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This week's magazine

16 January 1999

Issue 2169

New Scientist issue 2169 cover
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Editor's picks

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

The world turned upside down

Features
New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Space oddity

Features
New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Making life simple

Features
New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Nuclear lifeline

Features

Table of contents

News

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

All for nothing

Last year's heroic efforts to rescue SOHO, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, may have been in vain. The spacecraft's last gyroscope has now failed, which could end its career. After SOHO malfunctioned last June, it took until October to bring it back into service. Two gyroscopes failed during the recovery, and now the last has …

News

Pill-popping pooches

News

Roofie madness

News

Attractiveness is a game of two halves

News

Some like it cool

News

Galactic collisions

News

When hairy is sexy

News

Driven to extinction

News

Rogue gene

News

Mars on Earth

News

Technology

Furby fury

News

Turning the tide

News

Dance yourself dizzy

News

Data to go

News

Is Canada killing too many seals?

News

Tissue report pits privacy against pathology

News

Oysters do their bit for cleaner beaches

News

Fighting for survival

News

Satellite watch

News

Snow business

News

Game over?

News

On the scent

News

Synchronised sex

News

Fidgets against fat

News

Is this the mother of all brain cells?

News

Chilling out

News

Just a little

News

Mark of a princess

News

Closing in on cancer

News

Unlocking the mind

News

Breathe easy

News

Nuclear dilemma

News

Technology

The right note

News

Technology

Making a difference

News

Technology

Sock it to them

News

It's the solution

News

Roads to nowhere

News

Into the womb

News

Cystitis drug conscripted in war on CJD

News

Alive, but for how long?

News

All clear for Pill

News

Museum piece

News

Absolute sushi

News

Opinion

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Brand not contraband

IF YOU began the year with a resolution to give up smoking, you don't need to be told that it will take all the luck and determination you can muster. If you are still persevering, take heart: you are already ahead of the game. According to the statistics, two out of three people who tried …

Opinion

Features

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

The world turned upside down

SENSING what is up and down should be really straightforward. After all, it's such a vital thing to know. It guides how we walk, sit, stand, and tells us what things will fall over and where. But when you enter the old tilted shack on the side of a hill in Santa Cruz, California, your …

Features

Space oddity

Features

Making life simple

Features

Nuclear lifeline

Features

More

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

The broad brush treatment

SAVING university science is at the top of the 1999 wish-list drawn up by Australia's peak council for science and technology, the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies. FASTS president, Peter Cullen, has proposed a New Year's resolution for the government: "to sort out the mess in our universities". Cullen believes universities are slowly …

Forum

. . . . .

Forum

Sinking fast

Forum

Red and dead

Books & Arts

Space opera

Forum

Catch my drift

Books & Arts

Shore things

Books & Arts

Bird in the bush

Books & Arts

Also flew

Books & Arts

from Amsterdam

Books & Arts

Count me out

Books & Arts

Grab your waders?

Books & Arts

Art nouveau

Books & Arts

A bigger splash

Books & Arts

Regulars

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

The Last Word

Mercury rising Question : On a recent flight, I was studying a card listing items that were prohibited by airlines. I was amazed to see that I couldn't take a mercury thermometer on a flight. Why on earth not? Answer : Planes are largely made from aluminium and, surprisingly, a very small amount of mercury …

Regulars

Feedback

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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