New Scientist USA 08 3

WHY IT TURNS OUT NO
AMOUNT OF ALCOHOL
IS GOOD FOR YOU
WE ARE ABOUT TO FIND
THE EARLIEST STARS
IN THE UNIVERSE
NEW ALZHEIMER’S
DRUGS: SHOULD WE
BELIEVE THE HYPE?
WEEKLY August 3 - 9, 2024
WHAT MADE
US HUMAN?
How the latest archaeological
discoveries are redeﬁning the
origins of humanity
PLUS THE GREAT

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DOPING AT THE OLYMPICS /

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This week’s issue
On the 19 Why it turns out

no amount of alcohol
36 Features
cover is good for you “The first
32 What made us human? 36 We are about to find the stars could
How the latest archaeological earliest stars in the universe
discoveries are redefining the have been
origins of humanity 14 New Alzheimer’s drugs:
should we believe the hype? about 300
times the
mass of
our sun”
20 The great Neanderthal cook-off
Vol 263 No 3502 12 Doping at the Olympics
Cover image: Michał Bednarski 19 Komodo dragons’ iron teeth
News Features
10 Mysterious fossils 32 Becoming human
Odd organisms may be News What is a human and when
behind earliest signs of life did such a being emerge?
13 Blast from space 36 First stars

We may finally know what Finding primordial stars would
caused the biggest cosmic help to uncover the origins of
explosion ever seen supermassive black holes
20 Gas guzzlers 40 Mind merge

Trees are even better for the Will brain implants that
climate than we thought meld minds with machines
enhance human abilities?
Views
The back pages
23 Comment
Sea ice is receding, and the 44 Stargazing at home
effect on marine life could be A special year for the Perseids
catastrophic, says Pen Hadow
45 Puzzles
24 The columnist Try our crossword, quick quiz
Graham Lawton on the and logic puzzle
appetite for green politics
46 Almost the last word
26 Aperture Why do some flowers close up
A paradise blighted by plastic at night but others stay open?
28 Culture 48 Feedback
The story of RNA makes for Food for worms
a timely and fascinating read and worms as food
JSC/NASA
31 Letters 48 Twisteddoodles
How to store excess renewable for New Scientist
energy in our homes 21 Passing time Putting in a shift in space speeds up muscle ageing Picturing the lighter side of life
3 August 2024 | New Scientist | 3

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The leader
The straight dope

Performance-enhancing drugs aren’t the only source of sport inequality
ANOTHER Olympics, another battle GDP. In swimming, for example, bodily issue, as people from wealthier
to catch the dopers (see page 12). But features, such as hypermobile knees and countries can more easily afford the
why do we get so hung up on the use of ankles paired with big feet and hands, can latest body-boosting substances, so
performance-enhancing drugs anyway? help people like British multi-medallist doping exaggerates the advantages they
There are many reasons to combat Adam Peaty go faster. A nation is more already have. This also means plans for
them. One is that sport should be, likely to find someone like him if they an Enhanced Games in 2025 – in which all
well, sporting. People tune in to see have a larger population to choose from. athletes could openly use drugs to push
the best of the best clash, and we like their bodies to their limits – wouldn’t
to feel there is a level playing field. “Odds are stacked in other ways solve anything. Aside from potential
When it comes to stopping athletes too: Olympic success correlates health risks, it would just cement the
gaining an unfair advantage, it makes with population size and GDP” wealth-related imbalance.
sense to target doping. There are also We like to think that sporting prowess
health reasons for cracking down, with Meanwhile, richer nations can afford to is all down to talent and determination,
concerns over the long-term abuse of pay athletes to concentrate on their sport, but when viewed objectively the odds are
substances such as anabolic steroids. as well as supply the best diet, equipment already stacked. We have become fixated
But sport is rife with inequalities that and coaches. The result is that the big, on doping because it is measurable and
we don’t always think about. A nation’s high-income countries tend to get more the fight against it feels scientific, yet
Olympic success correlates with two big medals. That isn’t cheating, but it is unfair. even if we eliminate it, we won’t get
factors: the size of its population and its This inequity feeds back into the doping rid of inequality in sport. ❚
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News
On the podium Growing problem Ancient economics Heaviest element Going deep down
AI grabs silver medal Biodegradable plastic Bronze Age had a A way to make the Moon bases may
at human maths may actually be worse “modern” financial hypothetical element need to be buried to
competition p11 for plants p13 system p16 unbinilium p17 avoid radiation p21
Environment
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News
Palaeontology
Oldest rocks reveal bizarre cells

Fossils from up to 3.8 billion years ago look weirdly different from modern cells, and evidence
now suggests they are of a life form that couldn’t control its structure, reports Michael Le Page
THE oldest rocks on Earth contain microfossils, first unearthed in Biochemistry in Germany. “These
mysterious fossils of cells that 1987, have been found in multiple fossils look too complex. They’re
appear unlike anything alive locations around the world, but also too large,” he says. “What we
today, leaving biologists puzzled aren’t what biologists expected. find is always baffling.”
as to how they evolved. Now, The first living cells are assumed As a result, there is intense
experiments have shown that to have been even simpler than debate about what created these
the fossils could be of primitive the simple cells alive today, such as fossils and whether they really
cells that lacked the ability to bacteria. Modern bacteria are are the remains of living cells.
fully control their shape, making tiny – just 1 or 2 micrometres Now, Kanaparthi has stumbled
them a precursor to the modern wide – with no internal structures. across a possible answer while
cells we see today. But the fossilised cells found in studying bacteria growing around
Sedimentary rocks that formed ancient rocks are larger, at about freshwater springs at the bottom
up to 3.8 billion years ago – not 60 to 70 micrometres across, and of the very salty Dead Sea. Some of
long after Earth itself – appear to seem to have internal structures, these bacteria had bizarre shapes,
contain fossilised cells that could says Dheeraj Kanaparthi at and he eventually realised that
be traces of very early life. These the Max Planck Institute of they were a type of cell without a
cell wall, named L-forms after the
Lister Institute in London where
Mars rock shows hints of ancient life they were discovered in the 1930s.
Normally, the rigid cell wall of
Signs of ancient life in rocks fossilized record of microbes bacteria determines their shape,
aren’t just limited to Earth, as living in the subsurface.” That like putting a water balloon in
a discovery on Mars by NASA’s is because the type of chemical a box, but stressful conditions
Perseverance rover shows. The reaction that creates such spots can strip this wall away. In most
rock it has found, nicknamed on Earth rocks can also provide situations, such “naked” bacteria
Cheyava Falls, hints that the useful energy for microbes. swell and burst due to osmosis, as Bacteria without cell walls can
planet supported living microbes In the area near the rock, they absorb too much water. But create structures (main image)
billions of years ago – but for Perseverance also detected in salty conditions, these L-forms like those in ancient rocks
now, there is no way to be sure other organic compounds often can survive and sometimes even from South Africa (inset)
if life really existed there. considered building blocks of life. grow and replicate.
The rock measures about These signatures can be created Kanaparthi and his colleagues into separate cells, resembling
1 metre by 0.6 metres and without the involvement of any have now shown that when microfossils found in the 3-billion-
is mostly reddish, with thin living organisms, though. L-forms are put in high salinities year-old Cleaverville formation,
veins of white calcium sulphate The rover has added a sample like those that might have also in Australia.
that probably formed when of Cheyava Falls to its stash, existed in the coastal regions “We thought these cells would
water flowed through fissures, which is intended to be brought where the ancient fossils formed, just grow into large bubbles
depositing minerals in the cracks. back to Earth by a future mission they acquire structures that and then split apart into 1000
Water is one of the ingredients for further analysis. Leah Crane closely resemble some of the pieces,” says Kanaparthi. “But
necessary for life as we know it. enigmatic microfossils. actually, they reproduce in a
Between the streaks of white Depending on which salts are very defined manner.”
are strange, light-coloured present in what levels, the cells In the absence of a cell wall, the
“leopard spot” splotches (see grow very large and lots of new shape of these bacteria and how
image, right), each just millimetres cells form within them, creating they reproduce are determined
across and ringed with dark the illusion of internal structures by the conditions to which the
material containing iron and
Leopard
like those in complex cells. The L-forms are exposed rather than
phosphate. “These spots are a spot new cells are released when the their genes, the team found.
big surprise,” said David Flannery parent cell bursts apart. These “They’re at the mercy of the
at the Queensland University L-forms resemble microfossils environment,” says Kanaparthi.
NASA/JPL-CALTECH/MSSS
of Technology in Australia in a found in the 3.4-billion-year-old Their reproduction is also

NASA press release. “On Earth, rocks of the Strelley Pool rather inefficient, as lots of the
these types of features in rocks formation in Western Australia. content of the parent cell tends
are often associated with the In other conditions, the L-forms to leak out during the process.
grow into long strings that split However, this leakiness could

Technology
AI grabs silver
medal at human
maths competition
Alex Wilkins
AN ARTIFICIAL intelligence from to answer problems in a similar

Google DeepMind has achieved way to humans. “I thought that
a silver medal score at this year’s these magic keys would
International Mathematical probably be a little bit beyond
Olympiad (IMO), the first time what it could do,” said Gowers.
an AI has made it to the podium. AlphaProof works similarly to
The IMO is considered the Google DeepMind’s previous AIs
world’s most prestigious that can beat the best humans
competition for young at chess and Go. All of these
mathematicians. Correctly AIs rely on a trial-and-error
answering its test questions approach called reinforcement
requires mathematical ability
that AI systems typically lack.
In January, Google DeepMind 3 days
DHEERAJ KANAPARTHI ET AL. (2024); TICE ET AL., 2009
demonstrated AlphaGeometry, were needed for the AI to find

an AI system that could answer solutions that take humans hours
some IMO geometry questions
as well as humans. However, it learning, where the system finds
couldn’t answer questions from its own way to solve a problem
other mathematical disciplines, over many attempts. However,
such as number theory, algebra this method requires a large set
and combinatorics, which is of problems written in language
necessary to win an IMO medal. that the AI can understand and
Google DeepMind has now verify, whereas most IMO-like
released a new AI, called problems are written in English.
explain mysterious carbon evolved around 2.5 billion years AlphaProof, which can solve a To get around this, Thomas
deposits found outside some ago (bioRxiv, doi.org/gsx4cf). wider range of problems, and a Hubert at DeepMind and his
microfossils, says Kanaparthi. The resemblance between new version of AlphaGeometry. colleagues used Google’s Gemini
“We were able to reproduce not the L-forms and the proposed When the team tested the AI, a language model like the
just the morphologies of the cells, microfossils is striking, says systems together on this year’s one that powers ChatGPT, to
but also all the associated organic Jeffery Errington at the University IMO questions, they answered translate these problems into a
carbon structures.” of Sydney, Australia, who, in 2013, four out of six questions programming language called
The researchers also looked at first suggested that L-forms might correctly, giving them a score of Lean so the AI could learn how
how L-forms might be preserved reflect what primitive cells were 28 out of a possible 42 points. to solve them. It also produces
and fossilised. They showed, for like. “Most scientists would be This was enough to win a silver its answers in Lean, so they can
instance, that the remnants of cautious because [it] is a very medal and just one point under be easily checked.
L-forms can generate microscopic long time for a fossil to be this year’s gold medal threshold. However, it took AlphaProof
structures that resemble those preserved,” he says. “Nevertheless, At the contest in Bath, UK, at up to three days to find some
the results certainly provide the end of July, 58 entrants won solutions instead of the
“These cells could represent support for the idea that primitive a gold medal and 123 got silver. 4.5 hours per three questions
how early life forms L-form-like cells inhabited the “The rate at which AI is that competitors are allowed.
proliferated and explain planet soon after the Earth improving is breathtaking,” Hubert says he hopes
the early microfossils” cooled sufficiently to support says Gregor Dolinar, the IMO AlphaProof will help improve
carbon-based chemistry.” president. “Missing the gold the accuracy of Google’s large
found in the 3.4-billion-year-old “It is challenging to determine medal at IMO 2024 by just language models, like Gemini.
Buck Reef rocks in South Africa if the conditions used truly reflect one point… is truly impressive.” Trading firm XTX Markets
(see images, above). those of early Earth,” says Dennis At a press conference, has offered a $5 million prize –
Based on these findings, the Claessen at Leiden University in Timothy Gowers at the called the AI Mathematical
team proposes that primitive cells the Netherlands. “Nonetheless, University of Cambridge, who Olympiad – for an AI capable
also lacked a cell wall and weren’t I agree that these cells could helped mark AlphaProof’s of achieving a gold medal at
in full control of their shape and represent how early life forms answers, said the AI’s the IMO, but AlphaProof isn’t
reproduction. They may only have proliferated and explain the early performance was surprising and eligible because it isn’t
gained this ability when cell walls microfossils discovered.” ❚ it appeared to find “magic keys” publicly available. ❚

News
Briefing
Is Olympic drug testing good enough?

Measures are in place to catch athletes at the games who use performance-
enhancing drugs. Christa Lesté-Lasserre examines whether they are up to the job
WITH the 2024 Paris Olympics tasked with staying at the normal range. If they do, scientific carbon monoxide, which isn’t
well under way, the International forefront of new substances experts investigate to distinguish banned in sport, can increase the
Olympic Committee is aiming to and methods,” they say. The between potential illness, doping amount of oxygen an athlete’s
ensure the games are “clean” by agency collaborates with the or an inconsequential fluke. body can absorb and use during
rooting out athletes who use pharmaceutical industry to The passport has been useful in exercise, known as the VO2 max.
performance-enhancing drugs. stay on top of the latest trends. detecting “blood doping”, in which WADA’s Prohibited List Expert
To do this, it relies on the World “Innovative research leads to athletes inject themselves with Advisory Group has discussed
Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the identification of new doping additional red blood cells or drugs this issue, but hasn’t reached
which develops and coordinates trends, new substances, new to enhance red blood cells to carry a consensus about whether the
anti-doping rules and policies doping methods and new more oxygen to the muscles. toxic gas has a performance-
across all sports and countries. detection approaches,” enhancing effect, says the agency’s
Here’s how the agency is says the spokesperson. “Hair samples aren’t used, spokesperson. “No sufficiently
attempting to catch cheats. Furthermore, specialised but they could distinguish robust data currently supports
facilities store all samples for between real doping and that proposition. It is, however,
What doping agents are 10 years, opening the door to contamination via kissing” generally acknowledged that it
authorities looking for? further analyses when testing can be dangerous to use, so it
Every year, WADA publishes technology has advanced. What about gene doping? would not be recommended.”
updated lists of prohibited The athlete biological passport, CRISPR-edited genes could be
substances. The most an ongoing electronic record for injected to modify gene activity What samples are used in testing?
commonly spotted ones each competitor, can also flag in a performance-enhancing WADA mainly requires urine
are anabolic steroids, such as doping indirectly, by picking up way. To combat this, WADA has samples, although blood samples
trenbolone and oxymetholone, changes in samples over time. created the Gene and Cell Doping can be provided in certain cases.
both of which increase muscle This contains biological markers Expert Advisory Group to work Pascal Kintz at the Institute
mass and strength. These made up for each athlete throughout their with researchers to develop of Legal Medicine in Strasbourg,
42 per cent of positive results from sporting career. Regular blood detection methods for gene France, thinks hair and nails
competitive sporting events in and urine tests provide measures manipulation, it says. should also be part of official anti-
2022, according to a WADA report. of naturally occurring steroids, doping programmes, because they
Diuretics made up 16 per cent growth hormones, haemoglobin Is there a concern athletes will use can provide a longer-term picture.
of samples that failed doping and red blood cells, for example. carbon monoxide inhalation, as Hair, for example, grows at
tests. These increase urine output, Software analyses of each seen in the Tour de France? about 1 centimetre per month.
leading to a lighter body weight, new sample determine if such Recent research suggests that Tests can therefore detect
and can hasten the elimination measures fall out of the athlete’s regularly inhaling low doses of substances in each centimetre
of other doping agents. of a strand to determine roughly
Other substances found when, and how often, a doping
AYTAC UNAL/ANADOLU VIA GETTY IMAGES
include stimulants, hormone agent was consumed.

and metabolic modulators, For example, eating beef
cannabinoids, peptide contaminated with growth
hormones, glucocorticoids, hormones can sometimes trigger
beta-2 antagonists, narcotics a positive urine test, says Kintz,
and beta blockers. Overall, fewer but a hair analysis could tell
than 1 per cent of samples are whether or not it was true
positive, reports WADA. doping. Hair samples could
also distinguish between doping
Is there a lag between a new drug and accidental contamination
emerging and a way to test for it? from kissing and other intimate
As doping agents are evolving, so contact with partners who use
is the art of detection, says a WADA such substances.
spokesperson. “WADA’s science At this time, WADA hasn’t
and medicine department is included hair or nail analyses in
its policy and won’t accept them to
The 2024 Olympic overturn a positive urine or blood
Games are being held result from the games, says the
in Paris, France agency’s spokesperson. ❚

