Helium is vital for medicine -- just as well we discovered more of this rare element

Jul 01, 2016 12:10 pm UTC| Science Health

Helium is in short supply and its more than just the sellers of party balloons who should worry. This rare element is critical to medicine where ultra-low-temperature liquid helium is used to cool the superconducting...

Playing a science-based video game? It might be all wrong

Jul 01, 2016 09:04 am UTC| Insights & Views Science

You look down from the sky, manipulating the world and seeing how it responds to your changes. You are able to alter vegetation and climate while watching their effects on the surrounding organisms. In this way, and many...

NASA's Juno arrives at Jupiter to lift its cloudy veil – but first it must survive the hostile environment

Jun 30, 2016 14:46 pm UTC| Science

A burst of flame will streak across the skies of Jupiter in the early hours of July 5 as humankinds newest robotic explorer arrives at the giant planet. NASAs Juno spacecraft will be entering the unknown, penetrating deep...

It's time for the 'science of sensibility' to return

Jun 28, 2016 20:14 pm UTC| Insights & Views Science

What is beauty in art? Why can art move us emotionally? How do our minds and bodies respond to art? These and other questions, some linked to what we now call aesthetics, occupied some of the greatest minds of the...

Does a planet need plate tectonics to develop life?

Jun 28, 2016 20:05 pm UTC| Insights & Views Nature Science

Plate tectonics may be a phase in the evolution of planets that has implications for the habitability of exoplanets, according to new research published this month in the journal Physics of the Earth and Planetary...

Briferendum Series

What Brexit means for UK science: a view from the coalface

Jun 26, 2016 19:13 pm UTC| Insights & Views Science Economy

Science, and geoscience in particular, is an international activity that benefits from cooperation and collaboration. The Brexit vote is a wake up call, not just for the UK but more widely, and it underlines how so many...

Climate Change Series

How science can genetically strengthen endangered plants and agriculture

Jun 23, 2016 18:30 pm UTC| Insights & Views Science Nature

As the human population swells and in the face of a changing and unpredictable climate the demand for natural resources increases. This leads to distressing rates of deforestation to prepare land for agriculture,...