Another selection of amusing, and even interesting, articles you may have missed …
It’s that time of year when the IgNobel prizes — for research that makes you laugh and then think — are awarded. This year the recipients included research on the slipperiness of banana skins and …
… this mind-boggling report on controlling nose-bleeds with tampons of bacon.
Equally topically here’s a piece on the chemicals behind the colours of autumn leaves.

And while we’re on colours, it seems we’re all striped, with Blaschko’s Lines, it’s just that they only show in some rare medical conditions. It looks to me as if they may also be related to birth-marks.
Prof. Alice Roberts has a new book out: The Incredible Unlikeliness of Being; a masterful account of why our bodies are the way they are. Here’s a review by Adam Rutherford in the Guardian and here’s my review.
So you think you know where babies come from? Here’s Alice Roberts herself on the way in which our understanding of the making of babies has developed since Aristotle.
Recent research is suggesting that modern European genetic codes are made up from those of three ancient “tribes” which intermingled a bit less than 7000 years ago.
Just for a little more variety, Mick Jagger has had the 19-million-year-old species of extinct water nymph Jaggermeryx naida — Jagger’s water nymph — named after him. Apparently it is long legged and has a “highly innervated muzzle with mobile and tactile lips”.
Rewilding Britain: bringing wolves, bears and beavers back to the land. Should we? Or shouldn’t we?
So Jack the Ripper has been identified as Aaron Kosminski using DNA analysis. Or has he? Ted Scheinman isn’t convinced, and neither am I. This is research which needs to be peer reviewed and published in the scientific literature.
Next up a piece by Maryn McKenna in praise of her anonymous kitchen knife.
Paperclips! Love them or loathe them, they’re here to stay. The stories behind five everyday items of office stationery.
And finally from the annals of “what were they thinking?” we give you the Columbian Women’s Cycling team …