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This week's magazine

10 January 2015

Issue 3003

New Scientist issue 3003 cover
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Editor's picks

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.

Health

Fed up with fad diets? Just tweak your habits instead

Opinion
The time illusion: How your brain creates now

Humans

The time illusion: How your brain creates now

Features
Mapping the Milky Way: What's where in our galaxy

Space

Mapping the Milky Way: What's where in our galaxy

Features
Forget the fads: The easy way to control your eating

Health

Forget the fads: The easy way to control your eating

Features
Talking gibbonish: Deciphering the banter of the apes

Life

Talking gibbonish: Deciphering the banter of the apes

Features

Table of contents

Leaders

It's time to take drug trial participation seriously

Health

It's time to take drug trial participation seriously

A high drop-out rate in drug trials means lots of wasted time, effort and money. Empowering patients to choose the right trial for them could change that

Opinion

Health

Fed up with fad diets? Just tweak your habits instead

Opinion

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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.

Life

Deep bacteria may evolve even without passing genes on

Is evolution possible without reproduction? Bacteria living hundreds of metres below the seafloor carry more genetic changes than their peers nearer the surface – even though the deep microbes are unlikely to reproduce and undergo natural selection in its traditional sense. Investigations over the last 30 years have revealed that life exists several kilometres below …

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Life

Volcanic iron delayed explosion of life on Earth

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Earth

Climate change may halve giant panda's habitat by 2070

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Health

Booze binge has immediate effect on immune system

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Life

Bright black hole may have blasted early Earth life

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Health

Death rate drops when top heart surgeons are away

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Space

Jupiter's eroding core may already be just a husk

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Technology

Cooking Watson-style: Supercomputer turns to recipes

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Technology

One Per Cent

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Health

Celebrate your fat – it's fighting off infection

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Technology

AirAsia crash may have been caused by a stall

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Earth

How much oil must stay buried to avert 2 °C warming?

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Earth

Save the monarch butterfly from extinction

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Earth

60 Seconds

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Life

Brave new world-hunters spot exoplanets on the cheap

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Health

Radical therapies that could beat my brain tumour

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Forensic holodeck to transport jury to the crime scene

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Life

How conservation drives villagers to kill animals

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Life

Zoologger: The tasty crab that looks like an ugly frog

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Physics

Mathematician's anger over his unread 500-page proof

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Health

Cancer copies how healthy cells move to invade organs

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Life

New antibiotic could work for 30 years – if used right

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Health

Drug trials begin as Ebola plays hide-and-seek

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Opinion

War on drugs: The Kiwi comedown has lessons for all

Health

War on drugs: The Kiwi comedown has lessons for all

Hailed as a better way than prohibition, there is much to learn from New Zealand’s stalled attempt to legalise new highs

Opinion

Health

I'm tapping the housefly's genome to fight disease

Opinion

Space

NASA chief scientist: First an asteroid, then Mars

Opinion

Technology

Buttonmasher: Return of the video game arcade

Opinion

Aperture

Swooping frigatebird swipes fish from pelican's mouth

Life

Swooping frigatebird swipes fish from pelican's mouth

(Image: Michael Poliza/michaelpoliza.com) SWOOP – and it's gone. Hawaiians call the frigatebird "iwa", meaning thief. The metre-long bird evolved not only to hunt the seas, but to steal from those that do. Here one acrobatically grabs a piece of fish offal from the gaping jaws of a pelican. Wildlife photographer Michael Poliza snapped this photo …

Regulars

Features

The time illusion: How your brain creates now

Humans

The time illusion: How your brain creates now

Time is not out there – "now" is a strange trick of the mind. The good news is that with training you can live in the moment for longer

Features

Space

Mapping the Milky Way: What's where in our galaxy

Features

Health

Forget the fads: The easy way to control your eating

Features

Life

Talking gibbonish: Deciphering the banter of the apes

Features

Culturelab

Three searches for the wellsprings of creativity

Life

Three searches for the wellsprings of creativity

(Image: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory/SPL) Do you need to be extraordinary? Wealthy and white? Or can anyone be creative? Three books come at the question from different angles THE secrets of invention and creativity have long puzzled, eluded and fascinated in equal measure. Many scientists, inventors and artists seem to have understood them intuitively, yet …

CultureLab

Life

Whaleworld: Looking for cetacean culture

CultureLab

More

Hubble's new view of iconic 'Pillars of Creation'

Space

Hubble's new view of iconic 'Pillars of Creation'

(Image: NASA, ESA, Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)) Hubble is reprising one of its greatest hits. Twenty years after the release of its iconic image of the Eagle nebula's "Pillars of Creation", the space telescope – which turns 25 this year – has captured two new, even sharper views that peer through the pillars' shrouds of …

Regulars

Regulars

Feedback: Mindlessness for health

Feedback: Mindlessness for health

Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more Mindlessness for health READER Bernard Morcheles sends his tip for losing weight. He stresses that "this is not a diet" and we leave you to imagine the emphatic typography. His secret is simple: "Don't put anything in your mouth larger …

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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