Astrophysics
We may finally know what caused the

biggest cosmic explosion ever seen
Alex Wilkins
THE most powerful explosion distinct lines. But after careful for peaks, and they found that this this might be, the researchers
ever glimpsed contains a analyses, they found these were fit the data better. “That part of worked under the assumption
mysterious signal thought statistical errors and concluded the GRB spectrum has been the that there were no complete
impossible to exist. That signal that GRB spectra couldn’t be spiky. same for years, and nobody was atoms in the jet, due to how
gives us our first detailed look Now, Maria Ravasio at Radboud looking into it,” says Ravasio. energetic it must have been. This
inside a gamma ray burst and University in the Netherlands and The peak they saw points to a left one plausible explanation: the
suggests they involve matter her colleagues have discovered specific physical process behind annihilation of electrons with
and antimatter annihilating. that GRB221009A, discovered in GRBs that is missing from our best their antimatter counterparts,
Gamma ray bursts (GRBs) 2022 and dubbed the brightest models of them. To focus on what positrons. Such annihilation would
are the most powerful blasts of explosion since the big bang, in produce gamma rays at a peak
radiation in the universe and are fact contains an energetic peak Huge stars collapsing of 511 kiloelectronvolts (Science,
generated in cosmic explosions at about 10 megaelectronvolts. or colliding can launch doi.org/m9zg). “This is already
and collisions. But exactly how “The first time I saw the out bursts of gamma rays telling you the composition
the radiation is produced, and line, I thought I did something of the jet,” says Ravasio.
what the jets of energy contain, wrong,” says Ravasio. But after The higher 10 MeV peak that
has been hard to pin down. detailed statistical analysis and the researchers observed was
Much of this mystery comes ruling out problems with the because the energy spectrum
from the spectrum of the light observation instrument, she and was shifted by the fast-moving
NASA’S GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER/A. SIMONNET, SSU
we see. Unlike the light that we her colleagues concluded that jet that produced the radiation,
observe from other objects in the spectral spike was genuine. similar to how the siren of an
the universe, which contains “When I realised it wasn’t an error, ambulance moving towards
distinctive spikes that can tell us I got goosebumps,” says Ravasio. you sounds higher pitched.
about the matter that produced Because almost all GRBs show Finding a GRB with a distinctive
this burst of energy, the spectrum a similar distribution of energies, line is “one of the biggest surprises
of light from gamma ray bursts astronomers analyse new GRB in our field in more than a decade”,
seems smooth and featureless. detections using data analysis says Eric Burns at Louisiana State
In the 1990s, researchers methods that work best with this University. “It’s rather astounding.
became excited at the prospect pattern. But Ravasio and her team We totally missed this because
that some GRBs appeared to show instead used a method that allows we didn’t even look for it.” ❚
Environment
Biodegradable have turned to biodegradable to some of the samples and levels in the soil may therefore
plastics, known as bioplastics. bio-microplastics to others, then affect plant growth.
plastic may actually Now, Jie Wang at Jiangnan attempted to grow wheatgrass. The The team also added extra
be worse for plants University in China and her plant was also grown in unaltered water to some samples to simulate
colleagues have collected samples soil to provide a comparison. a flood. Bioplastics had an even
PLASTICS that biodegrade into of soil containing no visible plastic Just 10 days later, the bio- greater negative effect in these
microplastics seem to reduce soil from a forested area around the microplastics had significantly samples than in the other ones,
quality and affect plant growth university. After removing any reduced key minerals such as possibly because the excess water
more than conventional ones, debris, stones and vegetation, nitrogen in the soil, lowered its encouraged pathogenic bacteria
at least in the short term. the researchers dried the soil microbial diversity and stunted in the soil that affect plant growth.
Global plastic production and measured its pH, organic plant growth. The polyethylene “This study represents an
reached 400 million tonnes matter and nutrient levels. microplastics had much less of important step in understanding
in 2022, most of which isn’t They added conventional an effect (Science of The Total the impacts of biodegradable
recyclable. Large pieces of plastic microplastics, made from the Environment, doi.org/gtt6g6). plastics,” says Samuel Cusworth
that end up in the environment common plastic polyethylene, It is unclear why bio-microplastics at ETH Zürich in Switzerland.
can be weathered into smaller caused this outcome. However, “Biodegradable plastics are not
and smaller pieces, until these
are sometimes no longer visible.
To reduce pollution by these
10 days
in soil polluted by bio-microplastics
nitrogen is essential for producing
chlorophyll, the green pigment
that allows plants to absorb energy
necessarily a safe and sustainable
alternative and their use must
be carefully considered.” ❚
microplastics, some industries stunted plant growth from the sun. Reduced nitrogen Bárbara Pinho

News Insight
Health
The truth about Alzheimer’s drugs

A new class of drugs has been hailed as a breakthrough, but are the treatments
the game changers they are being billed as, asks Grace Wade
IN EARLY July, the US Food and analysis of longer-term outcomes
Drug Administration (FDA) from the second trial indicated
approved a treatment called that aducanumab did, in fact, slow
donanemab for people with cognitive decline. In 2020, Biogen
early-stage Alzheimer’s disease. submitted the drug for approval.
It is the second drug shown to But many experts were
slow the condition’s progression, concerned, especially given the
and the third FDA-authorised drug’s risks. About 40 per cent of
medication that clears the amyloid participants taking aducanumab
proteins that accumulate in the experienced serious side effects,
brains of people with Alzheimer’s. known as amyloid-related
The FDA’s approval of three new imaging abnormalities (ARIA),
drugs – donanemab, lecanemab in which fluid leaks from blood
and aducanumab – in just over vessels in the brain. Most cases
three years has led some to declare of ARIA are asymptomatic and
a leap forward in Alzheimer’s resolve on their own, but some
disease treatment. Japan, South can lead to headache, seizures or
Korea, China, Hong Kong and Israel even death. Four deaths have been
have also approved lecanemab, reported related to aducanumab,
SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/ALAMY

while the United Arab Emirates but Biogen said in a statement that
has approved aducanumab. none of the 11 deaths during phase
Donanemab and lecanemab are III trials was attributable to the
the first drugs to curb the disease’s drug. Biogen didn’t respond to
advancement: previous therapies a request for comment on
only tried to counteract symptoms, aducanumab’s side effects.
such as memory loss. But the new In 2020, an advisory panel to
treatments have been controversial Illustration of amyloid reversed cognitive deficits the FDA recommended against
and concerns linger about their plaques (orange) in rodents. Two decades on, the drug’s approval. Yet in 2021,
safety. On 26 July, an advisory among brain cells however, all the drug candidates the FDA granted this, pointing
body to the European Union had failed in phase III clinical to its ability to significantly clear
recommended against approving trials (see “Clinical trial phases”, amyloid plaques. In a statement,
lecanemab, citing its side effects. right). This raised serious doubts the FDA said the drug “is
All of these drugs use antibodies about them as Alzheimer’s reasonably likely to predict a
engineered to target and remove treatments and, consequently, clinical benefit to patients”, but
amyloid proteins from the brain. about the amyloid hypothesis. trials showed mixed results. The
The plaques these proteins form One of those drugs was controversial decision prompted
are believed to be critical in driving aducanumab, made by US firm a government investigation and
the progression of Alzheimer’s, Biogen. In 2015, the company sowed further doubts about the
an idea known as the amyloid launched two phase III clinical amyloid hypothesis and the drugs
hypothesis. However, this hasn’t
been confirmed as the cause of
the condition, which has raised
30%
Approximate reduction in rate of
trials with almost 3300 people
who had early-stage Alzheimer’s
disease and amyloid plaques
resting on it. Biogen announced
earlier this year it would
discontinue aducanumab.
concerns that we are moving ahead cognitive decline with donanemab in their brains. Early results
with drugs that target amyloids suggested the drug had little to
A new hope
before we know for sure they are
the culprit behind the disease. $32,000
Cost of one year of infusions
no effect: although one trial
showed that cognition declines at
a roughly 20 per cent slower rate in
“It was very messy in the end
and, unfortunately, it left a lot of
of donanemab those on a high dose of the drug uncertainty and lack of enthusiasm
Drug trial difficulties than in those given a placebo, the [for developing and prescribing
The race to develop amyloid-
clearing drugs began when a
landmark study in 1999 showed
2
Number of treatments shown to
second trial found no difference.
Biogen halted trials in 2019,
but seven months later, it changed
aducanumab],” says James Noble
at Columbia University, New York.
Two other amyloid-clearing
that removing amyloid plaques slow progression of Alzheimer’s course. The company said a new drugs have since alleviated some

More Insight online
Your guide to a rapidly changing world
newscientist.com/insight
of the doubts left in aducanumab’s head-to-head, so it is impossible according to a spokesperson for

wake. The first, lecanemab, is to say if one is more effective than Lilly. Nearly 3 per cent of those Clinical trial phases
made by Japanese pharmaceutical the other. However, Noble says given lecanemab developed severe
company Eisai. In a 2022 clinical donanemab may be slightly more brain bleeds. Three participants Pharmaceutical companies
trial of nearly 1800 people with potent based on clinical trial taking lecanemab also died during must show that a drug is safe
early-stage Alzheimer’s disease results. Yet this could be due to the trial, though Eisai says these and effective in order to seek
and amyloid plaques, those given differences in the trials, not the can’t be attributed to the drug. its authorisation. They do so
lecanemab had a 27 per cent drugs, says Steven Hersch at Eisai. An Eisai spokesperson says that by testing the drug in several
slower rate of cognitive decline For instance, a larger proportion four deaths during an extended phases of clinical trials.
of participants in the donanemab phase of the clinical trial were
“These medications provide trial were at a later stage of possibly related to the drug. Phase I trials involve between
the best chance of slowing the disease than those in the 20 and 100 people with the
down something we don’t lecanemab trial. This means condition being treated. Their
have good treatments for” they probably experienced Risk vs reward purpose is to test the safety
a more rapid rate of decline, “Certainly, there are risks of a medication and to
after 18 months compared making donanemab’s effects associated with these drugs,” identify the proper dose.
with those given a placebo. more pronounced, says Hersch. says Noble. Evidence suggests
This translates to a roughly There may also be differences in that people with a genetic variant Phase II trials usually
0.5-point difference on an side effects between medications. known as APOE4, which is one of include several hundred
18-point cognitive scale. In clinical trials, nearly 37 per cent the strongest genetic risk factors people, making them large
While that may seem small, of people taking donanemab for Alzheimer’s, are at a higher risk enough to begin assessing
surveys show it has meaningful developed ARIA compared with of severe brain bleeds. Noble says a drug’s efficacy. They also
effects. A 2023 study found that 15 per cent of those in the control clinicians may want to consider provide additional data
declines in quality of life slowed group. In the lecanemab trial, the genetic testing before starting on any side effects.
by about 50 per cent in people same was true for less than 22 per people on these medications.
taking lecanemab compared cent of participants taking the Ultimately, both lecanemab and Phase III trials are usually
with those given a placebo. drug compared with almost donanemab lead to only modest the final step before a drug
This was the first time a drug 10 per cent of the control group. changes in cognition and share a is submitted for regulatory
had been shown to slow the Most instances of ARIA didn’t similar risk-benefit profile. “Some review. They can include
progression of Alzheimer’s. cause serious complications. But people are uncomfortable with several thousand people
The only other drug with about 6 per cent of those in the the risks considering the relatively and they demonstrate
similar effects is donanemab donanemab group had severe modest benefit,” says Noble. whether a treatment works.
from US pharmaceutical company brain bleeds, which contributed “Others are the first to line up and Their size also makes it
Lilly. In a 2023 study of more than to three participants’ deaths, say, if it can do anything for me, I possible to identify rare
1700 people with early-stage want to start it now.” But accessing side effects or long-term
Alzheimer’s disease, donanemab Regular brain scans are the drugs isn’t simple or cheap. risks that may have gone
slowed cognitive decline by required when taking They require time-consuming undetected in smaller trials.
almost 30 per cent. Combined, Alzheimer’s drugs infusions and regular brain scans,
these results have provided the though Eisai has developed an
strongest evidence yet for the injectable form of lecanemab. amyloid proteins, lecanemab may
amyloid hypothesis. But they The drugs differ a bit in how be beneficial in treating people
also make clear there are other they work. Donanemab only clears at an earlier stage of the disease,
BRIAN B. BETTENCOURT/TORONTO STAR VIA GETTY IMAGES
processes driving the condition. plaques. Lecanemab does this too, before plaques start forming.
“The promise that we’ve but also targets amyloid proteins Studies looking into this are
been trying to deliver on as a that haven’t accumulated yet. So currently under way and should
field finally came to be,” says people can stop using donanemab conclude in 2027, says Hersch.
Noble. “These medications once scans show they no longer “These aren’t perfect drugs.
provide the best chance of have plaques, but those on They aren’t a cure,” says Noble.
slowing down something lecanemab are recommended to “But they are game changers
that we don’t otherwise continue using it. A year’s supply in that they’ve given us hope
have good treatments for.” of lecanemab costs $26,500 while in making an impact on the
No trial has compared donanemab costs $32,000. disease in ways that we’d
donanemab and lecanemab Because it targets unbound never really had before.” ❚

News
Archaeology
Bronze Age had a modern economy

An analysis of 20,000 metal objects from ancient Europe suggests human economic
behaviour may not have changed much over the past 3500 years, reports Becky Ferreira
PEOPLE in Bronze Age Europe stands in contrast to an influential
earned and spent money in much view put forth in the 1940s by the
the same way as we do today, anthropologist Karl Polanyi, who
indicating that the origins of cast modern economies based
the “market economy” are far on monetary profit as a new
more ancient than expected. and distinct phenomenon from
That is the controversial ancient economies centred
conclusion of new research that around barter, gift exchange
challenges the view that elites and social standing.
were the dominant force in Bronze
Age economies, and proposes that
Hard currency
J. LIPTÁK/LANDESAMT FÜR ARCHÄOLOGIE SACHSEN
human economic behaviour may

not have changed much over the “The argument, I think, will
past 3500 years – and perhaps prompt discussion among
even longer. archaeologists and economic
“We often tend to romanticise anthropologists, who have
European prehistory, but the been labouring under false
Bronze Age was not a fantasy assumptions about the antiquity
realm where townsfolk and of market economies for decades,”
peasants were merely the says Richard Blanton at Purdue
background for some great University in Indiana. “For me,
lord providing for their needs,” the paper throws a whole new
says Nicola Ialongo at Aarhus Above: A hoard of Bronze “The discovery of a widespread light on the function of the bronze
University in Denmark. “It was a Age metal fragments measurement and weight system hoards and their potential for
very familiar world where people from Weissig, Germany. makes it possible to model things the use of bronze pieces as
had families, friends, a social Below: Copper and that have been known about for units of exchange.”
network, marketplaces and a job, tin were smelted centuries in a way that they have However, Erica Schoenberger
and ultimately had to figure out to make bronze never been modelled before,” at Johns Hopkins University in
how to make ends meet.” says Ialongo. Maryland is sceptical of the team’s
Europeans of the Bronze Age, a To that end, the team found conclusions. “It’s risky to assume
period that spans 3300 to 800 BC, that the weight values of the huge that ordinary people in pre-
weren’t meticulous bookkeepers “It was a very familiar world sample follow the same statistical modern times used money in
like people of some other ancient where people had families, distribution as the daily expenses ordinary economic ways,” says
societies, such as Mesopotamia. friends, a social network, of a modern Western household: Schoenberger. “Medieval English
But Ialongo and Giancarlo Lago marketplaces and a job” small everyday expenses, peasants, for example, only began
at the University of Bologna, Italy, represented by lighter fragments, selling their produce for money
say important revelations about made up the vast majority of when their lords began demanding
their daily lives, and the roots of consumption patterns, while larger money in place of in-kind rents and
our own modern economic expenses, represented by heavier taxes. The peasants handed most –
behaviour, can be found in the fragments, were comparatively if not all – of that money directly to
troves of metal fragments, known rare (Nature Human Behaviour, the lord. They sold in order to get
as hoards, that they left behind. DOI: 10.1038/s41562-024-01926-4). money, but they did not use it to
Lago and Ialongo have analysed This pattern is analogous to what buy things they needed. We’re still
more than 20,000 metal objects you might find in a modern wallet, a long way from modern economic
from hoards buried in Italy, with lots of smaller banknotes and behaviour [in the Middle Ages].”
Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia and very few high-value ones. Lago and Ialongo hope their
Germany during the Bronze Age. Lago and Ialongo interpret the research will inspire similar
SCIENCE HISTORY IMAGES/ALAMY
The pieces appear in many forms, findings as evidence that Bronze work on artefacts from different
but around 1500 BC, they start to Age economic systems were regions and cultures. They suggest
become standardised by weight, a regulated by supply and demand that market economies naturally
shift that many historians believe market forces, in which everyone arose across cultures, and aren’t
distinguishes them as a form of participates proportionally to how modern or special inventions
pre-coinage money. much they earn. This hypothesis of Western societies. ❚

