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One Nobel Prize Later...
The Nobel-prize winning buckminsterfullerene, C60, discovery took place in September 1985. Its discoverers were Professor Harry Kroto, along with Richard Smalley and Robert Curl – but this wasn’t what...
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What colour were the dinosaurs?
The discovery that some dinosaurs were feathered rather than the initially-assumed scaly took palaeontology by storm. But the question didn’t end there. We still don’t know the extent to which feathers...
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The sweet taste of unknown
©TWDKI eat my artichoke-aubergine breakfast dish (my vegetarian take on Antigua and Barbuda’s traditional aubergine saltfish breakfast), and take a swig of water. It tastes sweet. But then, I’m not...
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Counterfeit brandy
Szalony kucharz via Wikipedia CommonsIn the 15th and 16th centuries, working out the alcohol percentage of wine was no easy feat. For ease, the authorities taxed alcohol according to volume rather than...
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Listening to the Ocean
This is a guest blog post. The article was adaped with permissions from Sofar Ocean. What has climate change done to oceans? And what do our oceans do for climate change?For more years than we can...
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Discovery
Carbon nanotubes were known before bucky balls – discovered in 1985 by Harry Kroto, Richard Smalley and Robert Curl. Yet eight years later, in 1993, Nature published two independent papers recording...
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Performing dogs and molecular roulette
Performing dogs Performing dogs take nerve-settling beta-blockers. HabjHow do we make new chemicals?It was a question James Black asked himself in 1964 (or perhaps a bit before then), when he developed...
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Resistance
In 1929, Alexander Fleming published his first observations of penicillin under a microscope. A sloppy technician, he’d returned from holiday to find a fluffy, white mass growing on his staphylococcus...
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A smart race
Nanorobot swarms are the stuff of sci-fi films, but smart dust is being developed now.Johan Oomen.An assembly of microelectromechanical systems or “MEMS”, smart dusts consist of a party of tiny robots...
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Going with the flow
Inkanoack (CC0 Public Domain via Pixabay)Ice is often overlooked. A small fraction of water, hostaged on land – it’s even missed out on the water cycle provided by the national curriculum. However, as...
View ArticleOf quartz – A colourful problem
Where does colour come from? Pigments, we say: the ability of certain materials to absorb and reflect different colours of light as electrons are excited along or within their structure. It’s true:...
View ArticleThree Things I Don’t Know (Part I): Cold
So, I asked myself, what unanswered scientific questions do I have, and are there answers out there for me? I had a think. And I came up with a list of three questions – and did my research. So here is...
View ArticleThree Things I Don’t Know (Part II): ‘Flu
So, I asked myself, what unanswered scientific questions do I have, and are there answers out there for me? I had a think. And I came up with a list of three questions – and did my research. So here is...
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Three Things I Don’t Know (Part III): Eyes
So, I asked myself, what unanswered scientific questions do I have, and are there answers out there for me? I had a think. And I came up with a list of three questions – and did my research. So here is...
View ArticleTypes of twins
Scientists are very interested in twins because it helps us identify the differences between genetic and environmental factors that influence health and behaviour. As a result, there’s been a lot of...
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Stress inner ear
Whale earwax has been studied to unlock the chemical history of the oceans[1]. Forming as a plug, whale earwax has rings in it like a tree that map the history of their hormones – letting us know when...
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The smallest astronauts ever
The extremes of space are sufficient to rip the atmosphere off Mars (our is protected by our magnetic field!) – so what hope does a little bacterium have? Actually, it turns out, rather a lot. Despite...
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The methane mystery
The methane mystery Methane on Mars is really interesting – and really hard to explain. On Earth, methane signals microbes: they produce it, lots, as they break down organic matter. Although there are...
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Sailing stones – a SOLVED scientific mystery
Have you heard of the sailing stones? One of the strangest natural phenomena ever identified, these are dolomite and syenite rocks around 8-17 kg that rest on the flat, barren lakebed known as the...
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Whale geologists
The voice of the fin whale penetrates the earth’s crust beneath the sea floor – a whale born ultrasound. The Earth’s layered structure. (1) inner core; (2) outer core; (3) lower mantle; (4) upper...
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