
Something new under a (dead) sun
Mar 31, 2016 23:55 pm UTC| Science
For all their enormous size and furious energies, stars are remarkably simple. Knowing just their mass and the smattering of elements heavier than hydrogen we can predict their lives from cradles to grave. But every now...

Saturn's moons may be younger than the dinosaurs – so could life really exist there?
Mar 30, 2016 13:59 pm UTC| Science
Saturn is home to more than 60 moons from the massive Titan and the crater-riddled Phoebe, to Enceladus with its geysers. Enceladus in particular has been put forward as a good candidate for harbouring microbial life,...

Weekly dose: Taxol, the anticancer drug discovered in the bark of a tree
Mar 30, 2016 13:33 pm UTC| Science
Taxol is a chemotherapy drug used in the treatment of specific human cancers. It is a member of the taxane family of drugs, which includes cabazitaxel and docetaxel. The drug is also sold under its generic name of...
Exciting cells and controlling heartbeats – could optogenetics create drug-free treatments?
Mar 30, 2016 13:04 pm UTC| Science
A laser-controlled brain or a heart that beats in time to a disco light display sound like some of the more vivid imaginings of science fiction writers. But scientists are gathering together tricks that may allow us to do...
Antimatter changed physics, and the discovery of antimemories could revolutionise neuroscience
Mar 30, 2016 12:33 pm UTC| Science
One the most intriguing physics discoveries of the last century was the existence of antimatter, material that exists as the mirror image of subatomic particles of matter, such as electrons, protons and quarks, but with...
Why being bold all comes down to evolution
Mar 30, 2016 12:30 pm UTC| Insights & Views Science
Chevalier Blondin was 35 years old when in 1859, with no safety harness and no net beneath him, he first tightrope-walked nearly half a kilometre across the Niagara Gorge. At different times over the coming years, he would...
Scientists turn to 3D printing, digital simulations to treat heart disease
Mar 26, 2016 06:30 am UTC| Science Technology
My mother bought her first GPS in the 1990s. A few months later, she came home angry because it had directed her to the wrong side of the city, making her an hour late. Thats too bad, I said, and we went on with our lives....