Easter morning excitement as the CERN accelerator team send beams around the LHC for the first time in many months - a major milestone on the way to even higher energy collisions!

Drawing on the widest survey of sexual behaviour since the Kinsey Report, David Spiegelhalter, in his book Sex By Numbers, answers key questions about our private lives. Here he reveals how Kinsey’s contested claim that 10% of us are gay is actually close to the markFor a single statistic to be the primary propaganda weapon for a radical political movement is unusual. Back in 1977, the US National Gay Task Force (NGTF) was invited into the White House to meet President Jimmy Carter’s representatives – a first for gay and lesbian groups. The NGTF’s most prominent campaigning slogan was “we are everywhere”, backed up by the memorable statistical claim that one in 10 of the US population was gay – this figure was deeply and passionately contested.Related: Gay Britain: what do the statistics say?The proportion of people with same-sex experience is higher than the proportion who identify as gay and bisexual Continue reading...

Cern confirms successful restart of world’s largest and most powerful atom smasher following upgrade, raising hopes of a ‘new era for science’ Continue reading...

The underlying realities of the world – from Earth’s rotation around the sun to Darwin’s theory of evolution – are rarely obvious or expectedAll is not what it seems. Much of the universe – from the unimaginably small to the cosmological – is not how it appears to us, and our view is lamentably limited. The Earth’s rotation around the sun has been accepted for less time than it was not, and we still don’t yet know what makes up most of the cosmos. The knowledge that all life is built of cells is less than two centuries old, that all life is encoded in DNA has been known for just 50 years. When Darwin came up with evolution by natural selection, his loyal ally TH Huxley exclaimed “How extremely stupid, not to have thought of that!”But evolution is not obvious at all, and it took thought and experiment and hard tenacious graft to reveal that truth. The real structure of the universe – the atomic, subatomic and quantum – was concealed from our eyes for all but the tiniest fragment of our tenure on Earth. We humans are awful at perceiving objective reality. We come with inbuilt preconceptions and prejudices. We’re dreadful at logic, and see patterns in things that are not there, and skip over trends that are. We attribute cause and agency to chance and coincidence, and blame the innocent as the root of all manner of evil. We use the phrase “common sense” as an admirable quality for scrutinising the world in front of us.Our senses and psychology perceive the world in very particular ways that are comically easy to fool.Related: Why racism is not backed by science Continue reading...

Psychologists have found that colours and certain types of music can enhance the enjoyment of wine and food Continue reading...

What books do you think people should read to understand science - not just its content, but also its history and place in society? Continue reading...

Just in time for “Caturday”; we watch two dwarf hamster sisters share their Easter holiday preparations with us Continue reading...

The UK could harness technology for a bright, economic future. If the leaders realised, it would breathe much-needed optimism into a stale political arena Continue reading...

The Snowden MacBook, destroyed in the basement of the Guardian, is on display at the V&A. Rebekah Higgitt asked some experts for their opinion of this unusual and provocative display of technology Continue reading...

The Nobel laureate on making science accessible – from Ptolemy to Darwin to DawkinsIf you had a chance to ask Aristotle what he thought of the idea of writing about physical science for general readers, he would not have understood what you meant. All of his own writing, on physics and astronomy as well as on politics and aesthetics, was accessible to any educated Greek of his time. This is not evidence so much of Aristotle’s skills as a writer, or of the excellence of Greek education, as it is of the primitive state of Hellenic physical science, which made no effective use of mathematics. It is mathematics above all that presents an obstacle to communication between professional scientists and the general educated public. The development of pure mathematics was already well under way in Aristotle’s day, but its use in science by Plato and the Pythagoreans had been childish, and Aristotle himself had little interest in the use of mathematics in science. He perceptively concluded from the appearance of the night sky at different latitudes that the Earth is a sphere, but he did not bother to use these observations (as could have been done) to calculate the size of our planet.Philosophical Letters (1733) VoltaireThe Origin of Species (1859) Charles Darwin Continue reading...

Better care has led to a fall in fatality rates even as the number of cases rose over the past decade, according to research published in Open Heart journal Continue reading...

Lawsuit with 800 plaintiffs seeks damages for individuals, spouses and children of people deliberately infected with STDs through US government programme Continue reading...

New model equates spread of worm across local networks and internet with progress of Aids virus through the body, suggesting early treatment is vital Continue reading...

Custom-made vaccines, designed to a make patient’s immune system attack tumours, have been used in a small-scale patient trial with some successPersonalised cancer vaccines that target people’s individual tumours have shown early signs of promise in tests on three patients diagnosed with advanced skin cancer.The vaccines were designed to make the patients’ immune systems unleash attacks on specific DNA mutations in their tumours, and so turn the body’s natural defences against the disease.

University of Tokyo team believe that similar implants may one day help blind people navigate more easilyResearchers have given blind rats a fresh sense of direction by connecting tiny digital compasses to their brains.The study by Japanese scientists shows that the animals learned quickly to use the unfamiliar signals to find their way around the world.

