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This week's magazine

28 September 2024

Issue 3510

New Scientist issue 3510 cover
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Editor's picks

Satellite image of the sea ice maximum extent in the north hemisphere. Elements of this images furnished by NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio; Shutterstock ID 1164807439; purchase_order: -; job: -; client: -; other: -

Environment

Geoengineering is now essential to saving the Arctic's ice

News
The brain has its own microbiome. Here's what it means for your health

Health

The brain has its own microbiome. Here's what it means for your health

Features
LATVIA. Jurmala. 1999.

Humans

The fascinating truth about why common sense isn't really that common

Features
The astrophysicist who may be about to discover how the universe began

Space

The astrophysicist who may be about to discover how the universe began

Features

Table of contents

Leaders

Satellite image of the sea ice maximum extent in the north hemisphere. Elements of this images furnished by NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio; Shutterstock ID 1164807439; purchase_order: -; job: -; client: -; other: -

Environment

Geoengineering is now essential to saving the Arctic's ice

If we want to preserve the dwindling ice in the Arctic, cutting our emissions is no longer enough – we also need to use geoengineering to refreeze this precious ecosystem

News

News

Physics

Our reality seems to be compatible with a quantum multiverse

Even though the strange behaviour we observe in the quantum realm isn’t part of our daily lives, simulations suggest it is likely our reality could be one of the many worlds in a quantum multiverse

News

Life

Some flowers may have evolved long stems to be better ‘seen’ by bats

News

Space

Dark matter may allow giant black holes to form in the early universe

News

Technology

Quantum computers teleport and store energy harvested from empty space

News

Chemistry

How to turn most of the CO2 an astronaut exhales into fresh oxygen

News

Technology

Cold war spy satellites and AI detect ancient underground aqueducts

News

Health

The complicated role loneliness plays in 26 common health conditions

News

Physics

Light has been seen leaving an atom cloud before it entered

News

Health

Antibiotic resistance forecast to kill 39 million people by 2050

News

Earth

Earth may once have had a ring like Saturn

News

Life

Air jacket helps 'scuba-diving' lizards stay underwater for longer

News

Life

Giant rats trained to sniff out illegal wildlife trade

News

Environment

People hugely underestimate the carbon footprints of the 1 per cent

News

Space

Bacteria on the space station are evolving for life in space

News

Technology

‘Shazam for whales’ uses AI to track sounds heard in Mariana Trench

News

Space

Black hole’s jets are so huge that they may shake up cosmology

News

Technology

Tiny nuclear-powered battery could work for decades in space or at sea

News

Environment

Special electrodes can split seawater to produce hydrogen fuel

News

Health

Evidence points to Wuhan market as source of covid-19 outbreak

News

Technology

An AI can beat CAPTCHA tests 100 per cent of the time

News

Health

Most effective migraine drugs revealed by review of trial data

News

Environment

Antarctica’s 'doomsday' glacier is heading for catastrophic collapse

News

Environment

Plan to refreeze Arctic sea ice shows promise in first tests

News

Aperture

This mosaic image of the magnificent starburst galaxy, Messier 82 (M82) is the sharpest wide-angle view ever obtained of M82. It is a galaxy remarkable for its webs of shredded clouds and flame-like plumes of glowing hydrogen blasting out from its central regions where young stars are being born 10 times faster than they are inside in our Milky Way Galaxy.

Space

Stellar views of some of the most spectacular sights in the universe

These dazzling images taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope are from the upcoming book Cosmos: Explore the wonders of the universe, which has a foreword by astrophysicist Becky Smethurst

Regulars

Features

LATVIA. Jurmala. 1999.

Humans

The fascinating truth about why common sense isn't really that common

New research is revealing that common sense is a lot more idiosyncratic than we thought, with important implications for tackling political polarisation and the future of AI

Features

Space

The astrophysicist who may be about to discover how the universe began

Features

Health

The brain has its own microbiome. Here's what it means for your health

Features

Culture

Manta ray {Manta birostris} from below, Sulu-sulawesi seas, Indo-Pacific

Life

Richard Powers's new novel is a beautiful love letter to our oceans

From colonialism to AI, this Booker-longlisted novel urges us to wake up to how we treat wild creatures and places

Culture

Environment

How colonialism and industrialisation fuelled the climate crisis

Culture

Technology

Samantha Morton stars in dystopian docudrama 2073

Culture

Society

New Scientist recommends Karl Ove Knausgaard's novel The Third Realm

Culture

More

If we reassessed what maths is, perhaps it wouldn't make us so anxious

Mathematics

If we reassessed what maths is, perhaps it wouldn't make us so anxious

Fear of maths has been around for at least a century. Here are some ways to overcome it, says Sarah Hart, professor emerita of mathematics at Birkbeck, University of London

Comment

Environment

How genetically modified crops could feed us and help safeguard nature

Comment

BrainTwister #39: Game of logic

Regulars

Chemistry

The chemistry behind making a perfect caramel sauce

Regulars

Tom Gauld on a party for time travellers

Regulars

Twisteddoodles on the anatomy of a task

Regulars

Regulars

Why does hair pulling hurt? Blame your myelinated nociceptors

Why does hair pulling hurt? Blame your myelinated nociceptors

Feedback explores the painstaking science of hair-pulling, and learns that experts have discovered that its effects can range from "hot-burning" to "aching"

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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