July 23 - 29, 2016 New Scientist

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FERTILE OR FUTILE? Myths and truths about getting pregnant

WOBBLING STAR Planet Nine pushed our sun off its axis

EBOLA EYEWITNESS The man who discovered the world’s deadliest virus WEEKLY July 23 -29, 2016

POKÉMON GO AWAY! Is anywhere out of bounds for augmented reality?

WE WANT OUR INTERNET BACK! The grassroots fight to regain control and what it means for you

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CONTENTS

Volume 231 No 3083

This issue online newscientist.com/issue/3083

Leader

News 5

8

News

Reversing the menopause

6

UPFRONT Bald eagles starving in Florida. SpaceX sends DNA analyser to ISS. GM mozzies beating dengue. New World Heritage sites 8 THIS WEEK Planet Nine tilted the sun. Your grandad made you fat. Tracking Stone-Age Britons on the beach. How to find fake nukes 14 IN BRIEF Kiss of death activates ant killer squad. Ducklings dabble in abstract thought. Pulsar swoosh. Self-folding graphene

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Breakthrough claims to make older women fertile again

Maybe baby... doctors and fertility clinics often contradict each other. Who to trust?

On the cover

Analysis

26

30 Fertile or futile? Busting pregnancy myths 10 Wobbling star Planet Nine pushed our sun off its axis 38 Ebola eyewitness The man who discovered the world’s deadliest virus 22 Pokémon Go away Bounds of virtual reality 34 No great shakes Stop a quake in its tracks

We want our internet back! The grassroots fight to regain control

Cover image Ahoy There Studio

16 Psychiatry’s last taboo Should those with unbearable mental illness be allowed to die? 18 COMMENT Human evolution at an end? Far from it. Decimating biodiversity should worry us all 19 INSIGHT Tackle police prejudice with small steps

Technology 20 Video games to help troops handle battle. Meeting Hubo, the world’s most advanced robot. Pokémon Go and the limits of VR

Aperture 24 Storks at all-you-can-eat buffet

Features

Features

34

26 We want our internet back! (see above left) 30 Fertile or futile? Myths and truths about getting pregnant 34 No great shakes (see left) 38 PEOPLE Peter Piot, the man who discovered Ebola

How to stop an earthquake in its tracks

TED SOQUI/CORBIS VIA GETTY IMAGES

No great shakes

Culture 42 Wild at heart When tech gets too complex to understand, time to copy field biologists 43 All lit up Finland’s starry art knows its limits 44 Red roads Science and the counterculture

Coming next week… You are junk It’s not our genes that make us human

Regulars 52 LETTERS Neo-Luddites versus AI 56 FEEDBACK Get a job, why don’t you... 57 THE LAST WORD Learn to like your voice

Conquering the deep The new golden age of ocean exploration

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 3

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One born every minute Who should we believe when it comes to fertility? HOW old is too old to have a baby? more alternatives. Egg freezing, For many women in their 30s for instance, allows women to and 40s, that question nags away squirrel away eggs from their at them as they try to strike a years of peak fertility and hence balance between their career, defer IVF without worrying about their finances and their desire declining egg quality. to start a family. Meanwhile, science keeps on If you ask the medical pushing the boundaries of the profession for an answer, the possible. As we report this week, message is clear: don’t delay. Get researchers at a fertility clinic in pregnant in your 20s if possible, Greece claim to have rejuvenated when female fertility is thought the ovaries of post-menopausal to peak. Any later and you face women, enabling them to the prospect of infertility, or produce viable eggs once more. health problems associated with If the technique works – which is older pregnancy (see page 30). However, the real world seems “Women starting families in their 50s may come to to be ignoring that advice. In be seen as unremarkable, England and Wales, the mean but not routine” age for a woman to give birth has been rising since the mid 1970s a big if at the moment – it would and is now over 30. Women in potentially enable women of any their 40s have more babies than age to have children (see page 8). those under 20, and the highest That is way in the future, but it number of births per capita is is clear that the direction of travel among women aged 30 to 34. is towards older motherhood. These demographic shifts Even if regeneration fails, egg are driven largely by social and embryo freezing could open and economic trends: the the door to post-menopausal increasing numbers of women pregnancy. Women could freeze in professional occupations, for eggs in their 20s and use them example, and the spiralling cost in their 50s, for example. of buying a home. But IVF has This isn’t an issue yet. But also played a big part, giving never say never. A small number couples the option of delaying of children are already born to in the knowledge that there is mothers over 50 every year, by a plan B – albeit a risky one. IVF using donated eggs. If there Couples will soon have even

