Letters archive

I was astonished by your comment article "Keeping our cool". It is subtitled: "Despite pessimism, limiting global warming to well below 2°C is within our grasp." The writer states: "And while 'well below 2°C' is very much in reach, we are clear the tougher 1.5°C goal no longer appears feasible... And a 'well-below 2°C' world …

In media coverage on the topic of significantly extending human lifespans, there seems to be a general view that doing so would be an unalloyed good. But the most significant impact would be an increase in population. If we all lived an average of 12 per cent longer than at present, that would amount to …

I read with interest about the "insect-eye" compass that can navigate by the sun even on cloudy days. While I can see a use for it in drones, it is relatively easy to compensate for the magnetic fields drones generate, and hence conventional systems can work. Where it may come in handy is for manual …

The study that found there is a weekend boost to plant productivity in Europe because of reduced air pollution by aerosols, which block sunlight, should be a warning to those who seek to address global heating by injecting aerosols into the atmosphere ( 25 November, p 11 ). This research shows how sensitive plants are …

It is suggested that the orbits of planets in our system would probably be unaltered by a star passing at about 100 astronomical units from the sun. But what of the many Oort cloud and Kuiper belt objects? They would be much closer to the passing star and more easily disturbed ( 9 December, p …

The arrival of the GNoME artificial intelligence model to predict new inorganic crystal structures is indeed exciting. Its positive potential is justly lauded, having increased the number of known inorganic crystal structures from around 48,000 to over 2 million, with potential for making better batteries, solar panels, computer chips, alloys and more ( 2 December, …

Recent correspondence ponders car culture and how to address it. Cheaper goods in more local shops, stopping motorised "school runs" and a culture of promoting (free!) public transport etc. would be far better than pushing even electric private vehicles ( Letters, 2 December ).

Did any of the teams looking at "art" dating back millions of years include an artist? If art academics studied a million-year-old activity that resembled science without a scientist, we would laugh ( 18 November, p 32 ).

At last, an advocate in James Wong for leaving nature to deal with leaf fall on your lawn. I would like to add that worm species are also important recyclers. In the UK at least, anecic earthworms form vertical burrows and drag leaves underground. No need to do any work ourselves ( 9 December 2023, …

You report that by far the highest known rate of long covid has been in Switzerland, a wealthy country with a northern temperate climate. This rate variation points to unknown factors being involved in developing long covid. Does some factor put certain wealthy Westerners at greater risk? Intriguingly, among the earliest recorded outbreaks of the …