It’s 25 years since a shuttle first put the giant space telescope into orbit, but the project initially seemed doomed to fail. How did Nasa’s team turn things around, going on to capture over a million stunning images of deep space?

The snake’s head fritillary can be seen in breathtaking abundance at Iffley Meadows, Oxford Continue reading...

The Hubble space telescope, which has captured images of stars coalescing out of glowing clouds of dust, peered back more than 10bn years to study the early universe, pinpointed the remnants of supernovae explosions and helped physicists uncover some of the cosmos's deepest secrets, turns 25. Happy birthday Hubble Continue reading...

Finding is most convincing evidence so far that male and female dinosaurs looked different and may have had mating selection rituals comparable to birdsThe male Stegosaurus had billboard-like back plates that it used to attract potential mates, while females had prickly spikes that kept predators at bay, scientists have discovered. Continue reading...

Bees have a preference for sugar solutions laced with the pesticides, scientists say, as a separate landmark field trial show neonicotinoids harm bee populationBees may become addicted to nicotine-like pesticides in the same way humans get hooked on cigarettes, according to a new study, which was released as a landmark field trial provided further evidence that such neonicotinoids harm bee populations.

Even more powerful than science’s capacity to explain is the human longing for mystery. So if Nessie is denied us, we’ll simply look elsewhere for fabled beasts Continue reading...

Readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific conceptsGalaxies rotate. Do all spiral galaxies rotate in the same direction?A Grieve, West Parley, Dorset Continue reading...

Why sex? Why then only two sexes? Why do we age and die? It’s the energy, stupid! This thinking is as important as the Copernican revolutionThe “Origin of Life” is a conundrum that could once be safely consigned to wistful armchair musing – we’ll never know so don’t take it too seriously. You will probably imagine that it’s still safe to leave the subject in this speculative limbo, without very much in the way of evidence.You’d be very wrong, because in the last 20 years, and especially the last decade, a powerful new body of evidence has emerged from genomics, geology, biochemistry and molecular biology. Here is the book that presents all this hard evidence and tightly interlocking theory to a wider audience. Continue reading...

Items from the history of space and aviation went under the hammer at Bonhams, New York – including the first robotic probe to land on the moon Continue reading...

A ‘dirty bomb’ of pseudo-science wrapped up nearly 268 cases – perhaps hundreds more. Now begins the ‘herculean effort to right the wrongs’George Perrot has spent almost 30 years in prison thanks to a single hair. It was discovered by an FBI agent on the bedsheet of a 78-year-old woman who had been raped by a burglar in her home in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1985.Perrot, then 17, was put on trial, despite the absence of physical evidence tying him to the crime scene. There was no semen. There was no blood. And so there was no way to conduct a conclusive DNA test. Continue reading...

Successful trial could pave the way for similar techniques to be used for conditions such as sickle cell disease and thalassaemiaChildren with a devastating immune condition appear to have been cured, after becoming the first to be given a new form of gene therapy.Without the treatment, the patients who suffer from a rare condition called Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome, faced short life expectancies and prolonged periods in hospital.Related: HIV gene therapy using GM cells hailed a success after trial Continue reading...

Reptiles were previously considered unable to play, but a Russian space experiment has overturned that view thanks to a loosely fastened collarThey can walk on walls with ease and shed their tails when they find themselves in a tight spot, but the one thing geckos were thought to lack was a capacity for playfulness. Now, a space experiment has overturned the view that geckos are entirely serious creatures, showing that they are open to a spot of fun after all.When given the opportunity, the Russian experiment found, geckos are happy to spend time batting an object around a tank at zero gravity. Continue reading...

Research involving cohort of 95,000 children is latest research to contradict findings of discredited gastroenterologist Andrew Wakefield Continue reading...

Google is not the first to take cameras into Loch Ness in search of the fabled monster. In 1972, the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau captured two frames that appeared to suggest the presence of two large, unidentified animals Continue reading...

Vespa velutina, which preys on honey bees, is already spreading rapidly across mainland Europe and could pose a serious risk to the UK’s apicultureBeekeepers have been told to be alert for invading hornets that have killed six people in France and could pose to serious risk to Britain’s honey bees.The Asian hornet, which preys on honey bees, is spreading rapidly across France and other parts of mainland Europe, and there are fears its arrival in Britain is only a matter of time – particularly in light of the unusually warm spring weather. Continue reading...

Hearings to conclude on Tuesday into whether reported concerns including loss of sense of smell are cause for greater regulation of booming industrySceptics consider homeopathy a joke, a bogus science that belongs in a punchline, not a pharmacy – but US government regulators are suddenly taking it seriously.The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is holding public hearings this week to explore whether it should toughen oversight of what has become a controversial, billion-dollar branch of the healthcare industry. Continue reading...

In these fascinating videos, we see how one man’s quest to merge two passions -- bird watching and beatbox music – has created an experimental new form of music Continue reading...

Researchers reviewing trials involving thousands of patients say taking extra vitamins and minerals does more harm than goodDietary supplements, such as over-the-counter multivitamins, do “more harm than good” and can increase the risk of developing cancer and heart disease, according to research in the US.The study by the University of Colorado, which reviewed several trials involving thousands of patients over a decade, showed that those who took extra vitamins and minerals were more likely to have health problems. Continue reading...

British chess master Nigel Short recently caused controversy by saying women’s brains aren’t ‘hard wired’ for chess. He also pointed out women have greater ‘emotional intelligence’. But this supposed praise reveals a great deal of cultural preconceptions and gender stereotyping, which suggests it’s not actually a compliment at all. Continue reading...

