Feb 21, 2013 | Brain & Behavior, Technology, Uncategorized
In the future police will be able to predict the spread of riots, and how they impact on cities, thanks to a new computer model. Developed by researchers at UCL, the model highlights the importance of considering the layout of cities in order for police to suppress...
Jan 7, 2013 | Earth, Energy & Environment, Life & Non-humans, Physics & Mathematics, Technology, Uncategorized
Animal cells behave like fluid-filled sponges in response to being mechanically deformed according to new research published today in Nature Materials. Scientists from the London Centre for Nanotechnology (LCN) at UCL have shown that animal cells behave according to...
Jan 3, 2013 | Earth, Energy & Environment, Uncategorized
A coherent pathway which starts from no more than rocks, water and carbon dioxide and leads to the emergence of the strange bioenergetic properties of living cells has been traced for the first time in a major hypothesis paper in Cell this week. At the origin of life...
Jul 5, 2012 | Earth, Energy & Environment, Life & Non-humans, Space, Uncategorized
Stick a shovel in the ground and scoop. That’s about how deep scientists need to go in order to find evidence for ancient life on Mars, if there is any to be found, a new study suggests. That’s within reach of Curiosity, the Mars Science Laboratory rover...
Jun 22, 2012 | Earth, Energy & Environment, Uncategorized
After 10 years of archaeological investigations, researchers have concluded that Stonehenge was built as a monument to unify the peoples of Britain, after a long period of conflict and regional difference between eastern and western Britain. Its stones are thought to...
Jun 5, 2012 | Brain & Behavior, Health, Technology, Uncategorized
A nuzzle of the neck, a stroke of the wrist, a brush of the knee—these caresses often signal a loving touch, but can also feel highly aversive, depending on who is delivering the touch, and to whom. Interested in how the brain makes connections between touch and...
May 29, 2012 | Uncategorized
Invisibility, once the subject of magic or legend, is slowly becoming reality. Over the past five years mathematicians and other scientists have been working on devices that enable invisibility cloaks – perhaps not yet concealing Harry Potter, but at least shielding...
May 17, 2012 | Life & Non-humans, Uncategorized
Pooling funds and putting their heads together, more than 70 scientists from 9 institutions including the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, sequenced the entire genome of the butterfly genus Heliconius, a brightly colored favorite of collectors and scientists...
Apr 20, 2012 | Earth, Energy & Environment, Uncategorized
A scattergun approach to borehole drilling in Africa is likely to be unsuccessful. This is the message from a group of UK researchers who have, for the first time, quantified the amount, and potential yield, of groundwater across the whole of Africa. They estimate the...
