Study found bags were still able to carry shopping despite environmental claims
Plastic bags that claim to be biodegradable were still intact and able to carry shopping three years after being exposed to the natural environment, a study has found.
The research for the first time tested compostable bags, two forms of biodegradable bag and conventional carrier bags after long-term exposure to the sea, air and earth. None of the bags decomposed fully in all environments.
Continue reading...Professor Ton van Raan told use of phrase for ignored work is culturally insensitive
A leading American academic journal has refused to publish an article by a respected professor on the grounds that his use of the fairytale Sleeping Beauty as a metaphor for ignored scientific work is culturally insensitive and in danger of being “sexualised”.
Ton van Raan, a professor emeritus of quantitative science studies at Leiden University in the Netherlands, first likened the belated discovery of an academic work to the story of the Brothers Grimm fairytale some 15 years ago.
Continue reading...For a century, the humble paper towel has dominated public toilets. But a new generation of hand dryers has sparked a war for loo supremacy.
By Samanth Subramanian
In the summer of 2005, a Chicago marketing consultant named George Campbell received a tantalising call from a headhunter. Was he open to an interview at Dyson? The company was secretively preparing to launch a new appliance, and it needed a sales strategy for the US: that was all the headhunter would divulge. Campbell was excited; he saw Dyson as “a company with the iconic quality of Apple, and an ability to take a basic product like a vacuum cleaner and make an 80% margin on it”.
He went along to Dyson’s office, a factory-like space with lofty ceilings and timber beams next to the Chicago river. In his first few conversations, he recalled, they wouldn’t even reveal what the product was. Finally, Campbell was told in strict confidence: it was a hand dryer. And he’d thought he was joining Dyson for the glamour. “My heart dropped to my stomach.”
Continue reading...Regarding Jeremy Beecham’s thoughts on Roger Waters (Letters, 19 April), I think we can take it as read Waters would not encourage Madonna to support the Assad regime by playing Damascus.
John Warburton
Edinburgh
• You failed to mention the two most important filmed rock concerts (Homecoming review – Beyoncé documentary is a triumphant celebration, 19 April): Monterey Pop and Woodstock. To write about seminal filmed rock gigs without mentioning them is like writing about influential 60s groups without mentioning the Beatles or the Stones.
Jon Ingram
Ilkley, West Yorkshire
Frogs, salamanders, and toads across the world are now under attack from a widening range of interacting pathogens that threaten to devastate global amphibian populations.
That is the stark warning of leading zoological experts who will gather this week in London in a bid to establish an emergency plan to save these endangered creatures. “The world’s amphibians are facing a new crisis, one that is caused by attacks by multiple pathogens,” said Professor Trent Garner of the Zoological Society of London, which is hosting the conference. “We desperately need to devise strategies that can protect them.”
Continue reading...Even light exertions can slow down ageing of the brain, activity-tracker data indicates
Even light activity such as household chores might help to keep the brain young, researchers say, adding to a growing body of evidence that, when it comes to exercise, every little helps.
The findings mirror upcoming guidance from the UK chief medical officers, and existing US guidelines, which say light activity or very short bouts of exercise are beneficial to health – even if it is just a minute or two at a time – countering the previous view that there was a threshold that must be reached before there were significant benefits.
Continue reading...DNA research adds to evidence soldiers heading east struck up relationships with locals
Crusader armies were made up of people from remarkably genetically diverse backgrounds, hailing not just from western Europe but also much further east, according to a new study that gives unprecedented insight into the fighters’ lives.
The Crusades to the Holy Land were spread over two centuries, with many Europeans heading east to fight, and others turning up to trade.
Continue reading...Helium hydride is thought to have played starring role in early universe
The most ancient type of molecule in our universe has been detected in space, scientists have revealed, backing up theories of how the early chemistry of the universe developed after the big bang.
The positively charged molecule known as helium hydride is believed to have played a starring role in the early universe, forming when a helium atom shared its electrons with a hydrogen nucleus, or proton. Not only is it thought to be the first molecular bond, and first chemical compound, to have appeared as the universe cooled after the big bang, but it also opened up the path to the formation of molecules of hydrogen.
Continue reading...People more or less keeping to NHS guidelines at higher risk than those who eat little
Eating even the moderate amounts of red and processed meat sanctioned by government guidelines increases the likelihood of developing bowel cancer, according to the largest UK study of the risks ever conducted.
The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) suggests anyone who eats more than 90g of red or processed meat per day should try to cut down to 70g or less, because of the known link with bowel cancer. The NHS describes 90g of red meat as “equivalent to around three thinly cut slices of beef, lamb or pork, where each slice is about the size of half a piece of sliced bread”.
