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This week's magazine

18 July 2015

Issue 3030

New Scientist issue 3030 cover
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Editor's picks

How does brain science affect our responsibility for actions?

Life

How does brain science affect our responsibility for actions?

Opinion
Travel back in time to a paradise lost under the North Sea

Earth

Travel back in time to a paradise lost under the North Sea

Features
How Aloe vera became a cure-all and cosmetic superstar

Earth

How Aloe vera became a cure-all and cosmetic superstar

Features
Travel back in time to the flood that filled the Mediterranean

Earth

Travel back in time to the flood that filled the Mediterranean

Features
Travel back in time to an Arctic heatwave

Earth

Travel back in time to an Arctic heatwave

Features
Travel back in time to the biggest volcanic apocalypse ever

Earth

Travel back in time to the biggest volcanic apocalypse ever

Features
Travel back in time to the most extreme desert and monsoons ever

Earth

Travel back in time to the most extreme desert and monsoons ever

Features
Travel back in time to snowball Earth

Earth

Travel back in time to snowball Earth

Features
Train your brain for better hearing

Life

Train your brain for better hearing

Features
A time traveller's guide to Earth

A time traveller's guide to Earth

Features
Travel back in time to Earth's mightiest rivers and mountains

Earth

Travel back in time to Earth's mightiest rivers and mountains

Features

Table of contents

Leaders

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

Tweet old things – why a Twitter back catalogue is a good thing

HOW would you feel about a piece of your writing being lodged in the US Library of Congress? Probably pretty honoured. But what if that piece of writing was a tweet? Or, actually, every single tweet you've ever sent? In 2010, the library announced its intention to store Twitter's entire back catalogue – then an …

Opinion

Life

How does brain science affect our responsibility for actions?

Opinion

News

Cushion plants harbour tiny mountain worlds inside

Earth

Cushion plants harbour tiny mountain worlds inside

Cushion plants are found in mountain environments all over the world, including here in the Andes (Image: Chris Mattison/Naturepl.com) They look like comfy cushions from the outside, but inside they contain mini-ecosystems, sheltered from the harsh mountain environment around them. One of the best ways for mountain plants to maximise their chances of survival in …

News

Life

Zoologger: The sex-addicted tiny lemur with giant testicles

News

Life

Training boys to recognise another's fear reduces violent crime

News

Earth

Earth's shrinking crust could leave us living on a water world

News

Health

Mice with hereditary deafness hear again thanks to gene therapy

News

Space

Record-breaking super bright supernova spotted in southern sky

News

Technology

Burst of light speeds up healing by turbocharging our cells

News

Technology

Pentaquark discovery at LHC shows long-sought new form of matter

News

Space

Bursting balloons in a sand box show distinct pattern of craters

News

Life

Tiny beating human heart made from scratch

News

Technology

Robot homes in on consciousness by passing self-awareness test

News

Technology

Cyberchondriacs act as early warning of drugs' side effects

News

Technology

One Per Cent

News

Technology

The battle to store the world's tweets for the future

News

Life

Fussy eating may have doomed ape-like humans

News

60 Seconds

News

To vanquish AIDS by 2030, "pay now, or pay forever"

News

Space

New Horizons fly-by shows Pluto to be a surprising world

News

Earth

Coal renaissance means switching to plan B on climate change

News

Technology

How historic Iran deal will block nuclear weapons – for a while

News

Opinion

Stop labelling unemployment as a psychological disorder

Health

Stop labelling unemployment as a psychological disorder

Out of work, into therapy (Image: Diverse Images/UIG/Getty) A banner draped from a London job centre window declares: "Back to work therapy is no therapy at all." It's a protest against government plans to integrate employment and mental health support for benefit claimants. This includes putting 350 psychological therapists into centres and pushing online therapy …

Opinion

Space

Why getting into orbit is tough 45 years after visiting the moon

Opinion

Imagine if we could play our sense of smell like a piano

Opinion

Humans

How your unknown prejudices can dictate your actions in a crisis

Opinion

Analysis

Pluto mission marks end of planet exploration era. Where next?

Space

Pluto mission marks end of planet exploration era. Where next?

Perhaps an exoplanet is in reach... (Image: J.M. Eddins Jr for The Washington Post via Getty Images) IT'S the end of the line. As New Scientist went to press, mission controllers were awaiting a signal from NASA's New Horizons probe confirming it has survived its rapid journey past Pluto. If all went well, images and …

News

Aperture

This mighty forest of British soldiers is a snack for voles

Life

This mighty forest of British soldiers is a snack for voles

(Image: Matthew Cicanese) IT MIGHT look like an alien forest, but it's really a glimpse of somewhere rather closer to home. In this strange realm, a huge variety of organisms form a complex web of interactions and relationships, all on a tiny scale. The “trees” are really British Soldier lichen, Cladonia cristatella , named after …

Regulars

Features

How Aloe vera became a cure-all and cosmetic superstar

Earth

How Aloe vera became a cure-all and cosmetic superstar

Its mucilaginous gel is big business and used daily by many, but until now we had no idea where Aloe vera came from or what makes it so special

Features

Life

Train your brain for better hearing

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to a paradise lost under the North Sea

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to the flood that filled the Mediterranean

Features

A time traveller's guide to Earth

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to Earth's mightiest rivers and mountains

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to snowball Earth

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to the most extreme desert and monsoons ever

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to the biggest volcanic apocalypse ever

Features

Earth

Travel back in time to an Arctic heatwave

Features

Culturelab

The Toxic Sublime: Marc Quinn on our relationship with nature

Earth

The Toxic Sublime: Marc Quinn on our relationship with nature

Marc Quinn with a Toxic Sublime painting and Frozen Wave sculpture (Image: Marc Quinn in his studio, 2015 © & courtesy Marc Quinn studio) The Toxic Sublime by Marc Quinn , White Cube, South Galleries, Bermondsey, London, to 13 September I HAVE always loved Turner and his paintings of the sublime, but we no longer …

CultureLab

Life

The Nature of Crops: Why do we eat so few of the edible plants?

CultureLab

Technology

Secret Science: Deadly experiments done for the 'greater good'

CultureLab

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.

Space

3D map of space dust is a galactic selfie of the Milky Way

Video: Milky Way tour reveals space dust in 3D Space dust is beautiful. See for yourself in the video above, which takes you on a voyage through the ghostly wisps of dust strewn across the Milky Way. These images are part of a three-dimensional map of the galaxy's dust – the largest map of its …

Regulars

Regulars

Feedback: A well-stuffed drugs sandwich

Feedback: A well-stuffed drugs sandwich

(Image: Paul McDevitt) Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more A well-stuffed drugs sandwich PITY those tasked to shore up the UK government's counter-intuitive drugs policy with robust scientific evidence. David Nutt, the former chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD), was ousted …

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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