was a way for older women to use their own eggs to have genetically related children, demand could increase. Assuming life expectancy continues to rise, the general health of the population carries on improving and the twin pressures of career and home ownership keep moving in the same direction, women starting families in their 50s might come to be seen as fairly unremarkable. But it won’t become routine. Most IVF cycles don’t result in the birth of a child, whether using fresh or frozen eggs. For the foreseeable future, then, couples will continue to face tough choices. They aren’t helped by inconsistent messages emanating from doctors on the one hand and fertility clinics on the other – who are often the same people wearing different hats. Faced with this mismatch, it helps to remember that much of the fertility industry is a profitmaking business that has been criticised by academics for making excessive promises and offering techniques that have never been properly validated. Of course, choosing when to have a child can be the most difficult decision of a lifetime and plan B can be the right one. But caveat emptor. ■ 23 july 2016 | NewScientist | 5

SPACE X

UPFRONT

SpaceX delivers again THE latest bag of goodies has been launched to the International Space Station (ISS). A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off just after midnight local time on 18 July from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The rocket’s first stage returned safely to ground just minutes later, marking SpaceX’s fifth successful landing. Afterwards, SpaceX boss Elon Musk tweeted that this stage was ready to fly again. The uncrewed Dragon capsule made its way to the ISS, where it was due to arrive on Wednesday carrying a selection of food, water and other supplies for the station’s astronauts, along with more exotic cargo. The other cargo includes a USB-stick-sized DNA sequencer

called MinION, made by UK firm Oxford Nanopore Technologies. It is the first DNA analyser to head into space, and may eventually allow astronauts to directly monitor changes to their genetic code caused by the harsh radiation environment in orbit. For this first flight, astronauts will just test that the technology works in microgravity by analysing the genomes of bacteria, viruses and mice. Also on board is a new docking port to be attached to the outside of the ISS. This will allow future crewed spacecraft to dock automatically and is designed to work with SpaceX’s Dragon V2 and Boeing’s Starliner capsule, both of which are expected to make their first trips to the ISS in the next couple of years.

–Blazing a trail–

Will Russia see Rio? RUSSIA is facing a complete ban from the Rio Olympic games following a damning investigation into doping claims made against Russian athletes competing at major international events over the past five years. The competitions included the 2012 London Olympics, the Sochi Winter Olympics in 2014, the 2013 World University Games in Kazan and the 2013 IAAF World Championships in Moscow. Media revelations about the scale of doping first appeared in May

“Doped samples from Russian competitors were swapped through a mouse hole drilled in the wall” based on evidence from Grigory Rodchenkov, former director of the lab in Moscow where athletes’ samples were handled, which was accredited by the World AntiDoping Agency. He is now in hiding in the US. The investigation whose results were released this week was launched in the wake of 6 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

Rodchenkov’s allegations. Authored by Canadian law professor Richard McLaren, it claims that the Russian Sports Ministry devised complex systems to prevent urine samples from testing positive and to secretly administer cocktails of steroids to athletes prior to competitions. The most damning findings involved a scam in the testing labs at the Sochi Olympics – and with full involvement of the FSB, the state security service – which used a mouse hole drilled in the wall of the laboratory to swap doped samples of Russian competitors for clean ones. Russia went on to claim 33 medals in Sochi. The International Olympic Committee, which met on Tuesday to discuss the revelations, expressed its dismay at the findings. “They show a shocking and unprecedented attack on the integrity of sport and on the Olympic Games,” said IOC president Thomas Bach in a statement. “Therefore, the IOC will not hesitate to take the toughest sanctions available against any individual or organisation implicated.”

