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This week's magazine

4 August 2007

Issue 2615

New Scientist issue 2615 cover
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Editor's picks

The man who crossed Carl Linnaeus

Life

The man who crossed Carl Linnaeus

Features
Neutrinos: The key to a theory of everything

Physics

Neutrinos: The key to a theory of everything

Features
Ignition impossible: When wildfires set the air alight

Earth

Ignition impossible: When wildfires set the air alight

Features
Risking life and limb to count the war dead

Life

Risking life and limb to count the war dead

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.

Technology

Antibody-laden gel can clean up after anthrax attacks

AN ANTIBODY-laden "ectoplasm" that can be sprayed onto walls, ceilings and floors and scraped off afterwards could make dealing with suspected anthrax attacks safer and less messy. When officials suspect an attack like the anthrax letters sent in the US in 2001, emergency workers cordon off the area and collect samples for identification. As they …

News

Life

Sharing a joke could help man and robot interact

News

Technology

Calls to free up US mobile internet

News

Life

Satnav makes car trips safer

News

Technology

Gizmo

News

Life

Smartphones are the PCs of the developing world

News

Technology

Rubber finger probes sense of touch

News

Health

New multiple sclerosis gene identified

News

Life

Emotional recall is in the genes

News

Health

Stem cells repair damaged tissue after heart attack

News

Space

Quadruple star system may host a planet

News

Plant invaders enjoy life in the fast lane

News

Life

For trilobites, variety really was the spice of life

News

Life

Orang-utan gestures get the message across

News

Life

Slim chance of tuning in to alien TV

News

Life

Termite is world's snappiest animal

News

This week 50 years ago

News

Earth

Atlantic hurricane frequency doubled last century

News

Soundbites

News

Life

Man roused after six years of minimal consciousness

News

Health

New HIV treatments will fight growing drug resistance

News

Life

Free will – is our understanding wrong?

News

Earth

Asia's brown clouds heat the Himalayas

News

Life

Drinking astronauts are nothing new

News

Health

Chlamydia screening is not cost-effective

News

Earth

Revealed: America's most polluting power plants

News

Life

US genetic privacy bill hits snag

News

60 Seconds

News

Life

Exotic pets pose risks to native species

News

Life

British lawmakers back saviour siblings

News

Space

Unusual nature of the fatal SpaceShipTwo explosion

News

Technology

Bush's push for new nuclear weapons

News

Opinion

Comment: Consent is crucial to medical research

Health

Comment: Consent is crucial to medical research

SUPERMARKETS and banks have been doing it for years. Increasingly, medical scientists are doing it too: digging into the vast amounts of data they routinely collect from the public in search of useful insights. Last week, data-mining experts met at the University of Plymouth, UK, to hear of the latest advances in applying such methods …

Opinion

Life

Editorial: Science could tell us if we have free will

Opinion

Earth

Climate change is about more than carbon

Opinion

Physics

Perspectives: Are we still addicted to certainty?

Opinion

Space

Interview: Helping NASA back to the moon

Opinion

Features

The man who crossed Carl Linnaeus

Life

The man who crossed Carl Linnaeus

"WHEN we had got aboard the rowboat, the groves and forests on both sides received us, and from everywhere the crying sound of the animals delighted us." On 20 June 1755, Daniel Rolander, a young Swedish naturalist with a passion for insects, caught his first glimpse of the tropical forest he had come to explore. …

Features

Physics

Neutrinos: The key to a theory of everything

Features

Earth

Ignition impossible: When wildfires set the air alight

Features

Life

Risking life and limb to count the war dead

Features

More

Review: <I>The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything</I> by Gordy Slack, Jossey-Bass

Life

Review: The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything by Gordy Slack, Jossey-Bass

IN A time of despair over social and political decay in the US, Gordy Slack's The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything is a truly uplifting tale. It is the story of how community activists, concerned parents and passionately driven lawyers came together in Dover, Pennsylvania, to defend the constitution and keep religion out of …

Books & Arts

Earth

The Word: Vernalisation

Regulars

Review: Max Perutz and the Secret of Life, by Georgina Ferry

Books & Arts

Review: Atom by Piers Bizony

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.

Feedback: Reading between the lines

Mystery ingredient FEEDBACK is thoroughly in favour of honest labelling. So we are delighted with the product that Lyn Hoare obtained: a 125-millilitre aerosol of Expert Sensitive Refreshing Facial Spritz from Boots The Chemists. The blurb on the can reminds us that "Sensitive skin needs extra care throughout the day, which is why this gentle …

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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