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This week's magazine

22 April 2017

Issue 3122

New Scientist issue 3122 cover
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Editor's picks

neonicotinoid protest

Life

Why a neonicotinoid ban isn't enough to protect the environment

News
protest

Humans

We should stand together on science, all over the world

News
self artwork 1

Humans

Your true self: How your personality changes throughout life

Features
self artwork 2

Humans

Your true self: The future is a foreign person

Features
fossils

Life

The heretical passion of the man who first described Parkinson's

Features
animal artwork 1

Life

Lazy fit animals: How some beasts get the gain without the pain

Features
invisible man

Humans

Your true self: Why it’s morals that make the human

Features
meteorite artwork

Earth

Rocks of ages: How meteorites reveal the solar system's history

Features

Table of contents

Leaders

Korea missile

Humans

Talk of a 'localised nuclear conflict' is ignorant and dangerous

The nuclear option? TWO and a half minutes to midnight. That was the time the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set their Doomsday Clock to just a few months ago – later than it has ever been except between 1953 and 1960, the height of the cold war H-bomb race. Among BoAS's concerns were bellicose …

News

Humans

We should stand together on science, all over the world

News

News

Drone maps mines to explore unsafe caverns and seek out minerals

Technology

Drone maps mines to explore unsafe caverns and seek out minerals

Ready to map underground worlds In the 2012 sci-fi film Prometheus , scientists release small drones into a mysterious tunnel complex to create a detailed 3D map of the caverns in minutes. Australian researchers plan to use a similar approach to explore parts of old mines that are unsafe to visit. The drones, which are …

News

Humans

Oldest tooth filling was made by an Ice Age dentist in Italy

News

Space

Quantum effects cloak impossible singularities with black holes

News

Life

Entire nervous system of an animal recorded for the first time

News

Health

Unprotected sex may disrupt the microbiome in vagina

News

Life

Gene editing opens doors to seedless fruit with no need for bees

News

Space

Water telescope uses gamma rays to track new kind of pulsar

News

Space

Mars's atmosphere hosts metal layers that shouldn't exist

News

Technology

Robot volleyball machine helps Japan team practise attacks

News

Physics

Physics of shoelaces shows why they come undone when you run

News

Life

Sea urchin emits a cloud of venomous jaws to deter predators

News

Technology

4D printing makes objects that assemble themselves when heated

News

Technology

Start-up uses biometrics to tailor music for good night’s sleep

News

Life

Soldier ants carry comrades wounded in raids back to base

News

Health

Fast CRISPR test easily detects Zika and antibiotic resistance

News

Space

EVE Online gamers will seek real exoplanets in virtual universe

News

Health

Psychedelic drug ayahuasca improves hard-to-treat depression

News

Health

Creative people physically see and process the world differently

News

Technology

Virtual syringe lets surgeons practise piercing skin and muscle

News

Space

Cassini finds final ingredient for alien life in Enceladus’s sea

News

Health

More than 8 million people in the US have mental health problems

News

Earth

California’s wet year eases drought but many still lack water

News

Space

Satellite swarms could increase space junk risk by 50 per cent

News

Life

Odds that Tasmanian tigers are still alive are 1 in 1.6 trillion

News

Health

Zika mosquito is spreading worldwide but WHO wants to stop it

News

Space

Distant DeeDee could be a new dwarf planet

News

Earth

Drone footage of coal dust leak on beaches may be overblown

News

Environment agency chief says US should exit Paris climate deal

News

Life

60 Seconds

News

Opinion

Earth from space, showing clouds

Earth

Simple equation shows how human activity is trashing the planet

How climate change adds up Homo sapiens now rivals the great forces of nature. Humanity is a prime driver of change of the Earth system. Industrialised societies alter the planet on a scale equivalent to an asteroid impact. This is how the Anthropocene – the proposed new geological period in which human activity profoundly shapes …

Opinion

Analysis

Dust from the Carmichael coal mine has spread widely

Earth

It’s not too late to save Great Barrier Reef from politicians

Dust from the Carmichael coal mine has spread widely More bad news about Australia’s iconic Great Barrier Reef emerged this week. Two-thirds of its coral has now been bleached following the scorching summers of 2017 and 2016. The scientific consensus is clear: the increased frequency of mass bleaching events is being driven by global warming …

News

Life

Marchers, raise your banners for the tortoise pace of progress

News

Life

Why a neonicotinoid ban isn't enough to protect the environment

News

Aperture

Marine life is rubbish... at least in these pictures

Earth

Marine life is rubbish... at least in these pictures

You have seen Copeopod langisticus (above) before – but it didn't look quite like this. The faux-Linnaean title, along with the expired film stock and doctored camera on which the image was shot, serves to veil a common object: the plastic binding from a six-pack of beer. Mandy Barker photographed this in a style that …

Regulars

Features

self artwork 1

Humans

Your true self: How your personality changes throughout life

You are not the person you were as a child, or even last year. The discovery that our characters change is unnerving, but embrace it and it can be empowering

Features

Humans

Your true self: Why it’s morals that make the human

Features

Life

Lazy fit animals: How some beasts get the gain without the pain

Features

Life

The heretical passion of the man who first described Parkinson's

Features

Humans

Your true self: The future is a foreign person

Features

Earth

Rocks of ages: How meteorites reveal the solar system's history

Features

Culture

Crowded pedestrian crossing in a city

Technology

A population paradox could help us outrun our doom

Our lust for growth as a species and economically spells our downfall, argues a new book, Scale. But we may have overlooked the way to save ourselves

Culture

Humans

Love your anthropological collection? Then hand it back

Culture

More

tea making robot cartoon

Trouble brewing your tea? Not if you build a diligent Dunkbot

We put together a marvellous machine to take the mind-numbing dipping out of the tea-making equation and maximise relaxing feet-up time

Regulars

Regulars

blue house cartoon

Feedback: Why the colour of #TheDress depends on your bedtime

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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