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This week's magazine

21 June 2008

Issue 2661

New Scientist issue 2661 cover
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Editor's picks

Solving postal problem could win million-dollar prize

Physics

Solving postal problem could win million-dollar prize

Features
Does the brain feature built-in noise?

Life

Does the brain feature built-in noise?

Features
Forensics ventures beneath the waves

Life

Forensics ventures beneath the waves

Features
When crocodiles roamed the Arctic

Earth

When crocodiles roamed the Arctic

Features

Table of contents

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Photon counter lets quantum messages go the distance

Technology

Photon counter lets quantum messages go the distance

ONE of the great things about quantum cryptography is that it promises to tip you off if an eavesdropper has intercepted your communications. But there's a catch: messages transmitted this way can only be sent over short distances. This week, however, researchers at Toshiba's European laboratory in Cambridge, UK, revealed a device that could extend …

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Technology

How to store a picture in a cloud of gas

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Technology

Tequila is surprise raw material for diamond films

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Technology

No way to hide from 'spit' web calls

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Technology

Smart binoculars tell soldiers where the danger lies

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Technology

Gizmo

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Earth

New technologies promise biofuel 'plan B'

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Life

Empathetic chimps cuddle their stressed friends

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Earth

Global warming to spark increase in US wildfires

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Life

Corrugated wings give dragonflies a lift

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Health

Gene-altering lifestyle slows cancer

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Technology

Physicist's atom-sorting 'demon' created with lasers

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Health

Smoking gene protects against cocaine addiction

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Life

Pulling a face alters sensory perception

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Space

Did volcanoes trigger Mars megaflood?

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Health

Leukaemia virus may protect against stomach cancer

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Life

Church provides hope of faithful spouses

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Health

Growth-boosting genes may extend cancer patients' lives

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Earth

'Junk food' diet may threaten marine populations

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Life

Bad guys really do get the most girls

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Soundbites

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Space

Could we strip a black hole naked?

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Earth

Time to go ahead with Nevada nuclear dump?

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Health

Competition puts homeopathy on trial

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Space

Planet Pluto fans rebel against 'plutoid' designation

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Space

NASA under pressure to extend space shuttle's life

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Life

Gay brains are hard-wired at birth

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Health

Organic pigs breed more bad bugs

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Life

Life's building blocks found on meteorite

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Health

How biological 'alchemy' can change a cell's destiny

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60 Seconds

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'Zero tolerance' proposed for lab cheats

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Earth

Oil companies given right to 'harass' polar bears

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Opinion

Comment: Are economic bubbles so bad?

Comment: Are economic bubbles so bad?

HOUSES, credit and now perhaps oil: is anything immune from the depredations of the speculators? The lives of millions have been caught up in economic bubbles that seem beyond anyone's power to control. Boom followed by bust: can anything be done to stop this vicious cycle? Perhaps not – and perhaps we shouldn't try. Exactly …

Opinion

Editorial: Why homosexuality is not unnatural

Opinion

Editorial: The blame-China syndrome

Opinion

Life

Commentary: Stop creationists undermining school science

Opinion

Interview: The age of entanglement

Opinion

Features

Solving postal problem could win million-dollar prize

Physics

Solving postal problem could win million-dollar prize

EVER since a Babylonian scribe decided to teach his students arithmetic by setting them problems using the formula "I found a stone but did not weigh it..." mathematicians have celebrated the hidden depths of apparently everyday problems. They have found inspiration in slicing pies, tying knots and spinning coins. But even mathematicians have been surprised …

Features

Life

Does the brain feature built-in noise?

Features

Life

Forensics ventures beneath the waves

Features

Earth

When crocodiles roamed the Arctic

Features

More

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Review: Worlds Before Adam by Martin Rudwick

WE TAKE for granted that Earth has a deep history divided into eras such as the Mesozoic, with its monstrous dinosaurs and catastrophic meteoroid impacts. But when and how was this geohistorical narrative established? This book, the sequel to Bursting the Limits of Time (2005), is a masterly exploration of the 19th-century roots of this …

Books & Arts

Review: 1000 Languages by Peter K Austin

Books & Arts

Review: A Nuclear Family Vacation: Travels in the world of atomic weaponry by Nathan Hodge and Sharon Weinberger

Books & Arts

Review: The Carbon Age by Eric Roston

Books & Arts

Review: Solving Stonehenge: The new key to an ancient enigma by Anthony Johnson

Books & Arts

Review: Strange Fruit: Why both sides are wrong in the race debate by Kenan Malik

Books & Arts

Regulars

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Feedback

Key to the Global Seed Vault FEEDBACK thinks the Global Seed Vault in the Norwegian territory of Svalbard, which opened in February ( ¿ìè¶ÌÊÓƵ , 15 March, p 54) , is an idea to marvel at. Brush aside the carping view that there's no substitute for actually growing seeds and maintaining the environments they …

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Regulars

Letters

Regulars

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