Continue reading...With dozens of events next week, many hope arrival of climate punks who’ve swept the UK will be a watershed moment
Bea Ruiz, a veteran progressive coordinator, has been telling scores of first-time climate change protesters they face being harassed and beaten by police next week. Most seem happy with the deal.
“I told a 72-year-old volunteer that he will probably be targeted by police,” said Ruiz, who is based in Eureka, California and is helping organize the first US rollout of Extinction Rebellion, a group founded in the UK that has grabbed attention through disruptive protests leading to mass arrests.
Continue reading...For most people, reaching 100 would be reason enough to put one’s feet up and take things easy, but Lisel Heise has other ideas.
The German centenarian, a former sports teacher, has started a new chapter in her life by standing for election to the council in her home town of Kirchheimbolanden.
Continue reading...Tens of thousands of young people in Britain and abroad are demonstrating for climate action in the latest wave of strikes
We will be closing the live blog shortly, so thanks to all those who contributed.
Organiser Cyrus Jarvis, 16, a year 11 student from London Academy school in Barnet, North London, reflected on the march, saying:
The police tried to frighten us with arrests but we just moved on. We are really sorry for anyone who did have issues because of us, but unfortunately this is what we have to do to get our point across to the government. If we don’t cause disruption they don’t listen to us and they haven’t listened to us in the past.”
Continue reading...Spacecraft crashes in to lunar surface after engine and communications breakdown
An Israeli spacecraft has crashed into the lunar surface, ending the first privately funded attempt to land on the moon.
About the size of a washing machine, the 585kg (1,290lb) robotic lander experienced an engine and communication failure in the last seconds of touchdown.
Continue reading...Experimental IVF, which involves extra egg from female donor, criticised by UK experts
A baby with DNA from three people has been born in Greece following a controversial fertility treatment.
The baby boy, weighing 2.9kg (6lb), was born on Tuesday and both he and his mother, who is 32, are said to be in good health.
Continue reading...Homo luzonensis fossils found in Luzon island cave, dating back up to 67,00 years
A new species of ancient human, thought to have been under 4ft tall and adapted to climbing trees, has been discovered in the Philippines, providing a twist in the story of human evolution.
The specimen, named Homo luzonensis, was excavated from Callao cave on Luzon island in the northern Philippines and has been dated to 50,000-67,000 years ago – when our own ancestors and the Neanderthals were spreading across Europe and into Asia.
Continue reading...Network of eight radio telescopes around the world records revolutionary image
Astronomers have captured the first image of a black hole, heralding a revolution in our understanding of the universe’s most enigmatic objects.
The picture shows a halo of dust and gas, tracing the outline of a colossal black hole, at the heart of the Messier 87 galaxy, 55m light years from Earth.
Continue reading...Medical students in Oregon made the discovery only after the death of Rose Marie Bentley
Rose Marie Bentley was an avid swimmer, raised five children, helped her husband run a feed store and lived to 99. It was only after she died that medical students discovered that all her internal organs, except for her heart, were in the wrong place.
The discovery of the rare condition, which was presented this week to a conference of anatomists, was astounding — especially because Bentley had lived so long. People with the condition known as situs inversus with levocardia often have life-threatening cardiac ailments and other abnormalities, according to Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU).
Continue reading...If emissions continue to rise at current rate, ice will have all but disappeared from Europe’s Alpine valleys by end of century
Two-thirds of the ice in the glaciers of the Alps is doomed to melt by the end of the century as climate change forces up temperatures, a study has found.
Half of the ice in the mountain chain’s 4,000 glaciers will be gone by 2050 due to global warming already baked in by past emissions, the research shows. After that, even if carbon emissions have plummeted to zero, two-thirds of the ice will still have melted by 2100.
Continue reading...Working memory of older group temporarily improves to match younger group in study
A decline in memory as a result of ageing can be temporarily reversed using a harmless form of electrical brain stimulation, scientists have found.
The findings help explain why certain cognitive skills decline significantly with age and raise the prospect of new treatments.
Continue reading...Jody Williams and Mary Wareham were leading lights in the campaign to ban landmines. Now they have autonomous weapons in their sights
It sounds like something from the outer reaches of science fiction: battlefield robots waging constant war, algorithms that determine who to kill, face-recognition fighting machines that can ID a target and take it out before you have time to say “Geneva conventions”.
This is no film script, however, but an ominous picture of future warfare that is moving ever closer. “Killer robots” is shorthand for a range of tech that has generals salivating and peace campaigners terrified at the ethical ramifications of warfare waged via digital proxies.
Continue reading...