The Independent - Science RSS Feed

Asian super-bean to gain roots in Britain

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:00:01 GMT

They have been touted as a super-food and credited with everything from staving off heart disease and cancer to maintaining Victoria Beckham's super-slim figure. Now the Asian edamame bean is being grown commercially on British soil for the first time, allowing shoppers to satisfy oriental tastes while still "buying British".

Asian super-bean to gain roots in Britain

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:00:01 GMT

New species of giant pterosaur discovered

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:24:07 GMT

A new species of pterosaurs which had a wingspan the size of a family car has been uncovered by scientists.

Super ants 'on way to Britain' warns study

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 08:09:33 GMT

A new ant which was discovered less than 20 years ago could be on the way to wreak havoc in parks and gardens of Northern Europe including Britain, according to a report published today.

Mother's 'horror show' as Facebook gatecrashers invade birthday party

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 00:00:01 GMT

A mother told how her daughter's 16th birthday party descended into an "absolute horror show" when about 300 people gatecrashed her luxury home after it was advertised on Facebook.

Turn veggie to save planet, says Sir Paul

Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Sir Paul McCartney has teamed up with a Nobel Prize-winning scientist to urge people to become vegetarian to save the planet from the greenhouse gases created by rearing livestock.

Fungi scientists are endangered species

Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

They give us our daily bread and beer, provide us with life-saving medicines and recycle our waste, yet the study of fungi – life forms that include everything from penicillin to truffles – could end within the next 10 years in Britain.

A Martian's view of Mars

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Mars has inspired the human imagination for thousands of years. The Greeks and Romans identified the Red Planet with the god of war, and the ancient Babylonians before them named it after Nergal, the fiery god of destruction and the underworld. They saw something sinister and malevolent in the erratically moving point of reddish light that refused to obey the astronomical rules of the night sky with its rigidly-ordered suite of stars.

How turtles got their shells... and other evolutionary mysteries solved

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

The fossilised remains of an ancient reptile that lived 220 million years ago may have solved the puzzle of how the turtle got its shell and, in the process, cleared up one of the most enduring mysteries of animal evolution.

Yippee! Houston we can turn urine into water

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:45:08 GMT

With a cry of "yippee!" the commander of the orbiting International Space Station told mission control that a contraption for turning urine into drinking water was finally working and the crew were heading to bed.

Acidic seas threaten coral and mussels

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Rising carbon dioxide levels are increasing acidity in the oceans 10 times faster than scientists thought, posing a greater threat to shell-forming creatures such as coral and mussels.

UK at risk of losing lead in stem cell research

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Britain's attempts to take stem cell research from the laboratory to the clinic are being undermined by government red tape and a lack of interest from City investors, according to experts meeting in London today.

Funding needed to keep stem cell research in UK

Mon, 24 Nov 2008 13:38:17 GMT

The UK risks losing its command of stem-cell research to the USA, a group of leading scientists said today.

Scientists 'wrong about ecstasy'

Sun, 23 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Controversial plans to downgrade ecstasy to a class B drug will be the subject of fierce debate on Tuesday, when the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) is presented with evidence on why the drug should remain class A.

The stuff of dreams

Sun, 23 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

What are dreams made of? This question has troubled the finest minds ever since people first woke up. Now, the ICA in London thinks it can shed some light on the matter. And, in the interests of science, I agreed to help by spending a night in an art gallery, sleeping with 20 people I had never met before.

Patient, heal thyself: Grow your own new organ

Sat, 22 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Surgeons crossed another medical frontier this week with the transplant of a windpipe grown from stem cells – the "mother" cells of the body capable of developing into specialised tissue. The success of the operation in Barcelona on Claudia Castillo, a 30-year-old mother-of-two, proved what scientists have long promised – that stem cells can now be used to fashion replacement body parts.

Patient, heal thyself: Grown your own new organ

Sat, 22 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

You're not boarding with that – how transplant pioneers were grounded

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

The transplant of a lab-grown trachea was widely hailed as a major breakthrough in the science of stem- cell technology this week. But it almost never happened.

The Big Question: Has the space station achieved anything or is it a waste of money?

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Ooops! A look at items lost in space

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 09:37:43 GMT

It's not easy holding on to a small bag some 200 miles above Earth.

Lost in space: the astronauts' toolbox

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 09:32:24 GMT

A spacewalking astronaut accidentally let go of her tool bag after a grease gun inside it exploded, and helplessly watched as it floated away with everything inside.

Claudia Castillo: The pioneer's story

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

Claudia Castillo was diagnosed with tuberculosis in 2004. "It started with a cough and I spent three months trying to find out what was wrong with me," she said. "I had many wrong diagnoses."

The medical miracle

Wed, 19 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

A 30-year-old Spanish woman has made medical history by becoming the first patient to receive a whole organ transplant grown using her own cells.

Large bill for Large Hadron Collider fix

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 11:55:38 GMT

Fixing the world's largest atom smasher will cost at least £14 million and may take until early in the Northern Hemisphere summer, its operator CERN said.

Discovered in a tender embrace, the first known nuclear family

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:00:01 GMT

A Stone Age burial ground, where the bodies of adults and children lay together for thousands of years entwined in tender embraces, has provided the earliest evidence for the existence of the nuclear family.