Chemistry Technology
We may soon be
able to make the
Social media firms change
heaviest element their policies after bad press
Karmela Padavic-Callaghan Chris Stokel-Walker
THE third-heaviest element in the NEGATIVE news stories about 11,000 news stories about in 2014, a campaign dubbed
universe has been made in a way social media platforms appear US politics that were #FreetheNipple pressured
that offers a route to synthesising to be highly effective at annotated by humans. Facebook into allowing users
the elusive element 120, which pressuring companies into Facebook was the subject to post photos of breastfeeding.
would be the heaviest element changing their policies. of the most negative reporting, However, those rules, and how
in the periodic table. Christian Katzenbach at the with around 37 per cent of news they are enforced, remain a
To create livermorium, or element University of Bremen, Germany, stories from the 26 major topic of debate: Meta’s oversight
116, Jacklyn Gates at Lawrence and his colleagues analysed publications being seen as board told the platform to
Berkeley National Laboratory policy changes across Facebook, negative. Around 26 per cent clarify its policies in January
in California and her colleagues Twitter (now X) and YouTube of coverage about YouTube and 2023 following confusion
smashed a beam of charged between 2005 and 2021, as well Twitter was deemed negative. over what did and didn’t
titanium atoms into a piece of as how media coverage from breach policy.
plutonium. It is the first time
titanium has been used like this
and physicists think a titanium
26 major English-language
publications affected their
policies. (New Scientist wasn’t
37%
of news stories about Facebook
Another example the
researchers highlight came
during the 2020 US presidential
beam will be crucial for creating among the publications picked were negative (2005-21) election campaign, when
the hypothetical element 120, also by the researchers.) Twitter announced it would
known as unbinilium, which would “There are really significantly The proportion of negative ban political advertisements
have 120 protons in its nucleus. more changes in the policies by coverage about all platforms from the platform. Facebook
The researchers started with the platforms in the weeks and significantly increased after was then criticised in the media
rare isotopes of titanium, which months after an increase of 2018, when allegations of for not fact-checking or banning
they vaporised at 1650°C (around negative reporting,” says the misuse of Facebook user political ads itself, and near
3000°F). They used microwaves Katzenbach. For every negative data by the consulting firm the end of the year it too
to turn the vapour into a charged story about a platform, the Cambridge Analytica came to started to do this.
beam, which they fed into a particle likelihood of that platform light (Political Communication, “I think it’s very much true
accelerator. When the beam reached changing its user policies doi.org/m9p8). that negative media coverage
roughly 10 per cent of the speed increased by 6 per cent. “We’ve seen that platforms affects the way platforms
of light and struck the plutonium To measure negative do respond to public criticism,” govern and behave,” says
target, the resulting debris hit a reporting, the researchers says Katzenbach. For example, Carolina Are at Northumbria
detector that revealed signatures looked at the content of news University, UK. Are believes that
of two atoms of livermorium. stories using an AI model that Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg deciding policies through media
Each atom rapidly decayed classifies sentiment. The AI had facing a hearing about coverage alone isn’t enough to
into other elements, because the been trained on a dataset of Cambridge Analytica in 2018 protect users. “A strategy that
stability of atomic nuclei decreases relies on PR is just a Band-Aid
as the mass of an atom increases. approach for the issues that
Yet the measurement was so we’re facing right now,” she says.
precise that there is only about a Are says a more proactive
one in a trillion chance the finding approach is needed to regulate
was a statistical fluke, says Gates. social media platforms,
She presented the findings on including legislation that checks
23 July at the Nuclear Structure how policies affect users: “If all
2024 conference at Argonne we get to do through the use of
National Laboratory in Illinois. PR is to change policies, then
The heaviest human-made we’re taking for granted that
element so far – element 118, platforms are always going to
ERIN SCOTT/ZUMA WIRE/ALAMY LIVE NEWS
also known as oganesson – has run the system as they are –

two more protons than livermorium while we need to hold them far
and was first synthesised in 2002. more accountable than that.”
Gates and her colleagues plan to Katzenbach echoes this view.
try creating element 120 in 2025, “Definitely you need regulation,
once they have replaced the and strong regulation,” he says.
plutonium target with the “Media coverage cannot
heavier element californium. ❚ substitute that.” ❚

News
Technology Infectious disease
AI can predict when dangerous How diseases like

smallpox survived
tipping points will occur long ocean voyages
Karmela Padavic-Callaghan Rachel Nuwer
COMPLEX systems like forest THE risk of pathogens lingering

ecosystems, stock markets or on a historical ship long enough
the power grid can suddenly to disembark with passengers
start behaving very differently, has now been calculated.
and artificial intelligence can Dangerous microbes hitched
now predict when this will rides on lengthy sea voyages like
happen. Identifying such that of Christopher Columbus, but it
tipping points may help avert wasn’t known how long they would
disastrous collapses in biology survive these early ocean crossings,
or human infrastructure. which took a month or more. “These
“History is full of harmful ships aren’t just carrying a pathogen
KAZUHIRO NOGI/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
critical transitions, such as like it’s an extra piece of cargo – it

financial market crashes, needs to be spreading through the
disease outbreaks and population,” says Elizabeth
blackouts,” says Gang Yan Blackmore at Yale University.
at Tongji University in China. Blackmore and James Lloyd-
To make predicting such Smith at the University of
transitions more precise, he California, Los Angeles, tailored
and his colleagues combined a mathematical model of disease
two different types of artificial pinpoint the precise conditions Financial markets spread to ship environments. It
intelligence called neural that lead to system collapse, can crash once they incorporated factors like journey
networks. They optimised asserting: ‘Watch out, if the pass a tipping point time, ship size, transmission
the first one to understand system reaches this [specific] intensity, susceptibility of those on
the functioning of and condition, it will collapse from (Physical Review X, board and the biology of the bug in
connections across systems immediately’ ,” he says. doi.org/m9mk). question. They ran predictions for
structured like large networks He and his colleagues Karen Abbott at Case Western how long outbreaks of measles,
with many nodes. For example, tested the AI on a range of Reserve University in Ohio says influenza and smallpox would
in an ecosystem, each node mathematical models and the new approach is “powerful”, have been likely to last in various
would be a geographical simulated data used to represent even though machine learning scenarios, and then compared
location where researchers power grids, crop harvests and doesn’t offer the same insight their model’s output with data
would collect data about how animal populations. In one test, into why a tipping point occurs about historically significant
many animals or trees live they used real-world data on as a full-fledged mathematical voyages between 1492 and 1918.
there. Nodes could also be vegetation and rainfall in a model might. But the advantage Their findings indicate that
different parts of the power forest ecosystem in Central of AI methods is that they can be smallpox and measles could
grid or areas where disease applied to many systems instead probably have persisted on certain
outbreaks are occurring.
The team designed the
second neural network to
10%
of the data was enough for the
of having to be formulated for a
specific one each time, and they
can be optimised to deal with
early voyages, which lasted an
average of five to 10 weeks.
The risk of one of these diseases
analyse how systems change AI to predict ecosystem change sparse datasets, she says. “We maintaining itself on board
over time. So the first network really, really need both. Machine depended on how many infected
processed data about the nodes Africa that suddenly became learning is telling us how to get individuals came aboard, how many
and the interactions between a savannah. The researchers more clues out of data, and people were present and how
them, then fed this into the trained the AI on simulations theory is telling us what to do densely packed passengers were.
second network, which and the scarce data available with those clues,” says Abbott. Unlike smallpox and measles,
detected recurring patterns for one part of the region, and Now, Yan and his colleagues influenza is a fast-burning bug, and
in the data and predicted then had it predict the value want to apply their method to was unlikely to make a full oceanic
future tipping points. for annual precipitation at more systems and work out crossing – at least early on. When
Yan says past studies focused the tipping point for another. why tipping points happen. steam travel was introduced in the
on identifying particular The AI correctly predicted “We aim to delve deeper into 19th century, however, it sped up
features of data that increased what had actually happened the algorithm’s black-box journeys and probably accelerated
or decreased as a tipping point to the ecosystem, even when it nature to explicitly uncover transmission of all three pathogens
approached, but his team’s was only given data for about the specific features used to the places where these ships
AI goes further. “It aims to 10 per cent of the nodes to learn for predictions,” he says. ❚ docked (PNAS, doi.org/m9mm). ❚

Health
No amount of alcohol is good for you

Claims that moderate drinking could help people live longer are often based on flawed science
Michael Le Page
DRINKING even small amounts health and drinking for the rest who no longer drink with those they’ve dealt with it appropriately.”
of alcohol reduces your life of their lives. Such studies can’t be that still do. People who give up His team found that just
expectancy, rigorous research done, so researchers instead have drinking, especially later in life, six of the 107 studies adequately
shows. A review of 107 studies to ask people about drinking often do so because they have handled these sources of bias, and
concludes that only those with habits and follow them over health problems, says Stockwell, none of these found any reduction
serious flaws suggest that much shorter periods of time. so moderate drinkers appear in risk with moderate drinking.
moderate drinking is beneficial. By the 2000s, numerous studies healthier in comparison. “The [high-quality] studies
“People need to be sceptical of this kind had suggested that suggest a linear relationship,”
of the claims that the industry the relationship between drinking “The more you drink, says Stockwell. “The more you
has fuelled over the years,” says and the risk of dying at a particular the higher your risk of drink, the higher your risk of
Tim Stockwell at the University age made a J-shaped curve. That is, heart disease, which is heart disease, which is obviously
of Victoria in Canada. if people drank a little then their obviously the main issue” the main issue even though our
While the risks of moderate risk of dying of any cause went studies look at all-cause mortality.”
drinking are small, people should down a bit compared with non- While some studies claim to The review shows clearly that
be told that it isn’t beneficial, says drinkers, but drinking more led compare current drinkers with poorer quality studies are more
Stockwell. “It’s maybe not as risky to a sharp increase in the risk. “never drinkers”, their definitions likely to suggest a beneficial effect,
as lots of other things you do, but Stockwell says he was convinced of the latter group often actually says Duane Mellor at the British
it’s important that consumers are the science was settled at the include occasional drinkers, says Dietetic Association. But he says it
aware,” he says. “I think it’s also time. But since then, he and Stockwell (Journal of Studies on doesn’t consider the social aspects
important that the producers are others have shown that there Alcohol and Drugs, doi.org/m9mp). of moderate drinking. “It is
made to inform consumers of the are flaws in such studies. “The great majority of healthier to socialise without the
risks through warning labels.” The main problem is that studies do not, in our opinion, need for alcohol, but the benefits
The best way to assess the effects they often don’t compare people deal with this potential source of spending time with others is
of alcohol would be to randomly who have never drunk alcohol of bias,” he says. “To be clear, still likely to be greater than the
assign people to drink it or not in with those who have. Many people have attempted to deal risk from the consumption of one
childhood and then monitor their studies instead compare people with this. We don’t think that to two units of alcohol,” he says. ❚
Zoology
Komodo dragons Komodo dragons have an

orange edge to their teeth (inset)
have teeth capped
with a layer of iron Compared with human teeth,
Komodo dragon enamel is very thin,
CHARLOTTE ELLIS/ZSL; DR AARON LEBLANC, KCL
ONE of the planet’s fiercest says LeBlanc. Along the serrations,

reptiles, the Komodo dragon the enamel is only 20 micrometres
(Varanus komodoensis), reinforces thick – the enamel in human teeth
its teeth with an iron cap. is about 100 times thicker.
These lizards are endemic to The iron layer in Komodo
a number of Indonesian islands. dragon teeth is coated on top
Their prey include large animals like of this extremely thin layer of
deer, pigs and water buffalo, and enamel. The team thinks it either
they can reach lengths of 3 metres gives the enamel extra strength
and weights of 150 kilograms. or acts as a barrier against acidic
When he noticed orange was I convinced that I was looking “We quickly realised that digestive juices (Nature Ecology
serrations on the Komodos’ teeth, at a novel adaptation,” he says. iron was concentrated along & Evolution, doi.org/m9mn).
Aaron LeBlanc at King’s College LeBlanc and his colleagues the cutting edges and tooth tips, Iron is readily available in the
London says he initially dismissed used high-powered X-rays at a but not on other parts of the tooth,” environment and the researchers
it as staining. “Only after visiting synchrotron facility to probe the says LeBlanc. “This also precisely think the cells that make the enamel
museum collections and looking Komodos’ tooth surfaces and matches the orange staining switch behaviour for the final coat
at all of the teeth along the skulls determine the different elements we can see on the teeth to produce this iron-rich finish. ❚
of many Komodo dragon specimens that are found along the tooth. under the microscope.” James Woodford

News
Archaeology
The great Neanderthal cook-off

Putting ancient human food-preparation techniques to the test reveals their culinary secrets
James Woodford
ARCHAEOLOGISTS have cooked These were of a similar size birds could be easily pulled “Our experimental study
and prepared five wild birds using and species to remains found at apart without stone tools, but demonstrated that raw birds
only fire, their hands and stone the Figuiera Brava and Oliveira the raw ones required a lot of processed with flakes show
tools to learn more about the archaeological sites in Portugal, effort using the flakes. distinctive cut marks, especially
culinary abilities of Neanderthals. which are associated with “Palaeolithic knives were around tendons and joints, while
The experiment shows it took Neanderthals, dating to about indeed very sharp, requiring roasted birds show burn marks
considerable manual skill for 90,000 years ago. careful handling,” says Nabais. and increased fragility, leading
our ancient relatives to butcher “The precision and effort needed to bone breakage,” she says. “This
animals using flint blades “Raw birds processed with to use these tools without causing study highlights the cognitive
without injuring themselves. flakes show distinctive cut self-injury emphasised the abilities of Neanderthals,
Neanderthals inhabited Europe marks, especially around practical challenges Neanderthals demonstrating their capacity
and Asia until about 40,000 years tendons and joints” might have faced in their daily to catch and process small,
ago. Hearths have been found at food-processing activities.” fast-moving prey like birds.”
many Neanderthal sites, and we They were two carrion crows The researchers then analysed Sam Lin at the University
also have evidence they hunted (Corvus corone), a common wood the bones for distinctive signs of Wollongong in Australia says
large animals such as elephants pigeon (Columba palumbus) and caused by the stone tools and the work demonstrates that
and cave lions. two Eurasian collared doves the fire. They also identified Neanderthals wouldn’t have
To gain insight into how these (Streptopelia decaocto). wear marks on the flint tools needed tools to prepare cooked
prehistoric humans lived, Mariana The researchers plucked all (Frontiers in Environmental birds for eating, which could
Nabais at the Catalan Institute of five birds by hand. Next, they Archaeology, doi.org/m9mb). mean that some bones won’t
Human Paleoecology and Social used flint flakes, which had been Comparing the burn marks and necessarily have tool scars.
Evolution in Tarragona, Spain, and prepared to mimic Neanderthal tool scars on the bones with food “They learned you can just rip
her colleagues selected five birds tools, to butcher a crow and a remains from the Portuguese a cooked wild bird apart the
that had died in a Portuguese dove. They baked the remaining archaeological sites revealed that same way we eat a barbecue
wildlife rehabilitation centre. birds on a bed of coals. The cooked the marks aligned, says Nabais. chicken,” says Lin. ❚
Environment
Trees are even Researchers measure

gas exchange in Manu
better for the climate National Park in Peru
than we thought
methane from the atmosphere
MICROBES living in the bark of trees at a large scale, across temperate,
are absorbing methane from the air, boreal and tropical environments.
adding to the climate benefits that Trees growing in tropical
we knew trees give us. locations are about 12 per cent
Methane is a greenhouse gas that better for the climate, once this
is responsible for about a quarter of methane-absorbing effect is
VINCENT GAUCI
human-caused global warming. factored in, while trees in temperate

Some trees growing in water- locations are about 7 per cent
logged soils can emit methane that better. In total, trees could be
was generated underground. But absorbing between 24 million and
we also know that methane-eating Birmingham, UK, and his colleagues exchange flips and trees start 50 million tonnes of methane from
microbes known as methanotrophs took measurements from trees absorbing atmospheric methane. the atmosphere each year, similar to
live on tree bark. Methanotrophs growing in well-drained soils The CO₂ the methanotrophs the volume absorbed by the world’s
consume methane as their source around the world, determining the produce is a much less potent soils (Nature, doi.org/m9mc).
of carbon and chemical energy, methane exchange between the greenhouse gas than methane, says “Existing forests are that
producing carbon dioxide and atmosphere and the tree bark. Gauci. “There’s tremendous benefit much more important than we
organic compounds. They found that, while most trees in that conversion to CO₂,” he says. thought, and we should preserve
To investigate this interplay, emit small amounts of methane at The findings demonstrate that them,” says Gauci. ❚
Vincent Gauci at the University of soil level, further up the trunk, the methanotrophs are removing Madeleine Cuff

