war ships, most of which are war graves, are vanishing from the Java Sea, yet the Indonesian government says nothing can be done. It is true?Two weeks ago, a Dutch expedition preparing a 75th anniversary commemoration of the Battle of the Java Sea found only holes on the seafloor where the ships used to be. The Dutch ships HMNLS De Ruyter and HMNLS Java are “completely missing” and a large section of HMNLS Kortenaer has been stripped away. The same has been confirmed for HMS Exeter and HMS Encounter, as well as sections missing from HMS Electra. The US submarine Perch is also completely gone. While the Perch sank without its crew on board, the other vessels are war graves.Related: Mystery as wrecks of three Dutch WWII ships vanish from Java seabed Continue reading...

It’s easy for UK researchers to focus on the downsides of leaving the EU. A House of Lords report today calls for a more positive approach

The puzzler tests general knowledge, logic and lateral thinking – and a subscription to Significance magazine awaits the winnerRiddle me this: do you have what it takes to complete the Royal Statistical Society’s Christmas quiz?It may not require specialist mathematical knowledge but the questions are a devilish test of general knowledge, lateral thinking and logic. Continue reading...

Stem cell infusions could treat babies affected with rare bone conditions, as well as older people – and even astronauts who lose bone mass in orbitPeople with fragile bones could have their skeletons beefed up with infusions of stem cells harvested from pregnant women, researchers say.Scientists proposed the unusual therapy after studies showed that the treatment led to 78% fewer fractures in animals that were bred to have a brittle bone disorder.

What has Juno revealed since it dropped into Jupiter’s orbit earlier this year? And how is the probe holding up against the solar system’s largest gas giant?Subscribe & Review on iTunes, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud & AcastOn Tuesday 5 July 2016, Nasa’s Juno probe dropped into Jupiter’s orbit after a five-year, 1.4 billion-mile journey. Five months on, we ask what fresh insights we’ve gained into Jupiter’s structure, its history, and its extraordinary weather systems. And with engine problems, radiation belts to dodge, and the solar system’s largest gas giant to navigate, how has the probe held up? Continue reading...