Mozzies cut dengue GENETICALLY modified mosquitoes really do seem to reduce disease. That’s the finding of a trial in Piracicaba, Brazil, involving the release of male Aedes mosquitoes modified to produce non-viable offspring. Just by eliminating standing water where mosquitoes breed, Piracicaba halved the incidence of dengue during the 2015-16 dengue season, compared with the previous year. But in areas where the mosquitoes were released

too, cases of dengue fell by more than 90 per cent. The result matters as regulators want evidence that this method cuts disease, not just wild mosquito numbers. This small trial doesn’t provide the rigorous evidence that epidemiologists need, but it demonstrates potential, says Hadyn Parry, chief executive of Oxitec, the UK firm that developed the mosquitoes. The US Food and Drug Administration is considering whether to approve use of these insects.

Bald eagles go hungry in Florida IT’S short rations for America’s iconic raptors. Eagles at Florida Bay are feeding their young less than twice a day on average, so the chicks get much less food than those elsewhere. Matthew Hanson and John Baldwin at Florida Atlantic University made the discovery by installing cameras at four bald eagle nests in Florida Bay. “Florida has always historically been a stronghold for the species,” says Bryan Watts at the College of William & Mary in

Williamsburg, Virginia. So why are bald eagles there in decline? A collapsing ecosystem may be to blame in the bay. In recent decades, high salt levels have killed off sea grasses, releasing sediments that triggered algal blooms, which in turn killed fish that eagles eat. Development in the Everglades may have led to these problems by disrupting the flow of fresh water into the bay (Southeastern Naturalist, doi.org/bmqk).

For new stories every day, visit newscientist.com/news

Shooting for Mars NASA wants an orbiter worthy of human missions to Mars. The agency has given contracts to five engineering companies – Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Orbital ATK and Space

© OCTAVIO ABURTO

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Cluck off Don’t want to get bitten? Hang out with a hen. Malaria-carrying mosquitoes seem to avoid the odour of chickens, according to fresh research. Isolating the compounds involved may lead to new ways of repelling the life-threatening pests (Malaria, DOI: 10.1186/ s12936-016-1386-3).

“Next-gen orbiters will rely on harnessing the sun’s energy to accelerate ions, propelling the craft”

Far out

JAMIE FELTON/GETTY

Systems Loral – to demonstrate what kind of spacecraft each one can build for a potential mission in the 2020s. Today’s Mars orbiters are vital for relaying data from rovers back Nature sites listed to Earth. To support a human EIGHT natural sites around the mission, the next generation will world have been added to need to be superior in terms of UNESCO’s World Heritage list, propulsion, imaging capabilities celebrating places of outstanding and communication. cultural or natural value. The sites Solar-electric propulsion will include sandstone canyons and be key to their design. Already in valleys in Chad, forests sheltering use in Earth-orbiting satellites, leopards and Asiatic black bears in it works by harnessing the sun’s China, and wetlands in Iraq. energy to accelerate ions, The latest additions bring the propelling the craft. total number of UNESCO sites to Future orbiters must be able 1052. Although they may feature to fly close to the Martian surface historically significant to get high-resolution pictures of good landing sites. They will “It’s going to make also boast high-fidelity conservation easier and communication systems to it’s going to be easier to cooperate with a ground crew. mitigate threats to areas” NASA would also like to see orbiters that can return to Earth architecture or “exceptional with Martian samples sent up by natural beauty”, many are in capsule from a planned rover. danger of degradation, for example, from the effects of climate change. Listing an area helps governments and NGOs preserve it, says Juan Bezaury-Creel at the Nature Conservancy in Arlington, Virginia. One of the newly designated sites is the Archipiélago de Revillagigedo in Mexico, pictured above. Each of its four islands in the eastern Pacific is the tip of an underwater volcano. The surrounding waters host whales and sharks that will now be –Emblematic but failing to thrive– protected, says Bezaury-Creel. “It’s

–Better protected, in principle–

going to make conservation easier, and it’s going to be easier to mitigate threats that come to the area,” he says. Richard Thomas of Mistaken Point Ecological Reserve in Newfoundland, Canada, another of the newly listed sites, says the designation will boost tourism and may be an economic “shot in the arm” for the region.

