Â鶹´«Ã½

Features

Explore the most exciting new ideas and emerging concepts in science, health, technology and the environment with Â鶹´«Ã½â€™s exclusive in-depth articles, interviews and long reads.

Everlasting picnic for protozoa

Many protozoa form consortia with other microbes or with chloroplasts stolen from microscopic plants. Some of these partners are 'milked', some are digested, while others mop up metabolic waste

Features

Materials with a bent for light: Optical processes are beginning to take over from electronics in information technology. The search is now on for better materials whose subtle and faster response to intense beams of laser light will lead to more efficie

Features

A land where the sparrow became an enemy of the people

Features

A silent spring in China: The dawn chorus in Beijing comes from caged birds. Pollution covers cities with smog. China’s drive to protect the environment may have come too late

Features

The degreening of China: By the year 2000, China may have lost more than a quarter of its scarce forests. Grasslands, farmlands, fisheries and water are also suffering from the spread of rural industry

Features

Hawaii fired up for irradiation

Features

A taste for irradiated food: The public remains unconvinced by the mountains of evidence that the irradiation of food is safe. Ministers are unperturbed

Features

Will these lands ne’er be clean?: For 40 years, the American bomb makers have been pouring nuclear waste into the ground beneath their factories – It will take at least 100 billion dollars to clear up the mess

Features

Nuclear safety after Chernobyl: The nuclear industry is pooling its expertise to make power stations more reliable – Operators say they want the world to be a safer place. If they fail, they could lose a lot of money

Features

Physics

With antimatter to the stars

Imagine being able to make a round trip of the Solar System in a few weeks. Space vehicles propelled by the exotic products of antimatter annihilation may take us to Pluto and back

Features

The case of the stolen slippers: In a landmark case at the Old Bailey, Judge Clarkson highlighted the plight of plants by jailing one of the key players in an international racket involving rare orchids

Features

Learn to live with lightning: Lightning can damage your health – If you understand how thunderstorms work, however, you stand a better chance of surviving the threat from Thor and his thunderbolts

Features

The exclusive life of the slipper orchid

Features

Great pests have little pests upon their back to bite ’em

Features