Bird’s eye view
As new research demonstrates how an artificially mutated a strain of avian influenza can spread in at unprecedented rates in ferrets — and possibly humans…
Tom Ingram
Up to speed
The team of European scientists who reported evidence of neutrinos moving faster than light in September have tentatively confirmed the result in another experiment. The…
Battle of wits
What will the wars of the future look like? That’s the question posed by a recent issue of the journal Synesis, centred on the theme…
HIV breakthrough
A South African husband and wife team have won the first-ever Olusegun Obasanjo Prize for their work on a microbicide gel that significantly reduces the…
Breach of integrity
This past September, a Dutch psychologist was suspended from his post after evidence surfaced that he had committed academic fraud on an extensive scale. Diederik…
Antarctic glacier to calve large iceberg
A NASA mission flying over Antarctica discovered a new rift in the ice shelf of Pine Island Glacier. The glacier could soon calve a large…
Biotech battle
A European court recently ruled that processes involving the use or prior destruction of human embryos are unpatentable. The decision came after a 2004 Greenpeace…
Prostate cancer roundup
Welcome to Movember, the month-long moustache-growing extravaganza raising awareness and money for men’s health issues — especially prostate cancer. Since its beginning in 2003, the…
It’s not a tumour
Could your cellphone be giving you brain cancer? It’s hard to say, but the latest research is reassuring. A study recently published in the British…
Where do oceans come from? Just ask Herschel
New data from the Herschel Space Observatory shows massive reservoirs of ice near the young star TW Hydrae. The ice, if it were in liquid…