Fix the ozone fix SAVING the ozone layer has inadvertently warmed our planet – but the error is about to be fixed. When nations signed the Montreal Protocol in 1987, the plan was to save the ozone layer by banning ozone-eating CFCs in aerosols, refrigerators and airconditioning units. Ozonefriendly HFCs were seen as a great substitute. But HFCs are potent greenhouse gases, and 30 years later their manufacture is rising globally by 7 per cent each year. Last November in Dubai, signatories to the Montreal Protocol agreed in principle to amend the agreement in order to outlaw HFCs – better alternatives now exist. At a meeting in Vienna, Austria, this week, they will begin the task of setting targets and timetables for doing that. The hope is that they will eventually be able to phase them out.

South Africa’s new MeerKAT radio telescope has discovered more than 1300 galaxies in a tiny patch of sky where we’d only spotted 70 before. The telescope is only at a quarter of its eventual capacity, with 16 of 64 dishes operational.

Zika sex The Zika virus seems to have passed from a woman to a man via sex. This is the first time this has been reported (MMWR, doi.org/bmqg). The woman had unprotected sex just after she returned to New York from an affected country. Earlier cases of sexual transmission involved men infecting women.

Traffic light party Fireflies’ flash colours harmonise with their habitats. Males in greener, more vegetated habitats evolved yellower flashes to contrast with ambient light reflected from vegetation. Females have a different strategy: because they broadcast while sitting on leaves, they use greener flashes that reflect better off leaf surfaces to boost their signal (Evolution, doi.org/bmn4).

Cuckoo karma Cuckoos that take a shortcut over Spain are more likely to die than those opting for a longer route over the Balkans. This is the first time a population decline in the common cuckoo has been linked to its choice of migration route. Drought at stopover sites in Spain may be to blame for higher death rates over the Western route (Nature Communications, doi.org/bmqq).

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 7

THIS WEEK

Reversing the menopause MENOPAUSE need not be the end number steadily dwindles, with of fertility. A team claims to have fertility thought to peak in the found a way to rejuvenate postearly 20s. Around the age of 50, menopausal ovaries, enabling which is when menopause them to release fertile eggs, New normally occurs, the ovaries stop Scientist can reveal. releasing eggs – but most women The team says its technique has are already largely infertile by restarted periods in menopausal this point, as ovulation becomes women, including one who had more infrequent in the run-up. not menstruated in five years. The menopause comes all-tooIf the results hold up to wider soon for many women, says scrutiny, the technique may Sfakianoudis. boost declining fertility in older The age of motherhood is women, allow women with early creeping up, and more women are menopause to get pregnant, and having children in their 40s than help stave off the detrimental ever before (see graph, below). But health effects of menopause. as more women delay pregnancy, “It offers a window of hope “It offers hope that that menopausal women will menopausal women will be be able to get pregnant using able to get pregnant using their own genetic material,” their own genetic material” says Konstantinos Sfakianoudis, a gynaecologist at the Greek fertility clinic Genesis Athens. many find themselves struggling “It is potentially quite exciting,” to get pregnant. Women who says Roger Sturmey at Hull York hope to conceive later in life are Medical School in the UK. “But it increasingly turning to IVF and also opens up ethical questions egg freezing, but neither are over what the upper age limit of a reliable back-up option (see mothers should be.” “The pregnancy pause”, page 30). Women are thought to be The menopause also comes born with all their eggs. Between early – before the age of 40 – for puberty and the menopause, this around 1 per cent of women,

Older mothers The percentage of women giving birth in England and Wales who are 40 or older has quadrupled since 1980

