Babies doing well in delivery overseen by 50 doctors in California

It's not just Jeremy Kyle and Trisha Goddard who are rivals: the polygraph experts on the two shows are engaged in a bitter defamation battle. Jerome Taylor reports

What really draws couples together? The mysteries of hormones are only now being unravelled – and giving us fascinating new insights into why we behave the way we do

Planet of the japes

Tributes pour in for conductor who founded City of London Sinfonia

Creativity Unlimited: Thinking Inside the Box for Business Innovation, By Michael Dahlén Wiley (£19.99)

There are some episodes that cast modern Britain in a very shabby light. Take two recent examples. Earlier this month, two DJs, both employed by the BBC, rang up an elderly actor and left offensive messages on his answering machine, supposedly for the purpose of amusing their listeners. We have also learned of a nurse who took a patient's blood pressure while casually chatting on her mobile phone.

Most of us know or can at least imagine what broken-heartedness feels like. But what does it actually involve for the body? Cathy Holding gets to know her stress cardiomyopathy from her catecholamines

Checks are urgently needed to find almost four million people who may be unaware that they are at high risk of heart disease, specialists have warned.

At least Frankie Gavin, the not quite light enough British lightweight, was still standing when his Olympic medal hopes were counted out before he had a chance to step into the ring. Poor Gary Russell Jr, one of the big hopes in the US boxing squad, knocked himself unconscious in his ill-fated attempt to make the 119lb weight in the bantamweight division.

Anthrax is an acute infectious disease caused by a bacterium, Bacillus anthracis, which can form highly resistant spores that can lie dormant in the soil for many decades. It has been extensively investigated as a potential biological weapon by Britain, America, Iraq and the former Soviet Union, although it has never been used in open warfare.

Today, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration marks its first half-century of exploration and discovery. But missions to the Moon and beyond are only part of the story. Without Nasa's scientists, life on Earth would be very different indeed. Rob Sharp chronicles a technological revolution

N ow what do you think was the response of the medical establishment to news that the contraceptive pill can be bought over the internet? You surely guessed it in one. The doctors – as represented by their spokesperson at the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists – do not like it at all.

Women will be able to get the Pill online without having to visit their doctor under a new service being launched today.