Space Health
Moon bases may need to be buried Spending time in

space speeds up
underground to avoid radiation muscle ageing
James Woodford Karmela Padavic-Callaghan
The surface of the RADIATION isn’t the only danger if

moon is inhospitable you venture beyond Earth. A week
despite the great view in the microgravity of space ages
muscle cells so much that their
“Neutrons have a large genetic activity looks similar to
biological effect as they can Earth-bound cells that have been
efficiently interact with the ageing for years. This finding could
human body to cause radiation explain why spending time in space
effects in the internal organs,” impairs muscle function.
says Guo. “They can contribute We know astronauts risk losing
more than 90 per cent of bone density and muscle mass due
the total effective radiation to low gravity in space. Now, Ngan
SHUTTERSTOCK/SHIVASHANKARA
when shielding is around Huang at Stanford University in

50 centimetres,” says Guo. California and her colleagues have
The study found that bases at analysed the effects of microgravity
a depth of 3 metres would safely on muscle cell genetics.
accommodate the same crew The researchers grew human
for more than 20 years without muscle cells in a scaffold of collagen
them exceeding lifetime and fibres, which directed the cells to
IF ASTRONAUTS on the moon SEPs, the radiation effect should annual radiation limits set assume the same structure as they
are to avoid harmful radiation, be small,” says Guo. But if a solar by space agencies (Nature would in the body. They then put the
long-term lunar bases may need eruption happens, the picture Astronomy, doi.org/m9gb). cells on a chip that could withstand
to be shielded by 2 to 3 metres changes. At the end of the Apollo NASA and the Russian flight and sent it to the International
of regolith – the moon’s surface programme, for example, space agency impose different Space Station (ISS) for a week.
layer of rock and dust. Apollo 16 landed astronauts lifetime radiation dose limits – When the cells returned to
Jingnan Guo and Mikhail on the moon for a few days in 600 millisieverts and 1000 Earth, they exhibited higher
Dobynde at the University April 1972. This was followed mSv, respectively – on their activity in genes associated with
of Science and Technology of by Apollo 17 in December that astronauts. Both agencies also fat formation, which is linked
China in Hefei have analysed year. In between, there was impose annual exposure limits. to muscle degradation. Gene
how the thickness of a lunar a large radiation storm. Natural background radiation expression related to the
base’s shielding would affect “There was such a big exposure on Earth amounts functioning of the muscle cells’
radiation doses for people SEP event that happened to about 2.4 mSv a year. mitochondria, which produce
living on the moon. Their study in between… that it could If the lunar stay for a energy, was also compromised.
includes using the lunar soil single crew is no more than “It seems that microgravity is
as protection as well as using “A large radiation storm a few months, 2 metres of total an environment that is accelerating
additional artificial shielding. could have caused death shielding should be enough, ageing,” says Huang.
There are two main kinds to astronauts who were says Guo. Crew members These changes are more similar
of radiation of concern: on the moon unprotected” could also be rotated back to what happens in sarcopenia, or
background levels of galactic to Earth to avoid exceeding age-related muscle atrophy, than
cosmic rays, which pose a long- have caused possible death lifetime and annual radiation in muscle loss that occurs due to
term cancer risk, and solar to astronauts on the moon health limits, she says. diminished activity, says Huang.
energetic particles (SEPs) if they had been there The most practical way When astronauts on the ISS added
associated with solar eruptions. unprotected,” says Guo. to reduce radiation exposure drugs that can potentially stimulate
The SEPs can lead to The study also found that would be to use natural muscle growth to some of the cells,
acute symptoms of radiation too little regolith shielding can shielding for bases by building the genetic activity of those cells
exposure, such as skin injury be worse than none, because them in existing caves or lava was less affected by microgravity
and damage to areas involved lunar soils scatter radiation, tubes or constructing habitats (Stem Cell Reports, doi.org/m9nk).
in generating cells for the blood, generating secondary particles beneath the surface, says Guo. This means astronauts and space
which include bone marrow. that can include neutrons. Better predictions of solar tourists could potentially mitigate
In severe cases, exposure This secondary radiation peaks storms will also be important, the effects of microgravity by taking
to SEPs can lead to death. at depths of about half a metre she says, to keep astronauts safe certain drugs. The findings could
“For short stays on the moon but decreases rapidly lower when they go outside the base also be useful for studying ageing
without encountering intensive beneath the surface. for activities on the surface. ❚ more broadly, says Huang. ❚

Views
The columnist Aperture Culture Culture columnist Letters
Graham Lawton How a paradise island The story of RNA Emily H. Wilson How to store excess
on the appetite for a is being blighted by is a timely and takes a trip to The renewable energy
greener politics p24 plastic pollution p26 fascinating read p28 Other Valley p30 in our homes p31
Comment
On thin ice
The frozen Arctic sea I trekked across to reach the North Pole is melting, creating
a potential shipping super-highway. It’s very worrying, says Pen Hadow
I
T WAS 21 years ago that disastrous for marine biodiversity
I trekked and swam solo, and its associated ecosystem.
without resupply, across the They also have a big impact on the
icy Arctic Ocean from Canada to circumpolar Indigenous peoples,
the North Geographic Pole. The many of whom depend on local
feat hasn’t yet been repeated and animals for their food and culture.
probably won’t be due to a drop in Explosive surveying techniques,
sea-ice cover caused by warming oil tanker spills, commercial-scale
resulting from greenhouse gas fishing and ships hitting marine
emissions far to the south. mammals are oft-cited issues.
It had taken three attempts But worryingly under-reported is
over 15 years before success in the effect on sea life of the noise
2003 in reaching the pole, around pollution created by propellers.
770 kilometres from Canada in Marine mammals, for example,
the central Arctic Ocean’s “high have evolved acoustic capabilities
seas”. By then, the nature of the to navigate, hunt, socialise and
75-day challenge had morphed to find mates. The impact of ship
require an amphibious element – noise, along with chemical and
swimming between drifting ice biological stressors, on some
floes was the only way to get there, of the Arctic’s most charismatic
with 30 hours in the water in total. species, including narwhals, orcas
I have spent over 10,000 hours and seals, needs to be addressed.
on the Arctic Ocean since 1989, In response, I have set up the
ELAINE KNOX
and have been witness to how the 90 North Foundation. Along with
region’s floating “ice-reef” habitat Indigenous peoples, scientists,
is dwindling faster than projected. conservation organisations and
My anecdotal experience is white “cap”– a critically important an unreliable water supply for the policy-makers, it will advocate
borne out by satellite data. NASA reflective heat shield – will trigger drought-hit Panama Canal. For for measures to safeguard the
reports a decline in the minimum far-reaching and uncharted some, Arctic routes might look Arctic Ocean’s biodiversity. We
extent of Arctic sea ice – which consequences for the northern attractive as the ice recedes. can’t rebuild sea-ice cover in
waxes and wanes seasonally – of hemisphere and beyond. China intends to operate the decades or even centuries
12.2 per cent per decade over the As the natural floating barrier its “Polar Silk Road” (aka the ahead, but we can boost the
past 40 years. The rise in average of sea ice recedes, new direct Transpolar Sea Route), a project to resilience of the biodiversity
ocean surface temperature in impacts, stressors and risks are optimise the efficiency of shipping there by minimising the risks
the region is four times that looming for wildlife from vessel- between east Asia and Europe, from ships. Establishing an
seen more broadly, and, in some based activities – commercial which involves transiting the Arctic internationally recognised
Arctic sea areas, it is seven times. fishing, cargo shipping, tourist Ocean via the North Pole itself North Pole Marine Reserve to
The Arctic Ocean could cruises and deep-sea mining. when it becomes ice-free for much achieve this is our shared goal. ❚
be 85 per cent ice-free in the Take shipping. Bottlenecks in of the year. That could be around
summer, including at the North key routes are creating increasing 6000 km shorter than some non-
Pole itself, from 2035. It could be costs, delays and accessibility Arctic routes, making it quicker, Pen Hadow is an Arctic
totally ice-free for nine months challenges. This follows recent more fuel efficient and cheaper. explorer and ocean
each year within another 45 years. geopolitical pressures in the Red But all vessel-based activities conservationist
The loss of our planet’s northern Sea affecting the Suez Canal and can be damaging and potentially

Views Columnist
No planet B
Time for change The Conservative party’s war on the environment

cost them dearly in the UK election. Voters around the world support
green policies, and politicians should take note, says Graham Lawton
I
N MY final column of 2023, Two opinion polls published say they are willing to contribute
I wrote that I hoped this year shortly after the election show 1 per cent of their personal income
would see anti-environmental this was probably a catastrophic to fund such action. “The vast
policies being punished at the miscalculation. One, carried out majority of people around the
ballot box. In July, my wish came for the climate think tank E3G, world are willing to act against
true, at least in the UK. I was in found that the Conservatives climate change and expect their
Mexico City when the results made no political gain from national government to act,”
of the general election started ditching the “green crap”. If they the researchers conclude.
to come through, and I watched thought it would woo voters on But interestingly, and
Graham Lawton is a staff with glee as 251 Conservative MPs their right flank tempted by the pertinently to the Conservatives’
writer at New Scientist and were skittled, ending 14 years Reform party, they were wrong. misjudgement, people also
author of Mustn’t Grumble: of increasingly shambolic rule. If anything, it damaged them as it hugely underestimate their
The surprising science of There were many reasons for made it easier for environmentally fellow citizens’ willingness to act.
everyday ailments. You can the Conservative party’s defeat, but conscious Conservative voters – of When respondents were asked
follow him @grahamlawton their regressive, cynical approach which there are many – to defect to how many other people they think
to the environment was definitely parties with stronger policies. are willing to contribute, they said
one of them. And that has given me The other poll, conducted for around 43 per cent. Why this
optimism that similar policies will Greenpeace, found that in the could be isn’t known. It may have
backfire elsewhere, maybe even something to do with the media
in the forthcoming US election. “Trump and Vance disproportionately giving oxygen
The Conservatives came have indicated they to minority anti-environmental
to power in 2010 (as part of a views, suggest the researchers.
will take a wrecking
coalition) promising to be the Whatever the cause, the
Graham’s week “greenest government ever”.
ball to Biden’s Conservatives appear to have
What I’m reading That didn’t last. Not long after, environmental fallen into the trap of assuming
I’ve been bingeing an the then-prime minister David successes” green policies are unpopular when
amazing The Rest is Cameron reportedly told his aides the opposite is true. They should
History podcast series to “get rid of all the green crap”. 251 parliamentary constituencies have consulted the scientific
about the fall of the From there on in it was downhill. the Conservatives lost, almost half literature. But that isn’t how
Aztecs. No time to read! By the time Rishi Sunak of voters surveyed said that the right-wing populists operate.
entered 10 Downing Street in party was wrong to backtrack on I fervently hope US Republicans
What I’m watching 2022 – the fifth prime minister the environment; less than a third have made the same error. Donald
Ripley on Netflix. in six years – the government said they were right. The sewage Trump and his running mate
had declared open war on the crisis turned out to be a major J. D. Vance are, if anything, even
What I’m working on environment, banning onshore vote-loser for the Conservatives in more reckless on the environment
Prepping for our wind farms, rowing back on net their former rock-solid heartlands. than UK Conservatives and have
wonderful science of zero, promising to “max out” on Polls, schmolls. But the indicated they will take a wrecking
rewilding weekender in North Sea oil and gas, jailing green scientific literature has been ball to President Biden’s green
Devon (16 to 18 August). protesters, giving full-throated pointing in the same direction successes. They presumably think
I’m hosting. support to motorists and allowing for some time. Voters do support this burnishes their popularity,
our rivers to fill with sewage. green policies and are willing but they may be in for a rude
This was all done with an (in theory) to pay for them. shock. Similar research in the US
eye on the votes of ordinary In February, a team led by shows that while 80 per cent of
working people, emboldened Armin Falk at the University of the public supports climate action,
by an unexpected victory in a Bonn in Germany published the they wrongly believe that levels of
by-election in outer London when results of a representative survey public support are around half of
opposition to the expansion of of nearly 130,000 people across that. Falk’s survey found that 70
the city’s Ultra-Low Emission Zone 125 countries that collectively per cent of Americans believe that
(ULEZ) became an election issue. account for 92 per cent of the their government should do more.
This led to a widespread belief that global population. They found I don’t know where I’ll be when
This column appears pro-environmental policies are a that 89 per cent of people say they the US election results start rolling
monthly. Up next week: vote loser; the opposition Labour want stronger political action on in. Hopefully not the US, because
Annalee Newitz party also fell into this trap. climate change, and 69 per cent I think there could be trouble. ❚

To advertise here please email Ryan.Buczman@mailmetromedia.co.uk or call 020 3615 1151 3 August 2024 | New Scientist | 25
Views Aperture

Island woes
Photographer Neal Haddaway
POKING out of the Tasman Sea

between Australia and New
Zealand is a crooked, crescent-
shaped volcanic remnant called
Lord Howe Island. The rocky
isle, which is 10 kilometres
long and 2 kilometres across
at its widest, is blanketed in a
lush, pristine forest and boasts
a sandy, coral-rich lagoon.
“It’s paradise,” says Neal
Haddaway, a photographer
who went there to document
the work of ocean research group
Adrift. “The sounds of birds are
everywhere, there’s beautiful
corals, golden sands.” Among
the bird calls is that of the flesh-
footed shearwater (Ardenna
carneipes), roughly 22,000
of which breed on the island.
But life there is far from idyllic,
and newly hatched shearwater
chicks, such as the one pictured
at top right, are under threat from
mounting levels of marine plastic
pollution. Adult shearwaters
often confuse plastic debris in
the sea for food and end up giving
it to their young. In fact, Adrift
researchers have found that chicks
are ingesting increasing amounts
of plastic every year. At bottom
left, one of the team is sorting
out the chunks of plastic found in
the stomach of just a single bird.
As a result, these chicks are
increasingly underdeveloped,
and dozens die from starvation or
plastic-related illnesses annually.
“The island may be magical,”
says Haddaway. “But it’s filled
with frustration and grief.”
To protect this population of
flesh-footed shearwaters, which
locals affectionately dub mutton
birds (see bottom right) after their
purported taste, there needs to
be tougher legislation against
plastic pollution, he says. ❚
Chen Ly

Views Culture
The irresistible rise of RNA

The amazing journey of RNA from background role to star in its own right
is told by a wonderful guide who was a big part of the story, says Tom Leslie
Book
The Catalyst
Thomas R. Cech
W. W. Norton
FOR 50 years, RNA was DNA’s

undervalued sibling, but now
it has jumped into the spotlight.
This multifaceted molecule –
which resembles DNA but can
morph into a variety of shapes
other than a double helix –
EZRA ACAYAN/GETTY IMAGES

brought us the most effective
covid-19 vaccines and is key
to CRISPR gene editing, one of
the most powerful technologies
in experimental biology.
Yet few of us have an in-depth
understanding of the molecule In the late 1970s, when RNA first to proteins. This shocker caused The most effective
and why it has suddenly become caught his attention, research was a major rethink of the status quo. covid-19 vaccines had
so important for research and largely focused on the more stable This sort of lab work involving RNA at their heart
medicine. Time for a biography sibling. Cech even refers to himself test tubes and incubation flasks
of the rising star, and few could as “a DNA guy”. Although RNA had is hardly glamorous (let alone cut DNA or developing aptamers,
tell the tale more cogently than an important role, it was still seen straightforward to explain), but RNAs that can bind to proteins
Thomas Cech, who shared the as subordinate, useful only because Cech finds telling phrases and apt to show how certain illnesses
1989 Nobel prize in chemistry it shared a language with DNA and metaphors. He also knows how to are progressing. Cech offers
for discovering that RNA – known could copy its genetic information explain what look like inscrutable meticulous explanations and
mainly as a genetic messenger into smaller “transcripts” that decisions by researchers so that by keeps us hooked with anecdotes
in cells – also possesses catalytic instructed the cell’s protein- the end of the book, you not only about colleagues or the
properties that make it an making machinery. As Cech grasp the science, but also how it atmosphere in the lab after an
active participant in the core puts it, RNA was “DNA’s grunt”. happened and why breakthroughs unexpected result – all providing
chemistry of life. occurred when they did. just the right amount of breathing
Cech unpacks the story to date “Cech keeps us hooked Take T. thermophila. It seems an space around the science.
in his new book The Catalyst: RNA obscure creature to be the source One such moment of levity is
with anecdotes about
and the quest to unlock life’s deepest of such an important discovery – his description of geneticist and
secrets, starting out by explaining colleagues or the lab Cech himself called it “pond scum”. lepidopterist François Michel,
exactly how RNA and DNA “are atmosphere after an But he also shows why it was whose bushy beard made him
cut from the same biochemical unexpected result” perfect: it has thousands of copies look like he had “just emerged
cloth”. Each has a sugary backbone of certain genes, compared with from the forest after a month’s-
studded with nucleobases. In DNA, But he and his colleague Art the two or so in human cells. This long butterfly hunt”.
these are the familiar A, T, G and Zaug were poised – if unwittingly – makes it an ideal organism in All this makes The Catalyst a joy,
C of the genetic code. RNA differs to add a new string to RNA’s bow. which to find transcribed RNA, as from a writer who can’t help but be
by only a single letter – U in place The pair were researching how the more copies of a gene there are, as endearing as he is authoritative.
of T – and its particular brand of RNA transcripts formed, and they the more copies of its transcript Cech displays a warm appreciation
sugar has one more oxygen atom, thought they might catch this as there are too. It is, says Cech, “easier for past students and colleagues,
but this makes all the difference. it happened by isolating one from to find a needle in a haystack if and underlying the book is his
Where DNA is long and stable, a single-celled organism named there are 10,000 needles”. passion for science, particularly
RNA tends to be short and Tetrahymena thermophila. They This and other breakthroughs when driven by curiosity. After all,
volatile, allowing it to pull off became the first to see evidence laid the groundwork for new uses without the freedom to investigate
wild stunts that make DNA “look of RNA catalysing a reaction, of RNA, such as in the targeting his “pond scum”, he might never
like a one-trick pony”, says Cech. something thought to be unique system that tells CRISPR where to have become an RNA guy. ❚