Scientists at Oxford University say a world-first form of research shows infants may be far more sensitive to pain than adultsThe brains of babies “light up” in a similar way to adults when exposed to the same painful stimulus, suggesting they feel pain much like adults do, researchers said on Tuesday.

Infected patients have higher levels of certain chemicals in their breath, undetectable to the human nose Continue reading...

A new study examines the use of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy in the treatment of recurrent clinical depressionSomehow, somewhere, across those six weeks, something happened inside me – in my head? my body? my soul? – and I began to understand. Sitting still became a boon and a comfort, even a luxury, rather than a threat or an irritation. And the present moment, right here, right now, began to seem a very comfortable (and comforting) place to be, bereft of dread and full of the possibility of peace and calm.Julie Myerson, ‘How mindfulness based cognitive therapy changed my life’ Continue reading...

The director of a new documentary on the Hubble space telescope reflects on the craftsmanship behind the planet’s most celebrated science instrumentIn a darkened room at Nasa’s Goddard Space Centre in Maryland, I found a focused team of men and women, engrossed in their daily task of taking the pulse of the planet’s most celebrated science instrument: the Hubble space telescope. On the wall in front of them a live 3D rendering of Hubble is projected onto the wall – its orientation and position in orbit 550 kilometers above the Earth presented in real time for everyone in the room to see.Today Hubble was being harnessed to hunt for distant icy dwarf planets, which Nasa’s New Horizons mission might be able to aim for later this year, after its historic flyby of Pluto. Such objects, found in the remote Kuiper Belt, over 4 billion miles from Earth, are typically only half as big as Long Island, NY, and so dark in colour that only Hubble’s exquisite mirror has a chance of detecting them. Continue reading...

Millions of women will each use more than 16,800 tampons over the course of their lives. We have no data to tell us if that’s unequivocally safe Continue reading...

Everyone is currently urging people not to miss the voter registration deadline which is today. But why so much enthusiasm at the last minute when it’s always been as important? Deadlines, as much as we hate them, often prove to be very motivating, for various psychological reasons. Continue reading...

Today’s “Museum Monday” video is a short time-lapse that celebrates the glory of springtime at London’s Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew Continue reading...

$4m for Bjørn Lomborg to lead the way on climate change? Not a problem for the Tony government, or for Australia’s ‘scientists’ Continue reading...

The pendulum clock of Longitude hero John Harrison is tested and declared a masterpieceOne of Guinness World Records’ more unusual awards was presented at the National Maritime Museum yesterday. After a 100-day trial, the timepiece known as Clock B – which had been sealed in a clear plastic box to prevent tampering – was officially declared, by Guinness, to be the world’s “most accurate mechanical clock with a pendulum swinging in free air”.It was an intriguing enough award. But what is really astonishing is that the clock was designed more than 250 years ago by a man who was derided at the time for “an incoherence and absurdity that was little short of the symptoms of insanity”, and whose plans for the clock lay ignored for two centuries. Continue reading...

Bad experiments for stroke and cancer drugs produce poor results, say research chiefsResearch agencies have ordered UK scientists to improve the way they use animals in experiments. Too often poorly designed projects – to test new medicines for strokes, cancer and other conditions – have produced meaningless results and wasted animals’ lives, the organisations have warned.In some cases, researchers – desperate to control the costs of their work – have underestimated the number of animals needed to test a new medicine. As a result, their tiny studies have lacked the power to pinpoint biological effects in the drugs under scrutiny. These unreliable results mean the lives of the animals involved have been wasted, along with scientists’ time and resources. The over-use of animals in experiments has also led to unnecessary loss of their lives. Continue reading...

Lord Renfrew says artefacts in Iraq endangered by war would be protected under the Hague convention Continue reading...

Footage shows swarms of barrel jellyfish (Rhizostoma pulmo) off the coast of Cornwall in the UK. The video, taken by a local wildlife enthusiast Ross Wheeler on Wednesday from a boat near Falmouth Harbour, shows the jellyfish gliding through calm water. This swarm of barrel jellyfish, which can grow up to six feet long, was reportedly a mile long Continue reading...

Like millions of other people, the drugs I take every day to live a normal life. But the amount of information we have on the risks is worryingly thin Continue reading...

Before heading out to a tropical island for your summer holidays, you might be interested to learn more about the critical role that islands play in the evolution of new species. Today, I share two important books with you, both of which explore the importance of islands as “natural laboratories” of evolution and ecology Continue reading...

The team discuss the ins and outs of sex surveys, plus the secrets of knuckle-cracking are revealed at last Continue reading...

What a curious beast we are, reducing the natural world to a petting zoo, then ceaselessly reinventing its threats Continue reading...

The latest reports of a dementia breakthrough illustrate the dangers of overhyping cutting-edge research into drugs and disease Continue reading...

Charles Bolden countered criticism from House on agency’s ‘partisan environmental agenda’ and ‘uninspiring’ space work at budget hearingThe National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s mission to land on an asteroid and its Earth science division both drew angry criticism from lawmakers on Thursday, as administrator Charles Bolden defended the agency on Capitol Hill.At a House hearing on Nasa’s 2016 budget, space subcommittee chairman Lamar Smith criticized what he called “the disproportionate increase” in funding for Earth science research, saying that over eight years almost $2bn had been added to its budget. Smith and other Republicans argued that Nasa should not devote so many resources to studying the climate when it could work on space. Continue reading...

Scientists have found that dogs and owners experience surges in oxytocin, a hormone responsible for maternal caring, when they look into each other’s eyesA rush of hormone that helps people bond could explain why humans and dogs have been best friends for thousands of years, say researchers in Japan.

Archaeologist responsible for raising the wreck of the Mary Rose, Henry VIII’s flagship, from the seabed Continue reading...