This new popular science book from Octopus Books provides a rare chance to understand the science that makes the modern world tick (quite literally, in the case of the ubiquitous quartz watch). It covers everything from the way your smartphone…
I’VE BEEN following developments in microfluidics for a couple of decades now, since I first got my hands on a prototype glass chip in a German development laboratory in the 1990s. After asking my hosts very nicely, they reluctantly opened…
I’M GENUINELY intrigued by the reports which have surfaced in the last few days from the deep drilling project in Antarctica, which has found thriving microbial colonies in very hostile conditions in a sub-glacial lake. It has long been suggested…
WE’VE all been hearing a lot about ‘citizen science’over the last few years, and there is no doubt that this phenomenon is here to stay. We see volunteers taking part in projects as diverse as counting butterflies in urban parks…
THE TENTH annual Planet xMap conference, currently underway in Monaco, has addressed many of the topical issues in medical research and diagnostics including the outlook for the people of the poorest nations, the potential of neuronal stem cells, and the…
THE TENTH annual Planet xMap symposium, to be held 10-11 October 2012 at the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco, has attracted over 500 delegate registrations reports Luminex. The symposium programme features scientific sessions, workshops, discussion groups, exhibitions, and networking events with…
SCIENTISTS in Canada and the USA have used 3D imaging techniques to settle a long-standing debate about how DNA and structural proteins are packaged into chromatin fibres. A paper published in Embo Reports shows that the mouse genome consists of…
THE UK’s Institute for Animal Health, which has a 100-year track record as a leading centre for surveillance and research into livestock diseases and the spread of viruses from animals to humans, has today (04 October 2012) been renamed the…
AN INTRIGUING aerial phenomenon last week gave a good indication of the poor standard of science knowledge among broadcast news crews. Late on Friday night, a strange fireball soared across the skies of northern England, Scotland, and Ireland. It wasn’t…
IT’S ALWAYS intriguing when science fiction becomes science fact, and never more so than when an item of kit from Star Trek gets made real. Fans of the series will recall that the apparently insurmountable problem of communications with alien…