New Scientist
recommends
Flying close to the wind

A detailed account of efforts to pull three bird species back from
the brink shows the scale of the task, finds Adam Weymouth
That is tempered with an awe ecosystems. Yes, it would have been Tharani Ahillan
at the ingenuity and tenderness so much simpler not to have pushed Work experience
Book London
shown in our efforts to save them. things to this point. But here we
Feather Trails are, and now millions of years
The devotion of Osborn and her I was given Rutger
Sophie A. H. Osborn
colleagues leaves you with the of evolution rests in the hands Bregman’s Humankind:
Chelsea Green
feeling that, if we are capable of of a few determined people who A hopeful history for
showing such care to other species, refuse to take no for an answer. my birthday when I was
WILDLIFE biologist Sophie Osborn then whatever other damage we Some sections of the book feeling down about the
has spent a career working with have done to the planet might are overlong and the extended world, and it became my
birds that have been a feather’s equally be healed. descriptions of bird behaviour new favourite book. At
breadth from extinction in the This is a book for the aspiring assume a readership as devoted as a time when optimism
US. Her new book, Feather Trails: field biologist in your life. Describing Osborn. Yet it deserves to be read
A journey of discovery among both the adventure and the impact widely, because it is only in coming
endangered birds, focuses on the of her work, Osborn makes it sound to understand these animals,
Hawaiian crow, the California condor the most alluring of career choices. suggests Osborn, that we can
and the peregrine falcon (also found When stories about the natural choose to love and help them.
globally). We have pushed them world feel hopeless, her book shows We are introduced to the dazzling
to the brink, and Osborn describes beyond doubt the difference a truly aerobatics of the peregrine falcon,
in painstaking detail the Herculean committed individual can make. the world’s fastest bird, the playful, can seem naive, it’s good
work to pull them back. Yet once things unravel, it is sociable Hawaiian crow and the to hear strong arguments
Two conflicting feelings arise terribly hard to stitch them back California condor’s dedicated for why thinking the best
from reading the book. The first is together. Osborn writes about parenting. When a species declines of people is realistic.
despair at our mindless destruction months spent camping in remote to a population you can count on Bregman re-examines
of the natural world. Whether it locations, monitoring each released two hands, individuals become key moments in history,
is pesticide use thinning peregrine bird during every waking hour, in personalities, more family member from the London blitz
eggs so they crack prematurely, every type of weather. The time and than animal, and Osborn describes to the Stanford Prison
invasive species killing Hawaiian money expended on each individual each intimately. experiment, questioning
crows or California condors being animal is immense, and for every Such familiarity makes each what we thought we
poisoned by lead shot, at times hint of progress, there are losses setback more heartbreaking. But in knew about them.
it feels like a miracle that we to endure. While such devotion to the words of ecologist Paul Banko, It’s a refreshing view,
have any birds left at all. a few creatures can seem profligate, talking about a failed release of particularly now, when
the truth is that birds will only be Hawaiian crows in 2016: “There it is most needed.
The peregrine falcon, the saved if we also save their habitat, is no room for pessimists in I also recently visited
world’s fastest bird, is thriving and they are the emblems that endangered species recovery.“ London’s Hoopla Impro
again in North America – for now push us to try to restore whole Thanks to conservationists, the (pictured) – and I was
peregrine is once again thriving in impressed at the quality
North America. And after almost of the shows. Amateur
40 years of captive breeding, there actors play a range of
are now 347 California condors “games” using scenarios,
flying free, although the population words and ideas from
still isn’t self-sustaining. The the audience, and must
Hawaiian crow, however, remains make them into scenes.
extinct in the wild. For someone who
The litany of threats many birds hates performing on
face, from poaching and disease the spot, it was incredible
to habitat loss and climate change, seeing people live out
means wins are never easy and my worst nightmare and
never assured. Yet the alternative think up great scenes on
is a landscape empty of birdsong, the fly. A friend was even
MIKE WALKER/ALAMY
the hardest thing to endure of all. ❚ inspired to sign up for

classes themselves
HOOPLA
Adam Weymouth is the author afterwards!

of Kings of the Yukon

Views Culture
The sci-fi column
Uncanny valleys An ordinary-looking town has a secret. If you manage to leave,

you will find each successive valley to the east is 20 years ahead. Go west, and the
reverse is true. This thought experiment is a heartfelt debut, says Emily H. Wilson
What if you could visit

a valley where your dead
loved ones are still alive?
good this novel is that I never

found myself questioning these
elaborate rules and processes, or
worrying about the physics of this
strange series of valleys or how the
Emily H. Wilson is a former Conseil might have come to be.
editor of New Scientist That’s because, as well as being
and the author of the beautifully written, The Other
Sumerians trilogy, set in Valley is a rip-roaring yarn, told
ancient Mesopotamia. with such conviction and elan that
SHUTTERSTOCK/SARATH MAROLI
Her second book in the I found myself simply accepting

series, Gilgamesh, is out the premise and diving right in.
now. You can find her at Our hero is a schoolgirl
emilyhwilson.com, or follow called Odile, and she is 16 when
her on X @emilyhwilson and the book opens. Quiet and socially
Instagram @emilyhwilson1 awkward, she is tougher than she
realises and her mother wants
THE Other Valley by Scott back in time… You get the picture. her to join the Conseil.
Alexander Howard is an unusual If people were free to wander If Odile manages to make it
Book
and deeply enjoyable time travel between the valleys, meeting their through the cut-throat assessment
The Other Valley
novel. It was published early this younger or older selves, collapsing process, a job at the Conseil would
Scott Alexander Howard
year, and sadly I didn’t review timelines willy-nilly, it would give her real power. She would be
Atlantic Books (UK);
it then for the simple reason cause a lot of chaos. So the valley the one who would decide who
Atria Books (US)
that I had no idea it existed. we find ourselves in is surrounded can leave the valley. Plus, the job
Fortunately, now that I have by fences, and these borders comes with a nice house.
had it recommended to me are guarded by gendarmes. Soon Odile’s Conseil prospects
Emily also and have actually read it, I have are looking good, and her social
recommends... special permission from my editor life also begins to bloom. She
“If people were free to
at New Scientist to travel back in is included in a social group
Book wander between the
time and celebrate its publication. and takes the first steps into a
The Future of The premise of this superb
valleys, meeting their relationship with a young man
Another Timeline debut is simple yet complex. younger or older selves called Edme, a violin virtuoso. But
Annalee Newitz We are in a valley not unlike an would cause chaos” then a chance sighting changes
Orbit Books (UK); ordinary valley on Earth. It has the course of Odile’s life forever –
Tor Books (US) a semi-rural, small-town vibe. Some foot traffic is allowed, and the book takes off with a roar.
If you enjoy time travel But there is nothing ordinary here. however, on compassionate I won’t say more about the
twisters, this novel by If you were allowed to walk east grounds. Under special plot because it would be a shame
my fellow New Scientist over the mountains into the next circumstances, with the approval to ruin any of it for you. This is a
columnist – telling the story valley, you would find yourself of the Conseil, the ruling council, complicated, jumbo jet of a story,
of a group of time travellers 20 years into your future. Walk you are allowed to travel into the but the author brings it in for
trying to make the future even further, into the valley neighbouring valley that is behind its final landing with incredible
better for women – has beyond, and you would be in time so you can view deceased aplomb, no mean feat when
all the time travel and 40 years ahead. Walk on and loved ones who are still alive in you are juggling multiple
twists you could hope for. it would be 60 years, and so on. that valley. This viewing of the timelines and causality.
Walk west out of your home dead is carefully policed, since The Other Valley is a thought
valley, however, and you would any information leakage between experiment, but it is one with
find yourself travelling back past and present could cause huge heart and hope at its core
20 years into your past. Walk on who knows what devastation. and I do, however belatedly,
further, and you would be 40 years It is a mark of how very recommend it to you. ❚

Views Your letters
Editor’s pick a picture frame smash a mile components of processed foods, a bit of an engineering challenge!
away, but not the heartbeat of by having all their micronutrients Could it be that we exist in
a person in the same basement? removed, are likely to contribute a three-dimensional universe
A ready solution to storing
No sonar, but they can get down most to harming health through because three is the minimum
excess renewable energy stairs? Unable to cross water, micronutrient deficiency? number of dimensions in which
Leader, 20 July but space is no problem? Until we have answers, I guess sentience can easily evolve?
From Rick Jefferys, The only credible explanation the most sensible strategy is to
Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, UK is that they are a genetically stick to unprocessed whole foods.
Cosmic significance:
You are right to highlight the engineered weapon. Given the
importance of heat storage as a way capabilities of modern robots A wise man once said…
Will roast dodo be Letters, 13 July
to use surplus renewable electricity. and artificial intelligence, I would
A big but under-appreciated be more frightened of something back on the menu? From Gabriel Carlyle, St Leonards-
resource on this front is the hot like this emerging from one of our 15 June, p 40 on-Sea, East Sussex, UK
water tank. We have about 9 million labs than landing from space. From Charles Joynson, Andrew Whiteley notes that the
in UK homes, typically supplied Rayleigh, Essex, UK idea of our cosmic insignificance
from a gas boiler, with a 3-kilowatt From David Congleton, Bringing back the dodo might involves “equating physical size
immersion heater backup. Sedona, Arizona, US have commercial implications with significance”, which he rightly
Adding an inexpensive Wi-Fi The underlying debate is whether because it was apparently tasty to decries as absurd. A similar point
controller to each would enable it is a good idea to send signals to eat. I can imagine meat producers was made by the polymath Frank
utility control of 27 gigawatts of try to reach intelligent aliens. The being interested in an edible bird Ramsey: “I don’t feel the least
demand, 18 times the size of the worry is there is no global entity twice the size of a turkey, especially humble before the vastness of the
largest pumped storage scheme that polices such transmissions if its growth or reproduction heavens. The stars may be large,
in the UK. This would be a lot less and, even if there were, it would be rates could be tweaked. but they cannot think or love; and
expensive than hydrogen storage, impossible to enforce. But I agree these are qualities which impress
yet could absorb most of our peak with Vakoch that it doesn’t matter me far more than size does.”
Maybe sentience can only
renewable production. because aliens advanced enough
to pick up those signals will already arise in three dimensions
13 July, p 32 We need a proper
know we are here by other means.
One big step back From Wally Sewell, London, UK substitute for fuel
to our distant past In your look at the possibility of 20 July, p 36
20 July, p 13 If in doubt, it is best to
extra dimensions, Georges Obied From Valerie Grant, Stockport,
From David Hulme, Stockport, stick with whole foods says: “There’s no reason why it Greater Manchester, UK
Greater Manchester, UK 13 July, p 10 has to be three. It could have been As I see it, to replace a lot of fossil
Some things don’t change. Our From Norman Fry, Newton Stewart, two; it could have been four or 10.” fuel use requires a chemical that
ancient ancestors valued caves as Dumfries and Galloway, UK I wonder whether we can look to would react, for example with
a haven from the weather and wild As a scientist, I prefer to think in the anthropic principle as to why water, to produce hydrogen on
animals. Now, we are considering terms of components, causality we have at least three dimensions? demand. A driver could go to a
using caverns on the moon as and processes. It would be good It might be a fair assumption fuel station with a spent pack of
protection from space “weather”. to know more about these when that for “observers” such as us this chemical, buy a new one and
Perhaps we should think about it comes to ultra-processed foods. to arise, information processors, fit it in place and drive off in the
installing a copy of the Lascaux There are many questions. such as brains, must evolve, and time it takes to fill up with petrol. ❚
cave paintings in the first lunar Which additives might degrade that a likely form for these is logical
cavern we use for habitation. the mucus lining of my gut, networks, whereby each node
For the record
leaving me at risk of bowel can be connected to any number
irritation and infections? of others. In two dimensions, to ❚ Geshuang Chen’s photo shows
These scary aliens aren’t
Which additives could perhaps permit connections to all other an optical corona (13 July, p 25).
even remotely feasible kill good gut bacteria, affecting my nodes, connectors – such as ❚ To gauge the ideal bowl size
6 July, p 21 comfort, nutrition and immune synapses or wires – must cross for spent pistachio shells, they
From John Reynolds, Canonbie, system? Which additives might each other. Some sort of gate were modelled as hollow half-
Dumfries and Galloway, UK contribute to the sabotage of my mechanism, akin to a railway level- spheres with 73 per cent of the
Having watched the first two body’s ability to handle spikes crossing, would have to evolve packing density of the whole
A Quiet Place films, and reading in blood nutrients? Which bulk to allow this. Not impossible, but nuts in shells (13 July, p 9).
Douglas Vakoch’s lament about ❚ Boston Dynamics’s robots are
the irrational fears raised by the banned from having weapons
portrayal of scary extraterrestrials Want to get in touch? such as flamethrowers fitted to
in the third film, I wonder if I am Send letters to letters@newscientist.com; them. One used for agricultural
alone in believing these blind see terms at newscientist.com/letters research was equipped with
movie aliens aren’t even remotely Letters sent to New Scientist, 9 Derry Street, a weed-suppressing propane
likely? Sharp-eared enough to hear London, W8 5HY will be delayed blowtorch (27 July, p 13).

Features Cover story
Becoming
human
What is a human and when did such a being emerge?
These fundamental questions about ourselves are
surprisingly difficult to answer, finds Colin Barras
I
S IT in the way we live, laugh and love? Or humanity and pinpoint its emergence? Why
maybe it is our dislike of cheesy clichés? do we now find ourselves as far as ever from
Deep within each of us, there must be establishing what, exactly, a human is? And
something that makes us distinctly human. what does all this tell us about ourselves?
The trouble is, after centuries of searching, we A century ago, the world’s greatest scientific
still haven’t found it. Perhaps that’s because minds were confident that humanity’s roots
we have been looking in the wrong place. lay in Eurasia. After all, it was in Europe that
Ever since researchers began unearthing the first Neanderthal (Homo neanderthalensis)
ancient hominin bones and stone artefacts, fossils had been discovered in the 1820s, and
their work has held the tantalising promise in Asia that the first remains of an even more
of identifying the moment long ago when ancient human – now known as Homo erectus –
our ancestors made the transition to become were unearthed roughly 60 years later.
human. Two of the most important fossil Then anthropologist Raymond Dart
discoveries in this quest celebrate significant at the University of the Witwatersrand in
milestones this year. It is 100 years since the South Africa made a discovery that changed
very first “almost human” Australopithecus everything. Dart had arranged to receive a
fossil came to light in South Africa, overturning consignment of fossils from a South African
established thinking about our place of origin. quarry site now known as Taung. In a crate
And it is 50 years since the most famous he opened on 28 November 1924, he found a
Australopithecus of them all – Lucy, also tiny ancient skull with a mix of ape-like and
known as “the grandmother of humanity” – human-like features. He soon concluded that
emerged from a dusty hillside in Ethiopia. it represented an extinct genus of “pre-human
Both fossils led researchers to believe we really stock”. Dart named the genus Australopithecus
could identify humanity’s big bang: the time and placed the fossil – nicknamed the Taung
when a dramatic pulse of evolution saw the Child – in the species africanus.
emergence of our human genus, Homo. The roughly 2.8-million-year-old Taung
But today, the story of humanity’s birth Child was important for two reasons. First,
has become far more complicated. A string of it suggested that our evolutionary roots lay in
discoveries over the past two decades suggests Africa rather than Eurasia, prompting further
NOELIA DE ALDA
the dawn of our genus is harder to pin down investigations in South and East Africa and the
than we had thought. So why did it once seem recovery of more hominin fossils. Second,
like Lucy and her ilk allowed us to define it gave us an idea of what our pre-Homo

ancestors looked like. However, it still
wasn’t clear exactly which species of
Australopithecus gave rise to Homo, or
when this immediate ancestor had lived.
Then along came Lucy. Still arguably
the most famous hominin fossil of them
all, Lucy is a roughly 40 per cent complete
Australopithecus skeleton. “It wasn’t a single
bone or part of a skull. There was an image
people could identify with and see that this
was an individual,” says Donald Johanson
at Arizona State University, who unearthed
Lucy in the Afar region of Ethiopia almost
50 years to the day after Dart first held the
Taung Child (see “Finding Lucy”, page 35).
Just like Dart, Johanson knew instantly
that this was a great discovery.
The first thing that made Lucy special
was that she wasn’t alone. Johanson and
his colleagues unearthed bits and bobs
from dozens of ancient hominins during
their Ethiopian fieldwork, providing a rare
opportunity to study an ancient hominin
“Something
momentous
seemed to have
occurred at the
dawn of Homo”
population, not just an individual. “Those
are the studies that lead to major advances
in palaeoanthropology,” says Johanson’s
colleague Tim White, now at the University
of California, Berkeley. Together with the
late Yves Coppens, they eventually concluded
that all the fossils at the site represented
a single species, which they named
Australopithecus afarensis.
The second outstanding thing about
Lucy was her pedigree. Johanson and his
colleagues declared that A. afarensis occupied
a key place in our evolutionary tree: here, at
last, was the species that gave rise to our genus,
Homo. “It was a pretty bold assertion,” says
Johanson. Yet it became accepted by many
researchers, even though, at 3.2 million years
old, Lucy predated the Taung Child. That the
older species, afarensis, should be considered
the grandmother of humanity rested in large
part on Lucy’s anatomy. Dart’s research left
no doubt that Australopithecus was more >