Eating human food may be an advantage to ant species found on pavements as opposed to species leaving in parks and other green spaces Continue reading...

This week world powers attempted to reach a deal to prevent Iran producing nuclear weapons. What is the potential global fallout from the talks? And how do you detect secret nuclear tests? Continue reading...

David S Goyer to produce Principia, a historical drama about Newton hunting a criminal, which takes inspiration from mathematician’s Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica Continue reading...

The decline of Latin and the rise of global English – science’s search for a lingua francaIf you’re a working scientist and you can’t read this sentence, you’re in trouble. English isn’t the only language of modern science, but it’s far and away the most important. “If you are interested in what it would be like to live in a world with one language of communication, a world with no Babel,” writes Michael Gordin, “you should look to the natural scientists. They come from there.” In Scientific Babel, Gordin looks beyond the dominance of English in contemporary scientific discourse to uncover a story of scientific debate that’s characterised by confusion and misapprehension as much as by collaboration and progress.Scientists have always found ways of making themselves understood to each other. After all, without a bridging of the language gap, Archimedes is just another naked Greek man shouting in his bathroom. Science, of course, has had a shared language before, at least in Europe. Latin was the main language of medieval and Renaissance scholarship, but its empire wasn’t as universal as is often made out. Historians of science and medicine have shown that much of the scientific knowledge of this period had its roots in vernacular languages. Continue reading...

Video shot from the International Space Station shows super-typhoon Maysak as it heads through the western Pacific en route to the Philippines. The island nation is on high alert with the typhoon, initially rated category 5, expected to make landfall on the weekend. British-based Tropical Storm Risk said Maysak would probably weaken to a category 2 typhoon, with maximum winds of up to 109mph, when it hits land Continue reading...

The 2015 election campaigns are under way, and it’s clear that doing or saying unintelligent things is no barrier to political success. Unfortunately, there are several psychological mechanisms that lead to apparent idiots being elected into powerful positions. Continue reading...

Gadget created by US researchers won’t be available to the public for some time, but has the potential to help disabled and elderly peopleThe market is undoubtedly there. Country strolls. Visits to museums. Weekend shopping trips. How much easier they would be wearing an unpowered, lower-leg, carbon fibre exoskeleton.

New research casts doubt on the theory that polar bears could survive habitat loss as sea ice declines by foraging for food on land Continue reading...

A raft of recent studies detail how air pollution might be linked to ailments from severe flu to ADHD Continue reading...

Study reveals that high-pitched ‘singing’ varies according to to social context, placing mice in an elite group of animal vocalisers

Inadequately referenced, badly designed and poorly executed studies are perverting the course of science Continue reading...

Former Top Gear presenter says being sacked by the BBC was a ‘wake-up call’ as he joins host of celebrities backing climate change campaign Guardian Media Group to divest its £800m fund from fossil fuels Continue reading...

By fitting it with tiny geolocators, scientists have proven that the blackpoll warbler completes the longest known oversea journey for any land birdA tiny North American songbird migrates 1,500 miles non-stop over the Atlantic, scientists have discovered, in the longest known oversea journey for any land bird.The blackpoll warbler weighs only as much as a £2 coin and normally lives in forest environments, but once a year it embarks on a perilous three-day journey, scientists have found. Continue reading...

Researchers want doctors to rethink endorsement of the drug, which they say is no more effective than a placebo for these conditions Continue reading...

Campaigners also accuse high street chain of ‘acting irresponsibly’ after retailer teams up with 23andMe to sell products currently banned in the US Continue reading...

Researchers have found a tribe in the Malay peninsula rainforest who are markedly better than westerners at identifying aromas Continue reading...

Male fertility in the west is in crisis. But, thanks to a lack of anxiety among men, we haven’t yet taken the problem seriously Continue reading...

New research provides direct evidence for an influential model of pain first proposed in 1965. Continue reading...

The manufacturer of the Airlander 10 is looking for investors to follow in the footsteps of Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson and the US military Continue reading...

Trial using tampons and UV light successfully identified sewage pollution entering rivers from householdsGlow-in-the-dark tampons could be used to show where sewage is seeping into rivers, scientists have suggested.A study has found that tampons absorb even tiny amounts of “brighteners” found in detergents, toothpaste and shampoo and subsequently glow under UV light. Continue reading...

Analysis of semen from men at fertility clinic matched with questionnaire on consumption of fruit and vegetablesEating fruit and vegetables containing pesticide residues could adversely affect men’s fertility, leading to fewer and poorer quality sperm, a study suggests.Research by Harvard University found that men who ate the greatest amount of fruit and vegetables with high levels of pesticide residue had a 49% lower sperm count and a 32% fewer normally formed sperm than those who consumed the least. Continue reading...

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Thanks, celebs, for emboldening women and ridding them of their shame over the workings of their internal plumbing. Then again, why don’t men’s ageing bodies get this much attention? Continue reading...

Expecting the Paris talks to succeed is a pious hope: but the Oslo principles, launched today, argue that governments are already in flagrant breach of their legal obligations to the planet Continue reading...