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This week's magazine

18 February 2017

Issue 3113

New Scientist issue 3113 cover
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Editor's picks

robot head

Technology

How to build better sex robots: stop making them look human

News
research

We need slow science to sow the seeds of future prosperity

News
symmetry artwork

Physics

Magnets, boiling kettles and the secret code underlying reality

Features
Lovelock

Earth

The father of the Gaia hypothesis shares his greatest invention

Features
Remy Mallett

Health

How you can control what happens in your dreams

Features
bison

Life

Slaughter of an American icon: The Yellowstone buffalo cull

Features
dreaming artwork

Health

Heal yourself from inside your dreams

Features

Table of contents

Leaders

research

We need slow science to sow the seeds of future prosperity

It's tempting to invest in rapid development at the cost of slow and steady research – but good things come to those who wait

News

News

Trinity nuclear bomb test

Space

Glass from nuclear test site shows the moon was born dry

Echoes of the moon's formation We can’t recreate the giant impact that led to the moon’s formation in a lab, but humans have made some other big explosions. By examining residue from the first detonation of a nuclear weapon, researchers have cracked a window into the moon’s past. On 16 July 1945, the US army …

News

Health

Antibiotics might kill gut bacteria that protect newborn lungs

News

Life

Primitive plants survive almost two years in outer space

News

Space

Rare mid-weight black hole found at heart of bright star cluster

News

Life

Synchronised swimming seems to make dolphins more optimistic

News

Space

NASA wants to put a lander on Europa’s surface to look for life

News

Life

Robotic bee could help pollinate crops as real bees decline

News

Technology

AI learns to solve quantum state of many particles at once

News

Space

Magnetic meteorites narrow down solar system’s birthdate

News

Life

New beetle species bites army ant’s butt and hitches a ride

News

Technology

How a raised hand from a pedestrian could stop driverless cars

News

Life

Monkeys and dogs judge humans by how they treat others

News

Health

Stinky armpits? Bacteria from a less smelly person can fix them

News

Technology

Software helps musicians stop slouching by ruining their music

News

Life

Foxes seen climbing trees at night to track down and eat koalas

News

Life

400 pilot whales stranded on New Zealand’s ‘whale trap’ beach

News

Earth

Secrets of Earth's birth carried in lava jets from planet's core

News

Life

Deep-sea squid points a big, bulging eye up and a tiny eye down

News

Earth

Australia's extreme heatwave is a preview of things to come

News

Technology

Virtual reality weather add-ons let you feel the sun and wind

News

Life

Metabolic switch may bring on chronic fatigue syndrome

News

Technology

NHS to start prescribing health apps that help manage conditions

News

Health

Timing when you get pregnant could prevent a miscarriage

News

Space

Mars landing sites for 2020 NASA mission down to the final three

News

Health

Human genome editing shouldn’t be used for enhancement – yet

News

Earth

Crews race to fix California dam before more rain falls

News

60 Seconds

News

Physics

Universes that spawn 'cosmic brains' should go on the scrapheap

News

Health

Two new drug therapies might cure every form of tuberculosis

News

Analysis

Science protest

Humans

Science stood apart from politics for a long time, not any more

A march for science to protest at Donald Trump's presidency has sparked debate about researchers getting too political. Why the fuss, wonders Michael Brooks

News

Earth

Great lettuce crisis is a taste of climate crop chaos to come

News

Technology

How to build better sex robots: stop making them look human

News

Space

The Mars paradox: Why we still don't understand water on Mars

News

Aperture

whale skin

Life

Sperm whale's skin comes off during mass 'scratchathon'

IT LOOKS like a plastic bag floating in the ocean, but it's something much stranger: a transparent chunk of skin from a sperm whale . It got rubbed off during a mass "scratchathon", a phenomenon that sees dozens of animals periodically gather, apparently to socialise and groom each other by rubbing their massive bodies together. …

Regulars

Features

symmetry artwork

Physics

Magnets, boiling kettles and the secret code underlying reality

A strange, unifying mathematical pattern is popping up in all sorts of unexpected places – and it could explain some profound questions about the cosmos

Features

Health

Heal yourself from inside your dreams

Features

Health

How you can control what happens in your dreams

Features

Life

Slaughter of an American icon: The Yellowstone buffalo cull

Features

Earth

The father of the Gaia hypothesis shares his greatest invention

Features

Culture

satellite

Space

Connecting us all: How satellites remade the world

From cold wars to hot junk, a new book about satellites shows how thousands of satellites extend humans' reach in every possible way

Culture

Space

A space travel guide for your first holiday off-planet

Culture

Earth

How the world made us: chance and climate in the human story

Culture

More

Pregnant and not heard of Group B Strep?

Health

Pregnant and not heard of Group B Strep?

Fighting infection in babies DID you know the UK doesn't test for the most common cause of life-threatening infection in newborn babies? Most people will never need to know about Group B Strep, also known as GBS or Strep B, even though 25 per cent of us carry the bacteria. It's living in and on …

Regulars

Regulars

heavy metal musician cartoon

A new formula reveals the most rocking science star of all

Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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