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ape-like than Homo. But the Taung Child of our evolution. This suggested that stone collectively, the evidence makes a persuasive
and other A. africanus individuals had some tool technology was a Homo innovation, case that several traits we had thought unique
features of the face and skull indicating useful for killing and butchering animals to Homo were seen in Australopithecus.
that the species had evolved in a direction and allowing Homo to adopt a meaty diet At a symposium this year to mark the 50th
distinctly unlike that of our own genus. that contrasted with the plant-rich diet of anniversary of Lucy’s discovery, she suggested
A. afarensis, by contrast, had none of these A. afarensis. “There was this assumption that A. afarensis might have been a scavenger,
evolutionary specialisms. It was anatomically that several things went together in an targeting animal carcasses and using stone
more primitive, making it a great starting evolutionary package,” says John Hawks tools to smash open the bones to access
point from which to evolve a Homo-like at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. the nutritious marrow overlooked by
body. This was assumed to have happened “Stone tools, new diets, smaller teeth and flesh-eating carnivores.
around 2.9 million years ago, because bigger brains.” This set of features defined Another recent finding also challenges
that is when A. afarensis went extinct. Homo, and by extension, it also defined the the idea that hunting is what set Homo apart.
moment our ancestors became human. A study published last year suggests that
However, in the past 20 years, the sharp Paranthropus, a genus of strange, heavily
One great leap? dividing line between Australopithecus built hominins that evolved at the same
This idea had broader implications. Given and Homo has begun to blur. In 2019, time as Homo, also used stone tools to
that A. afarensis was so primitive compared Jessica Thompson at Yale University and butcher animals. This indicates that there
with the species in our genus, it suggested her colleagues brought the evidence together. were fewer differences than we thought
something momentous must have occurred One key point is that A. afarensis’s brain, while between the two contemporary genera.
at the dawn of Homo. “We thought there small compared with ours, was still 30 per cent In light of all this, researchers now question
was this huge change from these ape-like larger than those of chimps of a similar size, whether there really was a dramatic transition
australopiths to these tall and elegant human- suggesting Lucy’s species had a calorific diet. between Australopithecus and Homo. “We no
like creatures striding across the savannah,” Furthermore, its hands were surprisingly longer assume there was an evolutionary
says Carol Ward at the University of Missouri. human-like, perhaps indicating dexterity. package,” says Brian Villmoare at the
There was even a good explanation for such This would fit with recent evidence of cut University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
a dramatic evolutionary event. For decades marks on ungulate bones, suggesting In retrospect, this makes sense. A. afarensis
before the discovery of Lucy, researchers had these hominins used stone tools to butcher is astonishingly well represented in the fossil
uncovered stone tools alongside the remains animals around 3.4 million years ago. record, but its disappearance some 2.9 million
of ancient hominins. But with A. afarensis, Much of this research remains controversial: years ago coincides with a million-year period
there were none. “And boy, we certainly White, for instance, has argued that the in which the hominin fossil record is patchy.
looked for them,” says Johanson. It seemed supposed cut marks are scratches left by By the time things improve, species that
that A. afarensis represented a pre-tool stage crocodile teeth. But Thompson thinks that, looked and behaved more like we do had
appeared. It was easy to assume that those
anatomical and behavioural changes had all
occurred in one dramatic evolutionary event
around 2.9 million years ago. In reality, they
probably happened gradually throughout
that million-year interval, says Villmoare.
So, what does this mean for our attempts to
define when humans evolved? One radical idea
UPPER: PATRICK LANDMANN/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY; LOWER: JAVIER TRUEBA/MSF/SPL
is that the term “human” should expand to

include every hominin that emerged following
the split between our ancestral line and chimps
some 7 million years ago. Although popular in
SCIENCE HISTORY IMAGES/ALAMY
the mid-20th century, few researchers favour

this view today. However, more recently it has
been argued that since the average lifespan
of a primate genus is between 7 million and
11 million years, even chimps and bonobos
should count as human. At the other extreme
is the idea that our ancestors became truly
The Taung Child, human only after our ancestral line diverged
discovered by Raymond from that of Neanderthals around 800,000
Dart a century ago, years ago. This rests on the assumption that
isn’t as old as Lucy Neanderthals were brutish and unintelligent.
but is less likely to be However, following recent archaeological and
a direct human ancestor genetic discoveries, many now argue that there

Finding Lucy
When Donald Johanson took up a significant new vista on
his first field trip to Africa in our origins,” says Johanson.
1970, most of the best-known It turned out that they could.
hominin fossil sites there Several hominin fragments had
contained geological deposits already been unearthed before
stretching back no further than Johanson discovered the partial
2 million years. But humanity’s skeleton of a small individual
origins predate this. “I thought on 24 November 1974. “My
‘there must be other places girlfriend at the time, [team
to look’,” says Johanson, now member] Pam Alderman,
a palaeoanthropologist at said if you think it’s a female,
BETTMANN/GETTY IMAGES
Arizona State University. why don’t we call it Lucy, after

He soon met the late Maurice [The Beatles’s hit song] Lucy
Taieb, a French geologist who in the Sky with Diamonds?”
had begun exploring Ethiopia’s says Johanson. “I wasn’t that
SABENA JANE BLACKBIRD/ALAMY
Afar region. Taieb’s photographs enthusiastic: I thought she

revealed a landscape littered deserved a scientific name.”
It is 50 years since Donald with animal fossils that were Eventually, she got one,
Johanson found Lucy, more than 3 million years old. Australopithecus afarensis.
the fossil dubbed the “If human fossils could be found But it is as Lucy that she
“grandmother of us all” at a place like this, it would open became a global celebrity.
were few behavioural differences between Villmoare, who says genera should be based less clear, and ancestry isn’t such a simple
our ancestors and them. “There’s a sense solely on evolutionary grounds. Do this using way to define what counts as human after all.
in which ‘becoming human’ can no longer the conventional hominin family tree, and A century after the discovery of the
be accounted for by events of the past few Homo is actually easy to define. This is because Taung Child, and 50 years after Lucy, we
hundred thousand years,” says Hawks. the descendants of A. afarensis ultimately seem no closer to understanding when or
went down two distinct evolutionary paths: why humans emerged. That is frustrating,
Paranthropus and Homo. Villmoare says this but also, paradoxically, a reflection of how
Walking the walk fork in the road, which happened roughly much progress has been made. When
Today, ideas about how to define “human” 2.9 million years ago, represents the moment researchers had just a handful of hominin
tend to fall into two camps, one based on that both genera came into existence. fossils to work with, it was easy to spot the
behaviour, the other on ancestry. In the former Regardless of the way they looked or behaved, significant differences between them and to
is Bernard Wood at the George Washington all hominins on the first path belong in the assume that there was a dramatic moment
University in Washington DC. “When we’re Paranthropus genus and all those on the when our ancestors became human. It is
searching for the origin of Homo, we are second path belong in Homo. However, this because we have better evidence that we
searching for the first evidence of creatures assumes that the conventional hominin family now know things are more complicated.
that go about their lives as we do now,” he says. tree is correct – which it might not be. “There What is clear is that we didn’t suddenly
Australopithecus probably didn’t. Even if we have always been uncomfortable questions “become human” 2.9 million years ago when
accept that A. afarensis butchered animals, it surrounding the genus Paranthropus,” says A. afarensis died out. That should come as no
had the long and powerful arms of a hominin Ward. She suspects that it includes hominins surprise. Evolution is a continuous process,
that spent a fair amount of time climbing in that are superficially similar in appearance and the propensity to divide life up into
trees – something that humans, in general, but not closely related. If so, that convenient conspicuously distinct species and genera
don’t do. Moreover, some species of Homo, fork in the road after A. afarensis becomes is less a reflection of fact than another
including Homo habilis and Homo floresiensis, human idiosyncrasy. Ultimately, where
also had long and powerful arms, leading Wood we draw the line between “us” and “them”
and his colleague Mark Collard at Simon Fraser “Some think isn’t simply a biological question –
University, Canada, to suggest that we reassign it is a philosophical one too. ❚
them to Australopithecus. They argue that even chimps
Homo began only once hominins grew longer
legs and became confined to the ground –
and bonobos Colin Barras is a freelance writer
a stage that was reached with the evolution should count based in Ann Arbor, Michigan
of H. erectus around 2 million years ago.
Researchers in the other camp include as human”
Features
FIRST LIGHT
The earliest
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of cosmic histor
history.
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places an upper limit on the mass a modern
star can attain. Not so with population III
stars. The lack of heavier elements means that
outward pressure doesn’t kick in so strongly.
“If a population III star forms massive, it stays
massive,” says Simon Glover at the University
of Heidelberg in Germany. Based on these
assumptions, astrophysicists have long
thought the majority of the first stars would
have been giants, typically hundreds of times
heavier than our sun.
The lack of heavy elements also means the
first stars would have had to become denser
and hotter to generate the energy necessary
to remain stable by preventing collapse. The
hotter and bigger a star, the shorter its life. So
astronomers reckon the first stars would have
lived fast and died young – lasting perhaps
only 5 million years. If that’s true, then the first
stars must all be long dead. Still, in astronomy,
A
S TURNING points in cosmic history suggestion that the first stars might be hiding looking at extremely distant objects equates
go, the birth of the first stars is hard closer to home than we ever thought possible. to peering back in time, because of how long
to beat. When they flickered into To understand the allure of the first stars and it takes their light to reach us. So although
existence between 200 and 400 million years how we might identify them, it helps to know seeing one of the first stars is fiendishly
after the big bang, the energy pouring from that stars in general are intimately connected difficult, it isn’t out of the question.
them ripped apart the atoms of gas that had to the chemical composition of the universe. One reason scientists are so keen to do it
been cooling the universe, reheating them in The big bang created only the two lightest involves the puzzle of supermassive black
a process called re-ionisation. Then, as they elements, hydrogen and helium (plus traces holes, which have masses spanning from
burned and died, they created a cocktail of of lithium and beryllium). All the heavier a million to billions of times that of the sun.
chemical elements that primed the universe elements – like the oxygen we breathe, the iron We know that one of these monsters lies at the
to generate galaxies, planets and, ultimately, we mine, the silver we prize – were made in the centre of almost every galaxy. How do they get
life itself. hearts of stars, where nuclear fusion glued there? Well, when the first stars exploded and
No wonder astronomers have been itching subatomic particles together to form larger died, they would have spread their outer layers
to glimpse this first stellar generation. They atoms. As stars died and exploded, they spread into space, with the remaining mass collapsing
were spectacular, for starters. Huge and these elements across the universe, only for into black holes, each weighing between 10
ferociously bright, they are thought to have them to be incorporated into new stars, which and 100 solar masses. These baby black holes
been up to 300 times as massive as our sun made heavier and heavier elements. It is true presumably collided with each other over
and 10 times hotter. But observing them could what they say: we are made of stardust. time and fed off passing stars and gas clouds,
also tell us a lot about the mysterious early gradually growing into the supermassive
phase of the universe, not least how it became black holes we see today.
potted with supermassive black holes in what Primordial giants But there is a problem. The further back
seems like an impossibly short time. Astronomers split the stars we have detected into cosmic history we have looked, the
Now, we might finally be on the cusp. Earlier so far into two types. Population I stars, such more astounded we have been to see nigh-on
this year, astronomers reported that the James as our sun, are the youngest and contain fully formed galaxies and supermassive black
Webb Space Telescope (JWST), by fixing its the highest proportion of heavy elements. holes that shouldn’t exist because there hasn’t
superior vision on the outer reaches of a very Population II stars are older and contain fewer been enough time for them to form. “It is one
distant galaxy, may have already seen evidence heavy elements. But it stands to reason that of the big mysteries at the moment: how do
of the first stars. “The observations we can do there must be a third type: the very oldest stars you make very massive black holes very early
AKINBOSTANCI/GETTY IMAGES
now are really pushing our knowledge,” says that are made exclusively from hydrogen and in the universe?” says Glover.
Hannah Übler at the University of Cambridge. helium. These are the population III stars. He thinks it could be telling us something
That signal may turn out to be a false alarm. Today, if a star grows to be more than say new and extraordinary about the first stars,
But what’s exciting right now is that others 100 solar masses, it will produce so much and he isn’t the only one. A number of teams
are homing in on different signatures of the internal energy that the pressure will lift off have been looking again at their computer
universe’s early light. There is even some its outer layers and blow them into space. This models and getting a surprise: it is possible >

that as re-ionisation increased the temperature
of the gas in the universe, these hotter clouds “ The first stars the data for GN-z11, they found some tentative
evidence of helium II close enough to the
collapsed into single stars with extremely high
masses. Rather than hundreds of solar masses, could have galaxy for it to have been in the halo. They
applied for more time on JWST and got it,
we are talking about a few tens of thousands of
solar masses. “These may give you a pathway been about resulting in a more careful look at the GN-z11’s
environs. Their results, published this year,
to making some of the first very massive black
holes,” says Glover. That’s because they would 300 times revealed more widespread indications of
helium II. Could they have found the smoking
accumulate so much mass that after their brief
stint as a hyperluminous star, they would the mass gun of population III?
Maybe. But just because a population III
collapse directly into a black hole. But to prove
this idea, we need to find the stars and see what of our sun” star could produce this signal doesn’t mean
that is what we are seeing. There could be other
they were really like. explanations. “There’s a relatively nearby
There is a way to do this, in principle. It galaxy, I Zwicky-18, which has a lot of very
involves a technique called spectroscopy, ionised helium, but we don’t think it’s coming
which means measuring the intensity of a from population III stars,” says Glover. Instead,
range of wavelengths of light. Different the ionising radiation there is thought to be
elements absorb specific wavelengths, so the result of gas being pulled from a star onto
spectroscopy gives us a fingerprint-like either an incredibly dense neutron star or a
reading for a star, showing exactly which black hole. In other words, being sure that the
elements it contains and how much of them glowing gas is caused by a population III star
are present. Since the 1950s, scientists have will hinge on eliminating other explanations.
been conducting spectroscopic surveys of the Maiolino knows this all too well. “That’s
sky, looking for stars with negligible amounts why we are still saying that this is a tentative
of heavy elements. They have certainly found result,” he says. To try to definitively establish
some very old stars, but none that makes the the source of the ionising radiation, he and
cut as a bona fide member of population III. his colleagues have been awarded another
Sadly, not even JWST – which was 40 hours of coveted time on JWST to spend
specifically designed to look as far into solely on this source. The observations have
the distant universe as possible – can see been scheduled for May 2025 and are designed
population III stars directly. The good news, to pick up even the faintest traces of heavier
though, is that it might just be capable of If modern stars like our elements. If they see them, it would suggest
spotting them through their effects. sun got too big, their that a population III star isn’t responsible.
The intense radiation these stars emitted atmosphere would If not – it could be a slam dunk. “We are really
had the power to illuminate surrounding gas start to blow away pushing Webb to the limit,” says Maiolino.
clouds and strip all the electrons from the But Übler and Maiolino’s method isn’t
helium atoms found there, creating helium II the only tool at our disposal. Rudrani Kar
ions. Some of these electrons then recombine Chowdhury at the University of Hong Kong
with their parent atoms, creating a glow. Since and her colleagues recently proposed that
the glowing clouds of gas are vast compared we could look for the exceedingly luminous
with the stars, they should be much easier to flares emitted by population III stars as they
see. And it is these clouds that Übler and her are torn apart by black holes, a process known
colleagues think they have detected. as a tidal disruption event or TDE. “JWST is
Working with Roberto Maiolino at the discovering massive black holes [in the very
University of Cambridge and others, Übler distant universe] and also massive galaxies.
used JWST’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph That made us think about a [population III]
J MARSHALL - TRIBALEYE IMAGES/ALAMY
instrument to study a distant galaxy whose star getting captured by the massive black
discovery was originally reported in 2016. holes,” says Chowdhury.
This galaxy, GN-z11, was at that time the most When a star is pulled apart by a black hole,
ancient ever seen, at 13.4 billion years old. That it can release more mass than the black hole
made it a prime candidate to have population can easily swallow. This sets up an incredibly
III stars nestled in its halo, the outer reaches of turbulent environment, in which the star’s
the galaxy where primordial gas would gather. gas heats up and glows. When this happens to
When the researchers got their hands on a population I or II star, the radiation interacts

