And so to this month’s collection of links to items you dodn’t know you din’t want to miss! Let’s start, as usual, with the tough science stuff.
Science, Technology, Natural World
Some scientists have been thinking about how life would have started and self-assembled. [LONG READ]
Turning the tables round, will we actually know alien life when we encounter it? [LONG READ]
While we decide that, how likely is it that alien life is eavesdropping on our mobile phone calls? [££££]
Staying with the cosmological … Observers have detected the largest cosmic explosion ever seen.
Meanwhile the James Webb telescope has found asteroids in the Fomalhaut star system.
And it gets weirder, as astronomers think they’ve seen live-action of a star swallowing one of its planets.
Coming back a little nearer to sanity … hare’s a look at Alan Turing and the most important machine that’s never been built. [LONG READ]
After which, riddle me this … How do you find a new species of Demon Catshark? By reading it’s eggs, of course. [££££]
But then again, genetics turns up many surprises, including the mutation which turned ants into parasites in one generation. [LONG READ]
More strangeness on genetics … it turns out strawberries have eight sets of chromosomes, which have contributed to their domestication and survival. [££££]
Deeper and deeper into plants, photosynthesis actually requires four photons to complete the transfer of sunlight into chemical energy but the details of the final step are only now coming to light. [££££]
And so back into the (almost) real world. Clever palaeontologists have been able to recover the DNA of the wearer of a 25,000-year-old pendant.
Health, Medicine
How accurate are all those old-wives tales – you know like “chocolate causes acne” and “carrots help you see in the dark”?
So just what are puberty blockers and how do they work? Side issue: should we be using them? [££££]
Medics now seem to have decided that removing just the Fallopian Tubes will significantly reduce the number of women with ovarian cancer. [££££]
Meanwhile, deciding whether to have HRT treatment for the menopause is a difficult decision for many women. [LONG READ]
Sexuality
Here’s the usual, and regular suggestion of ten ways to improve your sex life.
Environment
All the rubbish buried along the Thames estuary is coming back to the surface to bite us. Why do we think we can treat the place like a trash can? [LONG READ]
There’s one thing you do not want in your garden (or anywhere): Japanese Knotweed. [LONG READ]
Social Sciences, Business, Law, Politics
Historian and headmaster Sir Anthony Seldon has been writing book-length report cards on British prime ministers for 40 years. His latest is on Boris Johnson, and he’s not impressed.
Art, Literature, Language, Music
Oh dear. Some of the southern Italians are upset. They’ve decides that a mermaid statue is too provocative. Judge for yourself …
London’s Courtauld Gallery has released almost a million rarely seen photographs from their collections online anf free.
History, Archaeology, Anthropology
The Mediterranean keeps producing ancient shipwrecks. Now one off Sicily has been found to contain ingots of a rare alloy called orichalcum.
A look at the Port of London in Roman times.
A large Roman temple in France could have been used for the worship of many gods.
So what was the Medieval attitude to cats?
Food, Drink
Emma Beddington asks why we’re unable to give up salt – but doesn’t come up with a good answer.
Lifestyle, Personal Development, Beliefs
This is Local London website runs a series of thoughtful articles by senior school pupils on various topics. One recent such looks at attitudes to gender identity.
Here are yet another ten reasons to embrace everyday nudity.
Shock, Horror, Humour, Wow!
A study – surely a contender for an Ig Nobel Prize – has discovered that it is “barely possible to identify a beautiful scrotum“. [££££]
