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4 November 2009
From John Hayman
In her review of Brian Dillon's Tormented Hope , Amanda Gefter mentions the theory that Charles Darwin was a hypochondriac (3 October, p 48) . Darwin suffered from a chronic, incapacitating illness for much of his adult life; he also suffered – and still suffers – from numerous misdiagnoses. These incorrect diagnoses include psychogenic illness …
4 November 2009
From Mara Miele, Cardiff, UK, Dialrel
I read with interest Andy Coghlan's article on recent research findings about the pain experienced by animals when slaughtered without stunning (17 October, p 11) . I head a project in Europe called Dialrel , which aims to improve welfare at slaughter by finding more common ground between what science tells us about slaughter and …
4 November 2009
From David Bennett
I was surprised that your article on technologies for reducing greenhouse gases (26 September, p 38) did not mention two of the major culprits – the manufacture of steel and cement. Between them they contribute about 10 per cent of the global total. Any improvements in the efficiency of these two industries would have a …
4 November 2009
From Clive Semmens
In his article on the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, Stephen Battersby repeats the claim that nuclear fusion will produce much less radioactive waste than nuclear fission since the only radioactive waste produced is from the materials made radioactive by absorbing the neutrons produced during fusion (10 October, p 40) . However, a fusion reactor needs …
4 November 2009
From Jon Arch, Deputy Director of Metabolic Research, Clore Laboratory, University of Buckingham
Peter Brooks refers to a compound that made munitions workers feel hot and lose weight in his letter about brown adipose tissue, or BAT (3 October, p 29) . It was during the first world war, not the second as he said, that this was observed. The compound was dinitrophenol, which increases heat production in …
4 November 2009
From Gail Riekie
I was delighted to see a job advertised on the pages of your UK edition for which I could apply – it called for a "Senior Sounding Scientist" ( 24 October, p 55 ). Do I need to sound important or just old to apply for this post?
4 November 2009
• Apologies to John Wearden, whose name we misspelled in our article on time perception (24 October, p 32)
Issue no. 2733 published 7 November 2009