4.2 3.8 3.4 2.5

8 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

20 15

20 10

20 05

20 00

19 95

1.4

19 90

19 85

19 80

1.1

SOURCE: ONS.GOV.UK

1.7 1.0

either because of a medical condition or certain cancer treatments, for example. To turn back the fertility clock for women who have experienced early menopause, Sfakianoudis and his colleagues have turned to a blood treatment that is used to help wounds heal faster. Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) is made by centrifuging a sample of a person’s blood to isolate growth factors – molecules that trigger the growth of tissue and blood vessels. It is widely used to speed the repair of damaged bones and muscles, although its effectiveness is unclear. The treatment may work by stimulating tissue regeneration. Sfakianoudis’s team has found that PRP also seems to rejuvenate older ovaries, and presented some of their results at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology annual meeting in Helsinki, Finland, this month. When they injected PRP into the ovaries of menopausal women, they say it restarted their menstrual cycles, and enabled them to collect and fertilise the eggs that were released. “I had a patient whose menopause had established five years ago, at the age of 40,” says Sfakianoudis. Six months after the team injected PRP into her ovaries, she experienced her first period since menopause. Sfakianoudis’s team has since been able to collect three eggs from this woman. The researchers say they have successfully fertilised two using her husband’s sperm. These embryos are now on ice – the team is waiting until there are at least three before implanting some in her uterus. The team isn’t sure how this

PETER DAZELEY/GETTY

A blood treatment seems to restore periods and fertility to menopausal women. Is it too good to be true, asks Jessica Hamzelou

technique works, but it may be that the PRP stimulates stem cells. Some research suggests a small number of stem cells continue making new eggs throughout a woman’s life, but we don’t know much about these yet. It’s possible that growth factors encourage such stem cells to regenerate tissue and produce ovulation hormones. “It’s biologically plausible,” says Sturmey.

Fertilised eggs Sfakianoudis’s team says it has given PRP in this way to around 30 women between the ages of 46 and 49, all of whom want to have children. The researchers say they have managed to isolate and fertilise eggs from most of them. “It seems to work in about twothirds of cases,” says Sfakianoudis. “We see changes in biochemical patterns, a restoration of menses, and egg recruitment and

In this section ■ Planet Nine tilted the sun, page 10 ■ Psychiatry’s last taboo, page 16 ■ Pokémon Go and the limits of VR, page 22

an alternative way to boost the supply of youthful hormones, delaying menopause symptoms. However, Sfakianoudis’s team hasn’t yet published any of its findings. “We need larger studies before we can know for sure how effective the treatment is,” says Sfakianoudis. Some have raised concerns about the safety and efficacy of the procedure, saying the team should have tested the approach in animals first. “This experiment

fertilisation.” His team has yet to implant any embryos in postmenopausal women, but hopes to do so in the coming months. PRP has already been helpful for pregnancy in another group of women, says Sfakianoudis. Around 10 per cent of women who seek fertility treatment at his clinic have a uterus that embryos find difficult to attach to – whether due to cysts, scarring from miscarriages or having a thin uterine lining. “They are the most difficult to treat,” says Sfakianoudis. But after injecting PRP into the uteruses of six women who had had multiple miscarriages and failed IVF attempts, three became pregnant through IVF. “They are now in their second trimester,” says Sfakianoudis. Fertility aside, the technique could also be desirable for women who aren’t trying to conceive. The hormonal changes that trigger

STEVE GSCHMEISSNER/SPL

“One woman had been in menopause for 5 years. Six months after treatment, she had a period” would not have been allowed to take place in the UK,”says Sturmey. “The researchers need to do some more work to make sure that the resulting eggs are OK,” says Adam Balen at the British Fertility Society. To know if the technique really does improve fertility, the team will also need to carry out –Never too old?– randomised trials, in which a control group isn’t given PRP. menopause can also make the Virginia Bolton, an heart, skin and bones more embryologist at Guy’s and St vulnerable to ageing and disease, Thomas’ Hospital in London, is while hot flushes can be very also sceptical. “It is dangerous unpleasant. Many women are to get excited about something reluctant to take hormone before you have sufficient replacement therapy to reduce evidence it works,” she says. New these because of its link with techniques often find their way breast cancer. Rejuvenating the into the fertility clinic without ovaries with PRP could provide strong evidence, thanks to huge demand from people who are often willing to spend their life savings to have a child, she says. If the technique does hold up under further investigation, it could raise ethical questions over the upper age limits of pregnancy – and whether there should be any. “I lay awake last night turning this over in my mind,” says Sturmey. “Where would the line be drawn?” Health issues like gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia and miscarriage are all more common in older women. “It would require –More eggs, please– a big debate,” says Sturmey. ■

