Herbal Viagra actually contains the real thing

IF IT looks too good to be true, it probably is. Several "herbal remedies" for erectile dysfunction sold online actually contain the active ingredient from Viagra. Michael Lamb at Arcadia University in Glenside, Pennsylvania, and colleagues purchased 10...

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Smartphone projector breathes life into storybooks

Hal Hodson, technology reporter!--By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and C found at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/. -->!-- This script tag will cause the Brightcove Players defined above it to be created as soonas the line is read by the browser. If you wish to have the player instantiated only afterthe rest of the HTML is processed and the...

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Stem cells aboard SpaceX will seed mice back on Earth

Stem cell research is taking off – literally. When the SpaceX Dragon capsule sets off for the International Space Station on 1 March, its cargo will include frozen embryonic stem cells – kick-starting a clever experiment that uses short-lived mice to investigate the human health effects of long-haul space flights....

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US nuclear dump is leaking toxic waste

Waste from the production of US nukes is on the loose. Toxic cargo is escaping from six of the 177 ageing tanks at the Hanford site in Washington state where the nation stores two-thirds of its high-level nuclear waste, most of it from the production of nuclear bombs. ...

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China takes steps to clean up 'cancer villages'

The Chinese government has acknowledged the existence of "cancer villages": areas where rates of cancer are unusually high, probably because of industrial and agricultural contamination of drinking and irrigation water. The reference...

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Armband adds a twitch to gesture control

And you thought depth-sensing cameras were cool: well, now there's a gesture control device that looks like a sweatband. It lets you control everything from computers to flying drones just by moving the muscles in your forearm. ...

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New blood test finds elusive fetal gene problem

A NEW non-invasive blood test for pregnant women could make it easier to catch abnormalities before their child is born. Human cells should have two copies of each chromosome but sometimes the division is uneven. Existing tests count the fragments of placental...

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Amazon to open market in second-hand MP3s and e-books

A new market for second-hand digital downloads could let us hold virtual yard sales of our ever-growing piles of intangible possessions WHY buy second-hand? For physical goods, the appeal is in the price – you don't mind the creases in a book or rust spots on a car if it's a bargain. Although digital objects...

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First MRI movies capture fetal brain connecting up

Sandrine Ceurstemont, editor, New Scientist TV!--By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and Cfound at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/. -->It's the sequel to fertilisation:the brains of unborn babies have now been imaged in action, showing how connections form. This fMRI movie, produced by Moriah Thomason from Wayne State University in Detroit,...

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Sharing and streaming at heart of new PlayStation 4

Douglas Heaven, reporter Sony's Andrew House introduces the PlayStation 4 at a news conference yesterday (Image: Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images)It's typically only spoilt children and brilliant eccentrics that get away with not turning up to their own party. Sony's long-awaited announcement last night of the PlayStation 4 games console - its successor to the seven-year-old and 70-million-selling...

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Today on New Scientist: 19 February 2013

Doctors would tax sugary drinks to combat obesity Hiking the price of fizzy drinks would cut consumption and so help fight obesity, urges the British Academy of Medical Royal CollegesSpace station's dark matter hunter coy about findings Researchers on the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, which sits above the International Space Station, have collected their first results - but won't reveal them...

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Insert real news events into your mobile game

Paul Marks, chief technology correspondent(Image: MultiPlay.io)Seen it in the news? Now play it: a mobile-game programming system allows 3D depictions of news events to be introduced into the action. It's been developed by MultiPlay.io, a British start-up that says the technology could make gameplay more current and provide new ways for designers and coders to make cash - perhaps selling "news injection"...

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The fish with a rainbow eye

Michael Marshall, environment reporter(Image: Randall Benton/The Sacramento Bee)These eyes are positively spectral. They belong to a Caribbean trumpetfish, and their many colours are created by the refraction of light.Rays of light bend as they pass in and out of the fish's eyes, and different colours of light bend different amounts. As a result, what was previously white light splinters into bands...

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False memories prime immune system for future attacks

IN A police line-up, a falsely remembered face is a big problem. But for the body's police force – the immune system – false memories could be a crucial weapon. When a new bacterium or virus invades the body, the immune system mounts...

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False memories prime immune system for future attacks

IN A police line-up, a falsely remembered face is a big problem. But for the body's police force – the immune system – false memories could be a crucial weapon. When a new bacterium or virus invades the body, the immune system mounts...

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Brecht's Galileo is a play for our times

Tiffany O'Callaghan, Opinion editor Ian McDiarmid as Galileo (left) and James Tucker as the Bursar (Image: Ellie Kurtz)It has been more than 400 years since Galileo Galilei pointed his telescope toward the night sky and observed the movement of the moons around Jupiter, providing proof that all things do not revolve around the Earth - and drawing the ire of the Catholic church. And it has been nearly...

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Runaway stars to fill in the blanks in Milky Way map

GUIDES to the galaxy might call it Zona Galactica Incognita – the half of our home galaxy we know little about. Indeed, the Milky Way is one of the least charted spiral galaxies in the nearby universe. Now it seems that stars kicked out of their birth clusters can help fill in the void and create the first proper...

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US should vaccinate poultry to stop killer salmonella

It is a case of putting the bottom line before our health. This year, a million Americans will succumb to salmonella poisoning. Several hundred will die. Yet in Europe, a cheap vaccine for chickens has slashed the number of cases. Vaccination in Iowa shows US lives can be saved too – but US rules give meat producers...

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Robotic tormenter depresses lab rats

Hal Hodson, technology reporter(Image: Chris Nash/iamchrisphotography/Getty)Lab rats have a new companion, but it's not friendly. Researchers at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan, have developed a robotic rat called WR-3 whose job is to induce stress and depression in lab animals, creating models of psychological conditions on which new drugs can be tested. Animal are used throughout medicine...

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Can the internet revive US democracy?

Jim Giles, consultantTech-savvy campaigns get mixed results, as the Arab Spring shows (Image: William Dupuy/Picturetank)Gavin Newsom's Citizenville shows that technology can empower people, but the book fails to explore deep-rooted problems within the democratic processTHERE'S a lot of crime in Oakland, California. But until a few years ago, citizens had little way of assessing the scale of the...

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