effects of rotation on the collapsing gas cloud
that became the star, especially when it comes
to slightly cooler clouds of gas.
As a relatively cool gas cloud collapses,
it naturally flattens into a disc – think of a
pizzaiolo twirling dough. This means not all of
the cloud’s initial mass ends up in the central
star. Instead it fetches up in the surrounding
disc, where it fragments into smaller
NASA, ESA, P. OESCH (YU), G. BRAMMER (STSCI), P. VAN DOKKUM (YU), AND G. ILLINGWORTH (UC SANTA CRUZ)
population III stars. “We no longer think that

you just form one massive star. You actually
probably get a wide range of stellar masses
dominated by massive stars,” says Glover.
A few of these stars could have been really
tiny, perhaps as small as half the mass of
our sun. As we already know, a star’s mass
correlates inversely with its lifetime, so we
would expect these meagre celestial spheres to
eke out their supply of nuclear fuel for tens of
billions or even trillions of years. “If population
III stars are produced with masses below 0.8 or
0.7 solar masses, then these stars live longer
than the age of the universe. So every single
one of these stars should still be around,” says
Ralf Klessen at the University of Heidelberg.
There is even reason to think that some of
these stars could be lurking close at hand. In
2018, we saw the most pristine star yet detected
through spectroscopic sky surveys. Called
SMSS J1605-1443, it has just one-millionth
of the iron present in the sun and is located
with the heavier elements and drives a stellar Galaxy GN-z11 (inset), where in the Milky Way’s halo. This can’t be a
wind that cools the remaining gas, allowing it astronomers may have population III star – it is more likely to be a
to settle into the black hole. But, in theory, the spotted signs of primordial, direct descendent – because it still contains
lack of heavier elements in the population III population III stars some iron and, strangely, has a relatively large
stars should prevent these cooling flows, and amount of carbon. We don’t fully understand
so the gas stays hot and luminous for longer. gives a higher chance of detections,” says this star’s unusual composition. But it is a sign
This means that the luminosity and Chowdhury’s colleague Janet Chang, also that very old stars might not look exactly as we
duration of a TDE flare, known as its light at the University of Hong Kong. expect them to – and they can be found nearby.
curve, can be tied to the mass, density But there is one final twist to this story. On top of that, a recent study of a catalogue
and heavy element content of the star being While most astronomers continue to focus of stars compiled by the European Space
pulled apart. “So, if we can detect some light on the very distant universe in their hunt Agency’s Gaia mission has revealed 200,000
curves from this kind of massive stellar TDE, for population III stars, others have begun to Milky Way stars that appear to be extremely
then we can extract the properties of the suspect that there may be some survivors from lacking in heavier elements. That gives us an
population III stars,” says Chowdhury. that primordial epoch in our cosmic backyard. awful lot of targets. One way or another, you
Seeing these events won’t be easy. While The first models of the initial population III can’t help wondering if we will glimpse the
they are within the detection limits of JWST – stars, the ones that began the process of universe’s first lights much sooner, and much
and NASA’s forthcoming Nancy Grace Roman re-ionisation and reheating the gases in the closer, than anyone previously imagined. ❚
space telescope – the team calculates that universe, suggested that the stars would all
such events would be rare and fundamentally weigh in at hundreds of solar masses. Over the
unpredictable. This will give Roman the past decade, however, advances in computing Stuart Clark is a consultant for
edge because it is designed to survey a larger power have allowed astronomers to execute New Scientist. His latest book
swathe of sky. “Compared with JWST, Roman more sophisticated simulations. These show is Beneath the Night
has 100 times the sky coverage, so that that the first models might have neglected the

Features
Mind merge
Brain implants that give people with paralysis the ability to walk,
talk and operate computers with their thoughts are advancing
rapidly, but will they one day let us compete with an artificial
superintelligence, asks Ingrid Wickelgren
A
CYBORG bested me. When I played the skills downloaded is enticing, but there individual signals of many neurons at once.
online game WebGrid, using my finger will be incredible challenges to overcome. To enable this, they began working to
on a laptop trackpad to click on squares BCIs work by first detecting electrical adapt a technology originally invented by
appearing unpredictably on a grid, my speed signals from neurons using metal discs, wires Richard Normann at the University of Utah
was 42 squares per minute. When self-described or electrodes that are either inserted into the to stimulate the brain’s visual cortex to restore
cyborg Noland Arbaugh played it, he used a brain, under the skull or placed over the scalp. sight. Normann’s 4-millimetre-square chip,
chip embedded in his brain to send telepathic This information is then sent to a computer, called the Utah array, was studded with about
signals to his computer. His speed? 49. where it is processed and translated into 100 microelectrodes that could penetrate
Arbaugh was paralysed from the neck down commands that, for example, enable a person the outer layer of the brain. The array was
in 2016. In January, he became the first person to type a sentence or control a robotic device. redesigned to track the firing of individual
to be surgically implanted with a chip made by neurons, and each array could record from
Neuralink, a company founded by Elon Musk. about 100 of them at once. “That gave us the
Since then, Arbaugh has been operating his Decoding thoughts ability to look at populations of neurons and
phone and computer with his thoughts, surfing We have been able to siphon data from see really rich signals,” says Carlos Vargas-Irwin
the web and playing Civilization and chess. the brain in this way for decades. In 1998, at Brown University in Rhode Island, who
But Neuralink isn’t the only outfit melding researchers implanted the first invasive BCI, began working with Utah Arrays as a college
human minds with machines using brain- consisting of two electrodes, into the brain of student in 2000. The collective output of these
computer interfaces (BCIs). Thanks to a series a builder named Johnny Ray who had become populations represented the brain’s language,
of trials, a growing number of people paralysed almost totally paralysed after a stroke. Ray guiding functions such as reaching, writing,
from spinal cord injuries, strokes or motor learned to tune the signals from his implant walking, talking, smiling and thinking – and
conditions are regaining lost abilities. The to slowly spell words by imagining moving it was ripe for interpretation.
successes are taking some researchers by his hand to move a cursor over letters on a The signals most relevant to devices for
surprise, says neurosurgeon Jaimie Henderson keyboard. But the functionality and reliability people with paralysis reside in the motor
at Stanford University in California. “It’s been of such early BCIs was poor. Typically, these cortex, a strip of tissue that wraps like a
an incredible ride.” devices took weeks or months of training headband across the top of the brain and
Where that takes us remains to be seen. Musk before they could be used. Even then, they is charged with planning and executing
recently mused about making a bionic implant only allowed people to select a few characters movements. It is roughly organised by body
that will allow us to compete with artificial per minute and were prone to errors. part. For instance, in its face region, there are
superintelligence. Others are contemplating One issue was that devices made of only neurons that control face muscles, and in the
more profound implications. “In the future, a few electrodes didn’t gather enough data. leg region, there are neurons that operate
you could manipulate human perception and There are billions of intricately connected the legs, and so on. BCI researchers often put
memories and behaviour and identity,” says neurons in the human brain, and research electrodes in the hand region because people
Rafael Yuste at Columbia University in New York. had begun to indicate that it is the patterns tend to find it easy to imagine moving their
But while BCIs are undeniably impressive, of activity in groups of neurons – not single hands to do useful things, such as type or
as Arbaugh’s WebGrid score demonstrates, the cells – that specify our thoughts, actions manipulate a joystick or robotic arm.
relationship between brain activity, thoughts and perceptions. To decode these patterns, In 2004, researchers at BCI consortium
and actions is incredibly complex. A future BCI researchers wanted to test and deploy BrainGate reported implanting Utah arrays
in which memories can be implanted and technology that would pick up the in people with paralysis. One by one, people >

CHRIS MALBON

JIMMY RAVIER
volunteered for brain surgery, moving the a man paralysed from the neck down who has
field forward. A man with a paralysed upper two implanted Utah arrays played a simulated
and lower body due to a knife wound used his piano with 10 keys by imagining moving
thoughts to direct a cursor, opening simulated specific fingers on either hand. It doesn’t allow
emails and operating a television, as well as him to play anything by Tchaikovsky just yet –
opening and closing a prosthetic hand. Two more like Mary Had a Little Lamb, says Vargas-
people who had the same sort of paralysis Irwin. “But it has been proof of concept that
following strokes telepathically manipulated they can control each finger independently.”
a robotic arm to reach and grab objects; one In one of the most astounding
of them drank coffee from a bottle. A woman developments, BCIs have emerged that can
with muscle weakness due to amyotrophic reanimate paralysed limbs themselves. Last
lateral sclerosis, a neurodegenerative year, Grégoire Courtine at the Swiss Federal
condition that leads to paralysis, directed a Institute of Technology in Lausanne and
cursor towards up to eight targets on a screen. his team reported using a less invasive
“Every time we do one of these types of “electrocorticography” array sitting under
REUTERS/EMMANUEL FOUDROT
surgeries and work with a participant, we the skull just above the leg regions of the
learn so much,” says Henderson, who is part motor cortex, without penetrating brain
of BrainGate and also an adviser for Neuralink, tissue, along with AI to read signals in the
in which he has equity. brain and relay them to a stimulator in the
In the past few years, the capabilities of spinal cord. This enabled Gert-Jan Oskam,
experimental devices that translate brain whose legs are paralysed, to stand and walk –
activity into movement and even speech even navigating stairs and uneven terrain.
have surged ahead, says Yuste. With ever-more “[We have built] a digital bridge that turns Arrays (top) can transmit data
powerful algorithms at their disposal, the thought into action,” says Courtine. in and out of the brain to control
researchers can decipher the meaning of Moreover, the patterns of activity identified objects like exoskeletons (above)
increasingly complex patterns of activity from by AI are challenging our understanding of the
groups of neurons. “There is starting to be brain. On a more basic level, work on BCIs has
wholesale access to brain processes,” says Yuste. revealed that the jurisdictions of groups of information about what the entire body is
In 2021, it was reported that Dennis DeGray, motor cortex cells extend beyond single body doing – so arms, legs, face, tongue. There’s
whose spinal cord was severed in a bad fall parts to multiple joints and multiple body echoes of all that information,” says Vargas-
over a decade earlier, set a new speed record parts. It was found that DeGray’s array, despite Irwin. This suggests that the motor cortex
for virtual typing enabled by a Utah Array being placed in the “hand area” of the motor is organised according to complex concepts,
of 90 characters per minute. Unlike Ray and his cortex, could also pick up patterns for the such as actions, rather than body parts.
bionic descendants, who moved cursors by movements needed to produce speech. Still, the hand region is the wrong place
thinking broadly about moving a hand, DeGray “We had him speak and, to our great surprise, to put a BCI if the primary goal is to produce
“typed” by visualising himself writing on a there were pretty strong signals for words speech. Last year, it was reported that a
legal pad, so his brain fired off signals for the and syllables in an area of brain that we woman named Ann Johnson, who had lost
fine, multi-joint movements that would have thought was pretty highly specialised her ability to speak following a stroke, used
been required for this. An AI tool then decoded for hand function,” says Henderson. an electrocorticography array to operate an
the neural signals of this imagined handwriting This and other discoveries led to a more avatar on a computer near Johnson that spoke
and mapped it to individual letters. nuanced understanding of the brain region for her at 78 words per minute. The avatar’s
Similarly, in unpublished work, Vargas-Irwin charged with orchestrating actions. Instead AI-generated voice was trained on recordings
and his colleagues say they have ferreted out of being dedicated to one body part, as, say, a of Johnson’s voice made before the stroke
the brain’s “codes” for dozens of hand gestures cardiologist might focus on the heart, motor and made life-like movements of its mouth.
as well as individual finger movements cortex neurons seem to be more like general It could also display facial expressions such
involving both hands at the same time. practitioners with a subspeciality. “Even in one as happiness, sadness or surprise based on
In research presented by Vargas-Irwin in 2022, patch of [motor] cortex, you can get some readings from the array whenever Johnson

Gert-Jan Oskam, who
was paralysed in a cycling
accident, is able to walk using
a brain-computer interface
the brain,” he says. One day, this understanding for the rapid switching between disparate
might lead to devices that can restore speech activities that occupy most people’s days:
in people who, after a stroke, say, have an idea typing one minute, chatting to a friend, then
to express but can’t put it into words. It also going to the kitchen for a snack. “We cannot
comes closer to truly reading a person’s mind. build a model that works across all these things
“If you have the means to map and manipulate that we can do in our daily living,” says Gallego.
brain activity, by definition, you can map As a step in that direction, he and his
and manipulate mental activity,” says Yuste, colleagues have found a way to make
who sees few limitations to the near-future programming the individual tasks easier. BCIs
possibilities of BCIs. are currently personalised for each participant,
but Gallego’s team has created a universal
REBECCA NOBLE/NEW YORK TIMES/REDUX/EYEVINE
decoder that works across different brains,

Universal implant at least in monkeys and mice. It does this by
Engineering challenges still dog the field. tracking patterns that emerge in groups of
Brain-embedded devices, like the Utah and neurons that are shared across a species. “You
Neuralink arrays, pick up brain activity more can build a model in animal 1 to predict how
precisely but can lose their signal quality over animal 1 is moving his hand, for example, and
time. Meanwhile, some BCI set-ups involve use it in animal 2,” he says. If the algorithm also
wires which sprout from ports that present a works across different human brains, it could
persistent infection risk, and most eventually pave the way to more versatile BCIs, he says.
have to be removed or replaced. Advances like these continue to close the
These troubles aside, truly melding human gulf between our mental worlds and the
Noland Arbaugh is the first minds with machines, as Musk envisions, will neural activity from which these worlds
person to have a Neuralink require a two-way stream of information that emerge. Yet many BCI experts dare only to
chip implanted in his brain both reads from and writes to “every aspect dream as far as fashioning these devices into
of your brain”, Musk said in a Neuralink Show a standard treatment for movement and
and Tell in 2022. speech limitations. “We could have therapies
tried to produce the facial expressions related There has been gradual progress on that for people in a much sooner time frame than
to these emotions. “We are looking at Ann’s front. In 2021, a study reported on a man with I ever thought,” says Henderson.
embodiment in that digital form,” says a spinal cord injury using his mind to direct a Along with similar firms such as Synchron
neurosurgeon Edward Chang at the University robot to pick up objects and place them on a and Blackrock Neurotech (which produces
of California, San Francisco, who led the study. platform while electrodes stimulated sensory the Utah array), Neuralink is often seen as
After seeing Johnson’s avatar in action, regions of his brain. The feedback made him a partner in that goal – even if researchers
Chang was astounded by what his team had feel as if he were touching the objects with his can’t yet see a clear path, or rationale, for that
done. He called Yuste in the middle of the night own palm and fingers. It also allowed him to company’s aim of creating cyborgs who can
to talk about the implications. Had technology complete each movement cycle twice as fast keep pace with superintelligent AIs. Neuralink
effectively expanded the boundaries of our as he could without it. didn’t respond to requests for comment.
bodies and minds? “It’s not moving a cursor But this is a long way from visions in “We are still struggling to match the function
or playing a video game,” he says. “This is which memories are implanted or skills like [of non-disabled people] ,” says Vargas-Irwin.
another level where you are looking at an kung fu are instantly downloaded, says Juan “We’re not at the point yet where we can think
embodied form of yourself.” Alvaro Gallego at Imperial College London. about enhancement.” ❚
Henderson’s team, among others, “Remembering the texture of the muffin that
is attempting to expand this ethereal you ate for breakfast when you were a kid is
communication to inner speech, as a way different from feeling that someone is rubbing Ingrid Wickelgren is a freelance
of understanding how thoughts become your thumb,” he says. “We don’t know how to journalist based in New Jersey
communications. “One can start to see how write memories or knowledge into the brain.”
conceptual info is represented throughout Moreover, experimental BCIs don’t allow

