LATEST NEWS
Particle accelerators could stop isotope shortages
UPFRONT: 10:00 01 February 2009
Shifting production of vital medical isotopes from nuclear reactors could help keep hospitals stocked
Face-blurring technology raises privacy questions
FEATURE: 14:00 31 January 2009 | 26 comments
Clever image processing combined with a GPS cellphone could blur your face in CCTV footage – but should you have to opt in to avoid surveillance?
Ancient creature points to parallel evolution
IN BRIEF: 12:00 31 January 2009 | 19 comments
A study of the closest living thing to the ancestor of all animals hints that the nervous system evolved twice
Did gung-ho policies cause an earthquake?
COMMENTARY: 11:00 31 January 2009 | 15 comments
The proliferation of dams in the tectonically active Sichuan Province is evidence of skewed values, says A C Grayling, but in China no-one can say so
Is there a Planet X?
COVER STORY: 10:00 31 January 2009 | 49 comments
Lurking in the solar system's dark recesses, rumour has it, is an unsighted world – Planet X, a frozen body perhaps as large as Mars, or even Earth
Innovation: The cellphone economy
17:53 30 January 2009 | 8 comments
Cellphones far outnumber computers in Africa and talk time is even used in place of cash – could mobile social networks continue the trend and further transform the economy of poor regions?
Ocean rubbish dump could lock away carbon
17:10 30 January 2009 | 42 comments
Dropping bales of plant waste into deep water could be a neat way to counter human emissions – but questions remain over the method's impact on life
Conflict leaves Gaza's agriculture in ruins
16:40 30 January 2009 | 73 comments
Nearly all the territory's farms have been damaged and many destroyed by the 22-day conflict, says UN
Thermal computing is heating up
16:37 30 January 2009 | 4 comments
A major obstacle in the development of thermal memory devices that store data with heat has been overcome – in theory
Devastated forests could be replanted from the air
NEWS: 14:45 30 January 2009 | 20 comments
A technology that fires projectiles containing tree saplings from a helicopter could rapidly replant devastated tropical forests
FAVOURITE COMMENT
Devastated forests could be replanted from the air
"I'm sure the cost of fuel alone would make it much more effective to just hire some locals (who were probably displaced by the burning) to do this work." AjmoT
PUZZLE
Enigma No. 1529: Square corbel
Can you fill in a grid with non-zero digits, so that each row is a perfect square with different digits, and each row contains all the digits in all rows below it?
SHORT SHARP SCIENCE BLOG
Doomsday vault hit by financial crisis
16:49 30 January 2009 - updated 17:39 30 January 2009
Catherine Brahic, environment reporter, asks if we need a bail-out package for the world's plants
Whose Twittering is worth listening to?
16:31 29 January 2009 - updated 15:53 30 January 2009
Microblogging service twitter is growing fast - and the race is on to provide the best way to rank its users and reveal those worth following, says Jim Giles
Is Spirit succumbing to old age?
16:25 29 January 2009 - updated 18:04 29 January 2009
After 1800 days exploring Mars, one of NASA's rovers has been afflicted with amnesia. Perhaps it's heading for retirement, says Jessica Griggs
NEW DESIGN
Test-drive the new-look New Scientist
Try out the new-look magazine with this 12-page sampler
THE LAST WORD
Why are the ingredients of shampoo so complex?
And what exactly are chemicals such as sodium diethylene-triamine pentamethylene phosphonate and hydroxyisohexyl 3-cyclohexene carboxaldehyde doing to our hair?
