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This week's magazine

12 January 2008

Issue 2638

New Scientist issue 2638 cover
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Editor's picks

The great seed blitzkrieg

Life

The great seed blitzkrieg

Features
Theatrophone – the 19th-century iPod

Technology

Theatrophone – the 19th-century iPod

Features
Fighting cancer with filth

Health

Fighting cancer with filth

Features
The mystery of Planet X

Space

The mystery of Planet X

Features
Is it worth going to the mind gym?

Life

Is it worth going to the mind gym?

Features

Table of contents

News

Flawed NASA survey worth a second look

Technology

Flawed NASA survey worth a second look

If you fly, you may have been disappointed on 31 December 2007 when NASA released 16,000 pages' worth of survey data on flight safety. Despite spending $11 million on gathering the data, which involved questioning 500 US commercial pilots every month for four years, NASA administrator Michael Griffin says the results are unusable because the …

News

Technology

Iron nanobeads can control immune system

News

Life

Silicon poet pens haiku on demand

News

Technology

Gizmo

News

Technology

Cellphones could eat into TV picture quality

News

Technology

Graphite pencilled in to replace silicon transistors

News

Life

Monkey battles play to home-field advantage

News

Life

UK and US labelled 'endemic surveillance societies'

News

Life

Randy flies reveal how booze loosens sexual inhibition

News

Space

Galaxy's antimatter may leak from black holes

News

Health

Garlic combats arsenic poisoning

News

Health

Breast cancer genes don't have to mean cancer

News

Health

Universal flu vaccine works in humans

News

Earth

Switchgrass revives hopes for biofuels

News

Space

Could lightning strike in space?

News

Space

'Ball-shaped' universe bounces back

News

Health

Lead exposure may be a factor in Alzheimer's

News

Soundbites

News

Life

Anti-smoking drug could tempt athletes to cheat

News

Life

Did life begin on a radioactive beach?

News

Life

What makes the monarch butterfly's clock tick?

News

Earth

Brain 'seismology' helps predict epileptic attacks

News

Health

A little sun might fight cancer

News

60 Seconds

News

Life

Altruism is no family matter

News

Health

Delegating tasks could ease HIV doctor shortage

News

Technology

US funds stem-cell therapy for radiation sickness

News

Life

Legal battles threaten nuclear power programme

News

Health

Osteoporosis drug fears may be unfounded

News

Earth

Mixed news for US agency over emissions

News

Physics

US scientists tackle evolution deniers

News

Earth

Fuel emissions study 'misleading' claim experts

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.

Earth

Comment: Polar power game reveals surprise winner

WHEN Robert Scott and his men arrived at the South Pole on 17 January 1912 only to find another team had pipped them to the post, Scott pencilled an anguished line in his diary: "Great God! This is an awful place and terrible enough for us to have laboured to it without reward of priority." …

Opinion

Physics

Comment: The group delusion

Opinion

Technology

Commentary: Would-be traffic herders beware

Opinion

Editorial: It's evolution, stupid

Opinion

Editorial: Time for revolution in evolution?

Opinion

Life

Perspectives: Meaning and the body

Opinion

Space

Interview: From UFOs to space stations

Opinion

Features

The great seed blitzkrieg

Life

The great seed blitzkrieg

A SHOT rang out across the foothills of the Andes. Heinz Brücher, 75, Adolf Hitler's top botanist, lay dead in his vineyard on the outskirts of Mendoza in Argentina. It was December 1991. Nobody was ever charged with the murder, but plenty of organisations had a motive, including drug cartels, the KGB and Mossad. In …

Features

Technology

Theatrophone – the 19th-century iPod

Features

Health

Fighting cancer with filth

Features

Space

The mystery of Planet X

Features

Life

Is it worth going to the mind gym?

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.

Life

Review: Built by Animals by Mike Hansell

HOW are tiny animals like termites able to build north-south-aligned mounds up to 7 metres high? From aardvarks and beavers to yellowjacket wasps, animal architects make remarkable constructions that require "decision". When, for instance, does a giant golden digger wasp stop digging its burrow and start excavating the terminal chamber? Is it when she feels …

Books & Arts

Life

Review: Biology of Freedom by François Ansermet and Pierre Magistretti

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

Fear of repetitive websites LAST year Feedback noted the irony of a website offering help to people with a phobia of phones that advises sufferers to make a phone call (21 April 2007) . Kipp Lynch dug a little deeper. "While scrolling the alphabetical list of phobias in the 'p' section of changethatsrightnow.com ," he …

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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