The back pages
Puzzles Almost the last word Tom Gauld for Feedback Twisteddoodles
Try our crossword, Why do some flowers New Scientist Worm food and for New Scientist
quick quiz and close up at night but A cartoonist’s take worms as food, plus Picturing the lighter
logic puzzle p45 others stay open? p46 on the world p47 sizeable careers p48 side of life p48
Stargazing at home
A lovely shower
It is nearly time for one of astronomy’s dazzling annual sights - the
Perseid meteor shower. This year is a bit special, says Abigail Beall
ONE of the highlights of the

astronomical calendar, and
something I look forward to every
year, is the Perseid meteor shower.
This impressive display, which is
visible in the northern and parts
of the southern hemisphere, will
peak on the evening of 12 August,
running into the early hours of
Abigail Beall is a features 13 August. What makes it special
editor at New Scientist and is that, at least where I am in the
author of The Art of Urban northern hemisphere, it tends
Astronomy. Follow her to happen on a warm evening –
@abbybeall unlike the equally spectacular
Geminids in December.
The number of meteors you
can expect to see during the
FRANK SUN/ALAMY
Perseids varies depending on
light pollution, cloud cover and
moonlight – but luckily this year,
the moon will be in its first quarter
on the evening of 12 August. It will
set around midnight, giving are caused by remnants of the the Big Dipper. This is the Pleiades
viewers plenty of moon-free comet Swift-Tuttle. star cluster in Taurus. Perseus sits
meteor spotting time. Meteor showers are named between the two.
Regardless of where you are after the constellation the meteors The only thing you have to do
in the world, after midnight local appear to come from in the sky. now is to make yourself really
time is the best time to look for In this case, it is the constellation comfortable and warm. Go
the meteor shower. Keep an eye Perseus, one of the biggest in somewhere away from light
on the cloud cover forecasts on the the night sky. pollution if you can, and, if not,
evenings before and after the peak You don’t have to be able to try to turn off any immediate
and pick a night that looks best for find Perseus to enjoy the meteor sources of light near you. Let
you to watch it, but you have a shower, since the shooting stars your eyes adjust for at least
better chance of seeing meteors will cross the sky in all directions. 15 minutes, lie back and wait
before the peak than after. But if you do want to find it, you for the meteors to appear.
Stargazing at home Meteors, or shooting stars, are can do so using the constellations During the peak, you can expect
appears every four weeks. bright flashes of light that quickly Cassiopeia and Taurus. up to 100 meteors in an hour,
Share your stargazing cross the night sky. They are Find the bright W or M shape particularly if the moon has set
successes with us on X and caused by pieces of dust and debris of Cassiopeia, which should be and you have a clear sky. No matter
Instagram @newscientist entering Earth’s atmosphere and in the north, then follow the how often you have seen the
using the hashtag burning up. Meteor showers imaginary arrow created by shower, it never fails to delight. ❚
#NewScientistStargazing happen when Earth’s orbit around the shallower of the two Vs.
the sun takes us through a cloud You should eventually see a small These articles are
Next week of dust and debris left behind by collection of stars that looks like a posted each week at
Mathematics of life a comet or asteroid. The Perseids miniature version of the Plough or newscientist.com/maker

The back pages Puzzles
Cryptic crossword #141 Set by Trurl Quick quiz #263

set by Bethan Ackerley
Scribble 1 Which galaxy supercluster’s name
zone means “immense heaven” in Hawaiian?
2 In what year was the Miller-Urey

experiment conducted, aiming to
simulate conditions of early Earth?
3 What name is given to the units making

up an insect’s compound eyes?
4 Which of the following hominin fossils

is thought to be the oldest: Toumaï,
Lucy or Ardi?

5 Subatomic particles with an equal
number of quarks and antiquarks are known
as what?
Answers on page 47
Answers and
the next quick
crossword BrainTwister
next week set by Katie Steckles
#31 Fold and cut
ACROSS DOWN Imagine a piece of paper in a portrait
1 Particular sort of marine vessel 1 Frisch was swallowing part of speech (5) (or vertical) orientation. If you want to
hit quays, it’s reported (7) 2 Energy stored in dish, for part of make this puzzle more challenging, this
5 Very junior and very senior nutrient processing system (5) imaginary piece of paper is all you need,
journalists raised to power (5) 3 Harness fire, we’re told, to get otherwise, you can always try with a real one.
8 Futurist who wrote enriched content of shell (4,3)
Mercury Springs (1,1,5) 4 Taser broken? Zap leader If you fold the paper in half twice (first
9 Two accounts from Newton, perhaps (5) with substitute (6) down, then across), and then cut a small
10 After a long wait, incomplete states 5 Sound as a bell! (5) piece off each corner, how many holes
may have been drawn here (5) 6 Reformed liberal writing for people will you make through the paper?
11 Hobble unsteadily after watching whose views are limited (7)
third of old horror movie (3,4) 7 In last month, tells lies about What about if you make three folds (down,
12 Indian material made of three metals (6) someone stripped in unit (7) then across, then down) before snipping
14 Is dishonest bachelor about 12 Metal sort of music, including the corners off? How many holes now?
to make brave descent? (6) acoustic emission (7)
17 Test 50 per cent of people, for instance (7) 13 Extra 24 hours seen in diary, Is there a connection between the number
19 It’s said to be about “battleships”: oddly, after spring (4,3) of folds and the number of holes?
might it be idly contemplated? (5) 15 Utilitarian’s crooked – a bad actor (7)
22 At home, door opening – former 16 Remote, shimmering heavenly body (6) Solution next week
partner’s pointing finger! (5) 18 Standard fare is about 9, for animators (5)
23 Australian animal cruelly chained (7) 20 Spirit of Russia held back
24 UK prime minister, or a lesser official? (5) by bleak Dovlatov (5)
25 Memory (a bit) provides protection (7) 21 Smallest Tesla carrying most of lead (5)
Our crosswords are now solvable online

newscientist.com/crosswords

The back pages Almost the last word
Is it easier to cycle uphill if you

Time for bed
have rested on the previous
Why do some flowers close up downhill slope, or pedalled fast?
at night but others stay open?
when an electric current is passed
Leslie Wilson through them. By measuring
Reading, Berkshire, UK minute variations in those
The timing of the opening vibrations over months or
of flowers often relates to the years, scientists can predict
pollinators they hope to attract. a clock’s accuracy.
Bees and hoverflies largely go The value of those variations
to bed early, in my garden at least. is so small that it needs to be
However, some flowers are set up projected over tens of billions
to attract night-flying moths. They of years in order to be stated
SHUTTERSTOCK/DUNCAN ANDISON
are often pale in colour and if I in seconds for the benefit of
stroll in the garden at twilight, us readers. One second in
I see that they look more 40 billion years is a little more
noticeable at that time of day. meaningful to most of us than
In particular, I am thinking 25 picoseconds per year.
about dame’s violet or night-
scented stocks, both of which Shimon Kolkowitz
release scent at night but give This week’s new questions Herst Chair Associate Professor
off very little of it in the daytime. of Physics, University of
I often see moths at these flowers. Going down Cycling on hilly roads, what is the best option to California, Berkeley, US
Evening primroses only open at save energy: go as fast as possible downhill to gain No clock made by humans can
dusk, and are similarly attractive momentum for the next climb, or stop pedalling to have a rest tick for 40 billion years. After
to moths. They have a luminescent and regain some strength? Jean-Luc Kerdelhué, Nantes, France all, the universe is a “mere”
quality in the half dark. 14 billion years old so far.
Roses don’t shut at night, but Lighting up Is it feasible to start a fire with a fart and a static The statement that an atomic
they tend to produce the most spark from human hair? Jed Stephens, via email clock is so accurate that it can tick
scent in warm sunlight when for 40 billion years without losing
bees are most active. I have a second is a mathematical
recently noticed that cultivated keeping the pollen, stigma and However, some flowers have metaphor intended to convey just
water lilies not only close at night overall flower warmer. Insect adapted so that they don’t need how accurate these clocks really
but also prefer not to open on pollinators prefer warmer flowers. to expend energy in opening and are, using a timescale we are
dull days. There are also flowers that closing. Many moth-pollinated familiar with: the second.
open at night rather than during flowers remain open all the time, The clock in question has
“Giant water lily the day. A classic example is the but only produce their perfume by been characterised to have an
flowers close in the giant water lily, which opens in the night, which can make a summer accuracy of 8 parts in 10¹9. This
evening and actively warms itself evening pretty magical. is roughly the same as the ratio
morning, trapping
up to attract pollinating beetles. of 1 second to the number of
pollinators inside, It then closes in the morning, seconds in 40 billion years
then release them Tick tock
trapping its pollinators inside (~1.26 × 10¹8 seconds). There are
in the evening” before releasing them, covered How do you check the accuracy also ~1.26 × 10¹8 nanoseconds in
in pollen, the following evening. of an atomic clock that “will 40 years, so it would be equally
Heather Whitney lose less than 1 second every meaningful to say that the clock
Reader in plant interactions, Guy Cox 40 billion years”, as per a could tick for 40 years without
University of Bristol, UK Sydney, Australia recent New Scientist article? losing a nanosecond, or that
There are several reasons why Plants have different pollination it could tick for an hour
flowers are thought to close at strategies. Many are pollinated Pat French without losing more than
night. One is to protect nectar by bees, which are active by day. Longdon-upon-Tern, roughly 3 femtoseconds
from nighttime thieves, and Others are pollinated by moths, Shropshire, UK (there are 10¹5 femtoseconds
potentially to keep the rest which are mostly active at night. Atomic clocks are based upon in 1 second). These statements
of the floral tissue safer from In fact, some flowers only quartz crystals. These crystals are all equivalent.
florivores. Another reason could open at night. vibrate at a very uniform rate The ideal way to check if a clock
be to prevent pollen from getting really is this accurate is to compare
wet, due to rain or dew forming Want to send us a question or answer? it to an even more accurate clock,
on the petals. Email us at lastword@newscientist.com but as no such clock exists, you
Closing petals at night also Questions should be about everyday science phenomena instead need two independent
helps to control the temperature, Full terms and conditions at newscientist.com/lw-terms clocks. After building them, you

Tom Gauld Answers
for New Scientist
Quick quiz #263
Answers
1 Laniakea
2 1952
3 Ommatidia
4 Toumaï
5 Mesons
Quick crossword
#163 Answers
ACROSS 1 Pectin, 4 Paraffin,
9 In rut, 10 Tyre tread,
11 Ceps, 12 Iron, 15 Raccoon,
16 Lobe, 19 Mako, 20 Oil palm,
23 Proof, 24 Ants, 25 Ball,
27 Dot matrix, 28 Polyp,
29 Permease, 30 Pollux
DOWN 1 Poincare, 2 Carapace,

3 Iota, 5 Adrenal cortex,
6 Automobile, 7/13 Fields medal,
8 Nodule, 10 Tyrannosaurus,
would compare them to each “No clock made by sufficient quantities. 14 Solar flare, 17 Parallel,
other over the course of hours humans can tick Combining matter and 18 Smallpox, 21 Sped up,
or days. If after 1 hour of ticking antimatter would also make 22 Doctor, 26 Up to
for 40 billion years.
independently the two clocks a very efficient spaceship
still agree with each other on After all, the universe propulsion system, even better
the elapsed time to better than is a ‘mere’ 14 billion than hydrogen fusion. This kind
3 femtoseconds, then they have years old so far” of propulsion would enable #30 Digital targets
the claimed accuracy of 8 parts space travel at sizable fractions Solution
in 10¹9, and you could argue that identical in every respect, but with of the speed of light.
if they did tick for 40 billion years an opposite charge. When these The optimal set of numbers is
straight they would agree with two types of matter come into John Mills 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 0, 0, 0, 0 and 0.
each other to within 1 second. contact, they destroy each other, Ben Lomond, California, US This gets 150 points.
releasing energy. Microscopic atomic bombs do
In fission and hydrogen exist. They are created inside The digits 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,
Going nuclear bombs, only some of the material nuclear reactors when some of 9, 9 and 9 can be arranged
is converted into energy, which the fuel becomes supercharged several ways to get a score
Is there a minimum size for an tends to limit their destructive with energy, These atoms are the of 100 – for example, as
atomic bomb? Would it be possible power. However, in a matter- unstable even-numbered isotopes 14, 19, 29, 39 and 50.
to make a microscopic one that antimatter weapon, when equal of uranium, plutonium and
results in a very small explosion? amounts of these types of matter curium and they explode with The highest possible score with
(continued) are combined, this should result the force of atom bombs on a the digits 0-9 is 95. There are
in their complete conversion into one-atom scale. This is called many ways to arrange this – for
Richard Glover energy. This shouldn’t only result spontaneous fission and it is the example: 19, 28, 37, 46 and 50.
London, UK in a greater yield of energy reason why nuclear reactor waste
While there is a minimum size compared with a conventional is especially dangerous.
for a fission bomb to sustain atomic bomb, but it also doesn’t For example, 30 nanograms
a chain reaction, there should have a minimum size limit. (billionths of a gram) of this
be no such limit on a matter- As yet, matter-antimatter stuff can increase the internal
antimatter weapon. weapons are confined to science rate of spontaneous fission in
For every particle of matter, fiction because of the difficulty your body by a factor of 100,
there is an antimatter equivalent of producing antimatter in and that isn’t good. ❚

The back pages Feedback
Diet of worms? Twisteddoodles for New Scientist Miller et al. – the peoples
of Earth opt for a mostly
The phrase “diet of worms” earthworms dietary regimen.
intrigues people (if it intrigues
them at all) in various ways. For
The tall and short of it
historians, it can trigger arguments
about a political convocation that News about height requirements
happened in the city of Worms, for certain courses at Vietnam
in Germany in the year 1521. National University’s school
For nutritionists, the phrase can of management and business
describe the work of scientists (HSB) has Feedback wondering.
who are considering whether Deutsche Welle reported on
all of today’s 8 billion or so 2 July that “female students must
humans could, if need be, subsist be at least 1.58 meters tall and
on a diet of mainly earthworms. male students at least 1.65 meters
Henry Miller, James Mulhall, to be considered for admission
Lou Aino Pfau, Rachel Palm this year”. The reasoning here:
and David Denkenberger, whom “the school aims to train future
Feedback regards as the all-star leaders and excellent managers”
team of the nutritional-diet-of- and “height is a decisive factor,
worms community, recently especially when it comes to
feasted on a mass of data. leadership and self-confidence”.
Postprandially, intellectually That news report says that after
speaking, they produced a public outcry, “HSB adjusted its
study called “Can foraging for admission criteria” so that “the rule
earthworms significantly reduce now applies only to one course,
global famine in a catastrophe?” Management and Security”.
It appears in the journal Biomass. What schools or other institutions
The five analysed four in the science, medical or tech world
techniques for efficiently fishing, Got a story for Feedback? have managed to secure strict
so to speak, for earthworms: Send it to feedback@newscientist.com height prohibitions for students
“digging and sorting, vermifuge or New Scientist, 9 Derry Street, London, W8 5HY or employees? If you know of
application, worm grunting, Consideration of items sent in the post will be delayed one, please send documentation
and electroshocking”. to Feedback with the subject
They asked the “can” (of worms) line “Big/Small Careers”. Some
question: Can the worms gathered Many others have focused on Mark Teaford examined the teeth job requirements sensibly specify
by these methods feed all of us the diets of the worms themselves. of some habitual worm-eaters. that applicants be physically able
humans, given the constraints of Charles Darwin attained They wrote up their observations, to use some particular job-related
“scalability, climate-related barriers some measure of his fame for for the Journal of Mammalogy, equipment. Don’t send those.
to foraging, and pre-consumption the 1881 book The Formation under the title “The diet of Feedback craves examples in which
processing requirements”? Their of Vegetable Mould Through the worms: An analysis of mole numbers, not needs, rule the day.
answer, in a word: no. Action of Worms. Nearly a century dental microwear”.
Their answer in 48 words: later, Kristian Fauchald and Peter “We compared microwear from Toilet humour
“The authors are not aware of Jumars’s “The diet of worms: shearing facets of lower molars
any studies of the human health A study of polychaete feeding from Parascalops breweri (the Inspired by Feedback’s collection
impacts of consuming a diet rich guilds” occupied 92 pages of hairy-tailed mole) and Scapanus of abandoned organisational
in foraged earthworms. However, the Oceanography and Marine orarius (the coast mole) with that slogans, Ken Taylor takes note
in the authors’ opinion, there is Biology Annual Review. from other small mammal species of a slogan about things that
reasonable evidence that such a Fauchald and Jumars including a tenrec, a hedgehog, were abandoned.
diet could be harmful and so should included a conversation-stopper 3 primates, and 2 bats.” “I live in a very rural part of
not be recommended unless of a sentence that is worth Some of the mole tooth [the] UK – Cumbria. There are lots
starvation is the alternative.” memorising and spouting if you wear patterns, they write, of isolated properties that are not
want to worm your way into the can be “plausibly explained by linked to the sewerage network,
Diets of worms spotlight at a party: “Alciopids the interaction between teeth so rely on septic tanks. These have
are holoplanktonic animals with and soil from the inside and to be emptied from time to time.
Miller, Mulhall, Pfau, Palm and muscular, eversible pharynges.” outside of earthworms”. I saw one such tanker going about
Denkenberger are but the most Other scientists studied what Silcox and Teaford’s mole its business. The slogan on the
recent front-runners in a long can happen when one eats worms, teeth research would take on side said ‘Yesterday’s meals on
parade of scientists drawn to especially if one isn’t a human. new significance if and when – wheels’. Nothing more to add…” ❚
investigate diets of worms. In 2002, Mary Silcox and despite the warning given by Marc Abrahams

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