Herewith are the usual monthly collection of links to items you may have missed. It’s holiday season, so there’s not been so much of interest this month.

Science, Technology & Natural World

This year’s Royal Institution Christmas Lectures should be good. They’re titled “Who are You?” and will apparently be all about evolution and the rise of Homo sapiens. And who better to present them than the ever excellent Prof. Alice Roberts. But I bet there will only be three lectures again this year, rather than the original six.

Talking of human evolution, the latest research suggests that one of the last traits of our primate origins to disappear was our prehensile big toes.

More prosaically, it seems that the UK has this month been plagued by social wasps. I can’t say I’ve noticed, but here anyway are five reasons we should celebrate them. Oh and there’s another reason: our beloved honey bees are descended from ancient wasps.

I’ve seen it suggested that this is old news, but there are recent reports of Pine Marten recolonising the Kielder Forest for the first time in 90 years.

Health & Medicine

There’s a brilliant plan afoot to map the location of every publicly accessible defibrillator in the UK.

And a tragic story: how smallpox claimed it’s very last known victim here in the UK.

There’s new evidence that the HPV vaccine has been responsible for a huge reduction in the rate of cervical cancer. Even better is the news from last month that HPV vaccination is to be offered to teenage boys in England.

Apparently the idea that millions of sperm are in an Olympian race to reach the egg is yet another male fantasy about human reproduction. This Aeon piece has news of what actually seems to happen. [LONG READ]

I wasn’t sure whether to put this item under science or medicine, but here’s a piece of the chemistry of foxgloves, from which we still get the heart drug digoxin.

And here’s a strange phenomenon: aphantasia – the inability to picture things in one’s mind’s eye. It sounds as if there is a spectrum of aphantasia from very lucid to nothing; I suspect I’m somewhere in the lower half as the only pictures I have of events (even significant events like our wedding) are a few “snapshot” images, whereas other people I know can run everything in full HD video in their brains. It’s very curious.

Environment

Here’s another potentially disastrous new vanity project which George Monbiot has got his knife into: the Oxford-Cambridge Expressway. The article contains links to some of the official documentation, and it doesn’t look very pretty!

History, Archaeology & Anthropology

Researchers have made a very interesting discovery of an ancient hominid girl whose mother was a Neanderthal and father was a Denisovan. It suggests that hybridisation between hominid species, and especially our close relatives, was a lot more common than was suspected.

An interesting alternative theory about the development of major monuments like Stonehenge and Easter Island. [£££]

Yet more laboratory research has led investigators to unravel the recipe for Egyptian mummification.

It been a hot summer (although writing this over bank holiday weekend it doesn’t feel that way) and the lack of rain has been a great result for archaeologists as many hitherto unknown sites have become visible in crop marks. And the use of drones has made finding them so much easier than hitherto. [Mostly images]

London

One of our favourite London bloggers has undertaken an epic journey: across London on the 51½°N line of latitude. It is documented in a series of 12 posts of which this is the first – or you can have the whole 51½°N journey in a single post. [LONG READ]

Lifestyle & Personal Development

So what is it really like being an artist’s model? A handful off London’s life models give us a few insights.

Food & Drink

Gluten is getting a bad name. Are problems with gluten in the diet a fad? Or are they a real medical issue? Joanna Blythman in the Guardian looks at some of what seems to be happening. I think the jury is still out.

Despite many people’s dislike, we all know cabbage is good for you and now researchers are suggesting it may contain anti-cancer chemicals. Well if was good enough for Diogenes …

That’s all for this month; more at the end of September.