All life on earth has the same simple basic structure. It is based on the genetic code contained in DNA. The differences in DNA between a toad and Albert Einstein are what determines their different properties. The active ingredients in DNA…

With life expectancy steadily increasing, and frequent talk of a ‘pensions timebomb’, it is unsurprising that the government feels the need to introduce measures to protect people from a bleak old age. Tackling the problem by legislating o…

A Virgin Atlantic flight between Heathrow airport London and Schiphol airport in the Netherlands made history yesterday, becoming the first commercial flight to be partly powered by biofuel. While three of the 747s tanks contained conventio…

A study published in this week’s issue of the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience finds that including irrelevant neuroscientific information in an explanation can make people more likely to believe that explanation. Three groups of subjects …

Alcohol abuse in the UK has been escalating for decades, contributing to crime, unemployment, illness and death. Last month, the government reported that alcohol-related deaths in the UK have doubled over the last 15 years to almost 9,000. …

A television report aired in the US last week claimed that bodies used in public anatomical exhibitions might have included executed Chinese prisoners. There have been subsequent denials from exhibitors that any of the bodies currently bein…

An interesting new study on the heritability of childhood obesity has been widely publicised. The paper, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, found only a modest effect of shared environment on body mass index. The study…

The editors of Nature have today called for the US Senate to bypass Senator Tom Coburn’s (Republican, Oklahoma ) ‘hold’ the Genetic Information Non-discrimination Bill. The Bill, if enacted “would protect people from being discriminated aga…

An alternative approach to the problem of fake anti-malaria drugs would be to make such drugs available for free to those who need them in the developing world. It would be a shame if the problem of fake pharmaceuticals became a part of the…

The BBC today reported calls to scrap an acoustic device designed to disperse crowds of troublesome teenagers. There are 3,500 such ‘Mosquito’ devices in use in England, which work by emitting a sound normally audible only to those under th…