What exactly does 'instantaneous' mean?
Sep 15, 2016 03:03 am UTC| Science Nature
How short is an instant? Is it a second? A tenth of a second? A microsecond? You might think all of these qualify. What about 100 years? That certainly doesnt seem like an instant, and to a human being, it isnt, since wed...
Here's what dogs see when they watch television
Sep 08, 2016 08:16 am UTC| Science
Dog owners often notice their pets watching televisions, computer screens and tablets. But what is going on in their poochs head? Indeed, by tracking their vision using similar methods used on humans, research has found...
World War I to the age of the cyborg: the surprising history of prosthetic limbs
Sep 06, 2016 09:14 am UTC| Science
People have long dreamed of being smarter, stronger, faster. But now it seems that cutting edge technologies are out there, or in development, that might enable us truly to enhance our cognitive and physical capabilities....
Ceres asteroid may have an 'ice volcano' and other signs of water, NASA mission reveals
Sep 03, 2016 10:47 am UTC| Science
The arrival of NASAs Dawn mission at the huge asteroid 1 Ceres in early 2015 has turned out to have been well worth waiting for. This dwarf planet is the largest body in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and was...
Insects are helping us develop the future of hearing aids
Sep 01, 2016 09:18 am UTC| Science Health
The human ear is a miracle of mechanical evolution. It allows us to hear an astonishing range of sounds and to communicate and navigate in the world. Its also easy to damage and difficult to repair. Hearing aids are still...
Natural selection may be the answer to the cancer riddle, but can we beat evolution?
Aug 31, 2016 11:14 am UTC| Science Nature
Essential organs tasked with keeping us alive and reproducing such as the heart, brain or uterus may have evolved better protection against cancer than larger and paired organs, we have proposed. In an article...
Will superfast 'quantum' computers mean the end of unbreakable encryption?
Aug 27, 2016 12:57 pm UTC| Science Technology
There is a computing revolution coming, although nobody knows exactly when. What are known as quantum computers will be substantially more powerful than the devices we use today, capable of performing many types of...
Johannesburg in a time of darkness: Ivan Vladislavić’s new memoir reminds us of the city’s fragility
Why Germany ditched nuclear before coal – and why it won’t go back
Labour can afford to be far more ambitious with its economic policies – voters are on board
Sudan: civil war stretches into a second year with no end in sight