Â鶹´«Ã½

This week's magazine

28 June 2003

Issue 2401

Â鶹´«Ã½ issue 2401 cover
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Editor's picks

Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

The killer bean of Calabar

Features
Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Shifting Sands

Features
Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

To sleep, perchance to dream

Features
Written in the stars

Written in the stars

Features

Table of contents

News

Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Technology

Defacing digital downloads

The entertainment industry wants to control the distribution of digital music and movies by burying inaudible and invisible watermarks in them, as Â鶹´«Ã½ has often reported. But now Sony's research lab has come up with a different strategy (GB 2379295). Before being sent over the net, the music tracks will be deliberately "scarred" with …

News

Technology

Send bad breath into the void

News

Technology

Lilo absorbs bomb blasts

News

'Mutator protein' helps our bodies fight viruses

News

The high drama of a 3D South America

News

A breath of tellurium

News

Carbon balls from space

News

The shy brain

News

Submarine coating keeps muscles cool

News

Dammed mud

News

Rewrite the textbooks

News

We hear that…

News

How sensitivity to pain is really all in the mind

News

You'll never see it coming…

News

Farming pioneered in ancient New Guinea

News

A balm to soothe troubled minds

News

Entangled photons dance across the blue Danube

News

Earth

Giant lightning jets discovered

News

Safer peanuts are on the menu…but how will they taste?

News

Dispatches

News

Selfish gene revisited

News

Doctors don't fall for the hard sell

News

Counselling can add to the trauma

News

Space

News

Slipperiest particle gets away again

News

Your chance to win free flights

News

Going, going…but has it really gone?

News

Fungus in your tea, sir?

News

Do computer systems really help spot cancers?

News

Soundbites

News

'And here's your electricity forecast…'

News

If you can't kick the habit, filter it

News

Safety fears over unmanned planes

News

Opinion

Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Humans

Washington diary

THE US is not a country that likes to be beholden to anyone. Remember, we're the ones that refuse to dip our flag to the Olympic flame. So when NASA representatives go to Capitol Hill these days to testify about how the International Space Station is doing while the shuttle fleet stays grounded, the words …

Opinion

The word the core

Opinion

Past master

Opinion

How not to beat spam

Opinion

Move over Sigmund

Opinion

Blue lizards go out on the pull

Opinion

Features

Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

The killer bean of Calabar

THE first rumours of a macabre ritual practised in the south-eastern corner of Nigeria reached Britain around 1840. Missionaries reported that those suspected of witchcraft, murder and other terrible crimes were forced to swallow a bean that contained a deadly poison. If they died, which was more than likely, they were pronounced guilty. If they …

Features

Shifting Sands

Features

To sleep, perchance to dream

Features

Written in the stars

Features

More

Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Close examination

WHEN the torso of a young boy was found in the Thames in September 2001, the police were unable to identify the victim of this horrific killing. The key to the crime was the child's recent whereabouts. He was evidently of black African origin, but was he from the UK or abroad? Forensic scientists were …

Careers

Krakatoa by Simon Winchester

Books & Arts

Brand new Noah

Books & Arts

Jenny Diski

Books & Arts

Frank James

Books & Arts

The Bostonian

Books & Arts

Filling the void

Books & Arts

Sweet William

Books & Arts

The X in Sex: How the X chromosome controls our lives by David Bainbridge

Books & Arts

Regulars

Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Feedback

CERN, where the web was born ( www.cern.ch ), was unfortunately a little lax in acquiring the domain names one would expect it to have, such as cern.org , cern.int , and so on. It so happens that cern.org was registered to a company in Texas. The following conversation took place when Robert Cailliau of …

Regulars

Regulars

Letters

Regulars

The last word

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