Evolution in a bottle

Evolution on a grand scale – the sort of evolution that produced humans from our monkey-like ancestors - takes millions of years. But although these kind of timescales can't be studied in the lab, researchers at Michigan State University have been running an evolutionary experiment over 21 years tha...

Sneaky Sounds Enhance Eyesight

Some sounds, such as a speeding car or footsteps in a dark alley, actually improve our eyesight even before we are aware that we can hear them, according to research published in the Journal Current Biology. This gives us cause to rethink the idea that hearing and vision are handled separately in th...

Stresses and strains shape embryos

Embryonic stem cells have been hot news in science for a while – these are the first cells that form in a developing embryo, just a couple of days after fertilisation. They're amazing little cells because they have the potential to become any type of cell in the body.  And because of this prope...

The Taste of Fizz

The experience of drinking a fizzy drink is both a  physical and chemical experience, and now researchers have discovered just what happens when the bubbles hit your tongue. Reporting in this week’s Science, Jayaram Chandrashekar and colleagues from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the U...

Giving Insects the Slip

A new non-stick coating could give insects the slip, and prevent infestations...

This Week in Science History - Mr Tornado

This week in Science History saw the birth of Tetsuya Fujita, also known as Ted and ‘Mr Tornado’. Fujita dedicated his life to studying tornadoes and related weather phenomena and he lends his name to the Fujita scale, which describes the intensity of a tornado by how much damage it causes. Sarah C...