Children have reached their verdict on adults. Monkey Business Images/Shutterstock Every parent knows that sometimes your child says something that stops you in your tracks. Such a moment came for one of us, Emma Maynard, when her son Oscar was approaching his year 6 SATS tests at the end ofContinue Reading
As Europe faces a resurgence of coronavirus, having loosened strict lockdowns, one of the most important policy questions is how people can safely social distance in crowded places. Our ability to accommodate maximum safety and capacity has been greatly reduced during the pandemic, raising concerns about the future layout ofContinue Reading
There are still sexist views of women's brains. Dmitry Natashin/Shutterstock In 1879, French polymath Gustave Le Bon wrote that even in “the most intelligent races” there “are a large number of women whose brains are closer in size to those of gorillas than to the most developed male brains”. HeContinue Reading
John Tyndall. wellcome/wikipedia, CC BY-SA It is surprising that the Irish scientist John Tyndall, born 200 years ago on August 2 1820, is not better known. This is despite the existence of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, the Tyndall National Institute and the Pic Tyndall summit on theContinue Reading
In response to the coronavirus pandemic, the world has rushed to deploy infrared thermal imaging cameras (also known as infrared radiometers) to measure people’s temperature and the technology has become big business. Since the pandemic began, thermal cameras have been deployed in areas of high-density foot traffic such as airports,Continue Reading
Grzegorz Czapski/Shutterstock Elon Musk thinks his company Tesla will have fully autonomous cars ready by the end of 2020. “There are no fundamental challenges remaining,” he said recently. “There are many small problems. And then there’s the challenge of solving all those small problems and putting the whole system together.”Continue Reading
Illustration of NASA's Perseverance rover on Mars. NASA/JPL-Caltech Next spring is going to be a busy time for Mars. In close succession, three spacecraft will arrive at the planet, joining the dozen or so craft already circling Mars. Two of the spacecraft were launched in the past couple of weeksContinue Reading
The Crew Dragon spacecraft, produced by private company SpaceX, is scheduled to return from the International Space Station (ISS) and splash down in the Atlantic ocean on August 2. Contingent on a favourable weather forecast and a successful final week at the ISS, NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas HurleyContinue Reading
Shutterstock/GrigorevMikhail Zebrafish are one of the most well studied animals on the planet. But how they came by their beautiful black and gold stripes is more of a mystery. Our new research used mathematical modelling – and detailed observations of mutant zebrafish patterns – to get to the bottom ofContinue Reading
Sperm whale skull. JvL/Flickr, CC BY-SA Some whales are wonky. You might not know it to look at them, but their skulls are actually incredibly asymmetrical. This mysterious feature helps with echolocation, the way that whales work out where things are by making sounds and sensing how they are reflectedContinue Reading
