How to clean up space debris – using game theory

How to clean up space debris – using game theory

A piece of debris just 10cm in diameter could cause an entire spacecraft to disintegrate and it is estimated that there are more than 29,000 objects larger than 10cm in Earth’s orbit. This poses a major risk to the spacecraft to-ing and fro-ing from the International Space Station, not to mention the hundreds of satellites that are now essential to daily lives.

Did ‘dark matter’ or a star called Nemesis kill the dinosaurs?

The dinosaur extinction 66m years ago was most likely caused by a comet or big asteroid hitting the Earth. But given that asteroids don’t actually hit our planet very often, could this really be the whole story? Many scientists are now asking whether some sort of cosmological event could have boosted the number of comets at the time, making such a collision more likely.

Water, water, everywhere – where to drink in the solar system

Water, water, everywhere – where to drink in the solar system

Science fiction movies about aliens threatening the Earth routinely ascribe them the motive of coming here to steal our resources, most often our water. This is ill thought-out, as water is actually extremely common. Any civilisation coming to our solar system in need of water (either to drink or to make rocket fuel) would be foolish to plunge all the way inwards to the Earth, from where they’d have to haul their booty back against the pull of the sun’s gravity.

We want to build tiny backpacks for bees – here’s why

We want to build tiny backpacks for bees – here’s why

An exciting attempt to help honey bees has come about thanks to an unlikely intellectual marriage. One of us is an ecologist who wants to keep an eye on individual bees over their entire two to three-mile range and monitor their behaviour. The other is an expert in micro-electronics. Together, we want to develop miniature bee “backpacks” that will power tracking devices by harvesting the energy honey bees generate while flying and visiting flowers.

Why wine raises tricky problems for tackling excess drinking

Why wine raises tricky problems for tackling excess drinking

Is it time to cut down? East Dunbartonshire, a local authority just north of Glasgow in Scotland, is launching a simple initiative to encourage people to drink less. One hundred licensed premises have agreed to ensure that they offer wine in small 125ml glasses alongside their medium (175ml) and large (250ml) measures, taking us back to the days when this quantity was the standard measure that was on sale.

Six things you can do with coffee – after you’ve finished drinking it

Six things you can do with coffee – after you’ve finished drinking it

Many of us depend on coffee to fuel our early morning meetings, mid-afternoon slumps or all-night study sessions. These days, the words “coffee” and “fuel” are half-jokingly synonymous. More than 9m tonnes of the bean are produced annually around the world and, once we brew it, an awful lot of waste is created. The vast majority ends up in landfill.