SPERM HOME TEST KIT How are the little swimmers doing? Low sperm counts or poor sperm quality are behind around a third of cases of couples who can’t conceive. A visit to a clinic for a test can be awkward, but a smartphone-based system lets men determine whether that’s necessary by checking their fertility at home. Men often find it embarrassing to give a semen sample at a clinic, says Yoshitomo Kobori at the Dokkyo Medical University Koshigaya Hospital in Japan. So Kobori devised an alternative. “I thought a smartphone microscope could be an easy way to look at problems with male fertility,” he says. Kobori and his colleagues came up with a lens less than a millimetre thick that can be slotted into a plastic “jacket”. Clipped on to the camera of a smartphone, it magnifies an image by 555 times – perfect for looking at sperm. To do a home test, a man would apply a small amount of semen to a plastic sheet around five minutes after ejaculation and press it against the microscope.

WATCH THEM SWIM The phone’s camera can then take a 3-second video clip of the sperm. When viewed enlarged on a computer screen, it is easy for someone to count the total number of sperm and the number that are moving – key indicators of fertility. Kobori says the system works as well as the software used in fertility clinics. When the team ran 50 samples through both systems, they got almost identical results. The work was presented at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology meeting in Helsinki this month. The system can’t assess the ability of sperm to fertilise an egg. “This method is only the simple version of semen analysis,” says Kobori. But that could be enough for men to identify potential fertility problems, and decide whether to seek help from a doctor.

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 9

KEITH LADZINSKI/GETTY

THIS WEEK

Obesity is passed on down generations

Planet Nine antics led to sun’s odd tilt Rebecca Boyle

all the other planets’ orbits. Earlier this year, Michael Brown and Konstantin Batygin at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena argued that this Planet Nine could be responsible for some of the erratic movements of icy worlds in the outer solar system. With that planet plugged in to our models, the machinations of the heavens begin to make more sense. Now the idea can be extended to the orbit of all the planets, says Elizabeth Bailey, also at Caltech,

A JEALOUS Planet Nine may have shoved its siblings for attention. If a massive ninth planet exists in our solar system, it might explain why the planets are out of line with the sun. The eight major planets still circle the sun in the original plane of their birth. The sun rotates on its own axis, but surprisingly, that spin is tilted: the axis lies at an angle of 6 degrees relative to a line perpendicular to the plane of the planets. “If the sun captured Planet There are a few theories to explain this jaunty slant, including Nine early on, its gravity could have realigned the the temporary tug of a passing planets’ orbital plane” star aeons ago, or interactions between the magnetic fields of the sun and the primordial dusty disc who did the work together with that formed the solar system. But Brown and Batygin (arxiv.org/ it is hard to account for why the abs/1607.03963v1). sun’s spin is aligned the way it is “Because we think Planet Nine relative to the planets. has a significant inclination, if it Two teams of astronomers exists, then that means it would have just announced a new tilt things,” Bailey says, and by the explanation: a hypothetical just right amount. “It’s one puzzle massive planet in the outer solar piece that seems to fit together, system could be interfering with and it really seems to be in support 10 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

