Anyone going to mention RCTs today?
PA/PA Wire
A new survey has found MPs are largely in favour of randomised controlled trials, even if they don’t understand why.
The whole olive-growing region of Puglia has been devastated.
olive grove by risteski goce/www.shutterstock.com
Thousands of miles of olive groves across southeastern Italy are threatened by the Xylella fastidiosa bacterium.
Is this the future for non-stop, long-haul flights?
IIAF
How do we make aircraft more efficient? By keeping them in the air longer.
All digitalled up with nowhere to plug.
Crown Copyright
Reaping the rewards and avoiding the pitfalls of an increasingly digital economy will take more effort than politicians are currently putting in.
Not a happy cousin.
Gorilla Tracking
Poaching, habitat destruction and disease have reduced mountain gorilla numbers for decades, but how have these threats affected their genomes?
Mass extinction, good news for this guy.
Esparta Palma/flickr
The end-Triassic mass extinction may be better known for preceding the rise of the dinosaurs, but it had a profound effect on oceans too.
Rare earth elements, the unusual spices of the industrial world.
Peggy Greb/USDA
Metals are generally abundant throughout the Earth’s crust, but not always at the right cost in the right place at the right time.
Can you spot the crop?
ShutterStock
Little is known about how parasitic plants live side-by-side with their hosts. But new genetic techniques may help scientists gain further insights.
Some will come out alive, other will not.
batteries by Anna Shkolnaya/Shutterstock.com
Bouncing batteries to check their charge isn’t an internet myth after all.
Dreamtime.
Sleep by Shutterstock
When you sleep your brain consolidates memory and encodes experiences. A recent study sought to show how this was happening.
From 1-click to 1-push ordering with Amazon’s Dash Button.
Amazon
Amazon Dash can ensure you never run out of soap, washing powder or razors again. But it can’t push the button for you.
Internet of things: a helping hand, or holding us back?
gleonhard
How many gadgets can we handle before what is supposed to ease and simplify becomes a burden?
‘This finding, like this stock image, is uncredible!’
Shutterstock
Scientific discoveries have moulded modern society. But the reliability of scientific results have recently been called into question. How will scientists solve this problem?
What’s in a name anyway?
Wikimedia
Since 1903, pop culture has been struggling to catch up with the fact that there was no such creature as a Brontosaurus. But now it turns out that there was, so thank goodness for that.
Deception wrong-footed scientists three times in ten years, and remains a mystery.
Wikimedia
Deception is the premier tourist destination in the Antarctic. It’s also the volcano that scientists are still not sure why it’s there.
Jonas the lemur defied his small size by living to the age of 29.
David Haring, Duke Lemur Center
A new study looking at a long-lived lemur species attributes it to their frequent hibernation-like state. But what lessons can humans learn from this?
This sort of 3D display you can’t buy in the shops.
Jason Alexander/Lancaster University
The iPad changed the way we interact with screens, but the physical, 3D touchscreens of the future will change it more radically still.
Heard it on the (research) grapevine.
Naotake Murayama
Spreading mutations and chimeric plants – there’s a lot going on in the Pinot grape.
Who is watching them while they are watching you?
sacred_destinations
Police and spies’ calls for more powers should fall on deaf ears until they have learned the letter of the law.
Won’t get fooled again (posed by models).
twins by iofoto/www.shutterstock.com
DNA profiling is a powerful tool, but being faced with identical DNA from identical genes has been a problem - until now.
This is science, not clairvoyance.
fingerprint by Torsak Thammachote/www.shutterstock.com
Forensic science has revolutionised justice, but we may have too much faith in it.
Pretty impressive, mimicry octopus, but you don’t fool us.
Klaus Stiefel/flickr
Last week, a new frog capable of shape-shifting, was discovered. Though many other animals use camouflage, there are only a few other species known which can actually shift their shape.
There needs to be more to the net than just data scraping and surveillance.
heyrocker
There are many organisations studying the web. But whose interest do they have at heart?
Hold your breath.
Radharani/Shutterstock
New research has found a link between exposure to air pollutants during pregnancy and abnormalities in children’s brains. But how at risk are we?
Trigger happy?
Magnus Fröderberg/norden.org
Parents could certainly do more to be aware of what their children are playing. But threatening letters are unlikely to help.