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Leah Crane and Richard Webb allude to the possibility of life in the subsurface seas of the Jovian moon Europa ( 25 May, p 34 ). I enjoyed the article but ask: what about Jupiter itself? It has an internal energy source and plenty of the right ingredients for life. Perhaps its rich variety of …

Responding to Yvaine Ye's report on the use of 5G mobile technology in remote surgery, Sam Edge raises an important point about transmission delays in the land-based part of the network (Letters, 8 June ). This is of wider significance than for remote surgery alone. Any communications using the Internet Protocol (IP) to govern the …

Robert Plomin tells Clare Wilson that there are good intervention programmes for improving children's language, but they are intensive and expensive, while the cheap, easy ones don't work ( 25 May, p 39 ). It isn't always true that successful schemes are expensive. I am involved with effective, research-based programmes for parents in New Zealand …

You have to admire NASA's confidence in running a competition to figure out how to settle the galaxy ( 8 June, p 15 ). This presumes we will create a spaceship that can keep humans alive for millions of years in interstellar space. We have yet to master living sustainably off the resources of an …

In reference to your feature on space exploration, the cover of your 18 May issue asks "Are you ready for lift-off?" ( 18 May, p 36 ). I first read science fiction in 1945, and I was hooked. At the ripe old age of 7, I wasn't just ready for lift-off, I believed in it. …

• David Marsh at the University of Göttingen, Germany, and his collaborator Dave Ronan at AI Music produced the dark matter simulations used in Aura Satz's sound installation ( 15 June, p 31 ). • Rick Ostfeld works at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York ( 1 June, p 13 ). …

Julius Wroblewski offers a vision of robots going down mineshafts to extract minerals until the day they are swallowed by our sun, then grown into a red giant (Letters, 22 June ). I find this a little optimistic. Personally, I am looking forward to the day when robots do our recycling for us and there …

You report a survey that seems to show belief in the supernatural is still alive, even among people who don't believe in a god 8 June, p 14 . Only at the end do you note that the survey questions could be interpreted in a secular way. Take the statement "significant life events are meant …

Chris Packham is now on a mission to prevent the culling of "pest" birds to protect crops ( 4 May, p 13 ). This will probably result in lower yields, more expensive food or expansion of farms to make up for the loss.

Rereading Leah Crane's account of bees in the US suddenly stopping buzzing during the 2017 solar eclipse reminded me of the last UK total eclipse , on 11 August 1999 ( 20 October 2018, p 18 ). Researcher Candace Galen says it wasn't clear whether the bees flew back to their hives or stayed put. …