BLAME grandpa if you get fat eating junk food. It seems that the grandsons of pudgy male mice are more susceptible to the health effects of a bad diet, even if their fathers are lean and healthy. Last year, a study found thousands of epigenetic modifications to DNA in the sperm of obese men, as well as differing amounts of short pieces of RNA, when compared with lean men’s sperm. Epigenetic changes like these don’t alter the code of DNA, but may –All askew in the heavens– affect how active particular genes are. Now Catherine Suter at Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute in of the Planet Nine hypothesis.” The planet would have between Sydney and her colleagues have investigated the longer-term effects 5 and 20 times Earth’s mass and of paternal obesity by mating obese be in a wildly eccentric orbit, male mice with lean females. reaching 250 times the sun-Earth They found that, unlike the distance at its farthest point. offspring of lean males, both the That elongated trajectory has led sons and grandsons of obese ones some to suggest that it was once were more likely to show the early an exoplanet and was kidnapped signs of fatty liver disease and by the sun. diabetes when given a junk-food diet If that happened early enough, (Molecular Metabolism, doi.org/ then its gravitational influence bmn3). The same effect wasn’t seen since the solar system was born in daughters or granddaughters. would be enough to pull the Even when the sons of obese males planets’ orbital plane out of were fed a healthy diet and kept at a alignment with the sun, Bailey normal weight, their own sons still says. Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and had a greater tendency to develop Neptune would move as one, so obesity-related conditions when Planet Nine would not be able to exposed to a junk diet. shift them individually like However, the effect didn’t seem pinballs. Instead, the entire solar to be passed on to great-grandsons. system would tilt as a whole. Planet Nine’s tilt, not its mass, is “This is good news because it key, says Alessandro Morbidelli at suggests that the cycle of obesity can be broken,” says Suter. Côte d’Azur Observatory in Nice, As a result, she suggests that France, who has independently junk-food susceptibility is passed on by come to a similar conclusion epigenetics. Her team’s research hints (arxiv.org/abs/1607.05111). If it that small RNA pieces in the sperm were a question of mass, Jupiter could be to blame, possibly influencing would be the prime suspect. how a male embryo develops. “What is important is that the Such studies underscore the perturbing planet is off-plane. importance of men’s health at the time Jupiter cannot cause its own tilt,” of conception, says Suter. “A baby’s he says. The sun’s tilt doesn’t prove that health has long been considered the mother’s responsibility, but little Planet Nine exists, however. That attention has been paid to the father’s would require seeing it with a health.” Alice Klein ■ telescope. ■

INTRODUCING THE SECOND IN A NEW SERIES OF WHITE PAPERS FROM NEW SCIENTIST What’s the future of business? We at New Scientist decided to take a look at how three of the key drivers of business – energy, money and automation – might change over the next decade. To do that, we’ve asked three writers with deep understanding of these areas to tell us how they think the future could unfold, and how it might confound our initial expectations. The author of our second GameChangers report in the series is Steven Cherry, who for 15 years covered the work sector for IEEE Spectrum, and now directs TTI/Vanguard, a members-only forum that explores the impact and implications of future technologies for senior business leaders. In his report, Cherry examines the arguments for and against the idea that automation will ultimately outsource every human job, and explores the paradoxes inherent in both. If cognitively complex jobs are the only ones that are safe, why is there still such high demand for cashiers? If automation generates new jobs, why is GDP slowing? And when can you expect the robots to take your job? To find out, register to download your free copy of GameChangers: Automation and Artificial Intelligence today.

Sally Adee Editor, GameChangers

GET YOUR COPY NEWSCIENTIST.COM/GAMECHANGERS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Steven Cherry is the Director of TTI/Vanguard, a membership forum based in New York that explores future technologies. Previously he was a journalist and editor at IEEE Spectrum, the magazine of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Prior to that he was an editor at the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). He founded and co-hosts the award-winning podcast series, Techwise Conversations, which covers technology news, careers and education, and the engineering lifestyle.

GAME CHANGERS AUTOMATION AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN THIS EXCLUSIVE NEW REPORT FIND OUT:

] Why every technological breakthrough takes twice as long as we expected, but we’re still not prepared for its arrival ]Why GDP is an increasingly limited tool for measuring productivity, and what that means for jobs and automation ] Which jobs might be safe – and which won’t

THIS WEEK FIELD NOTES Cleethorpes, Lincolnshire, UK

Stone-Age paths revealed by tides footprints of humans and animals, Britain’s first lifeboat station and a 40-metre-deep Bronze-Age shaft. Sherman and his colleague Megan Clement, based in York, train volunteers and act as a response team when something crops up – as it did here on Cleethorpes seafront.

IT LOOKS like a long way to the prehistoric dig site, and there’s a lot of slippery mud separating me from it. But I have more to worry about than face-planting into the estuary. “We actually need to give you the safety talk,” says Andy Sherman, an archaeologist with the Museum of London Archaeology. As we stand in a battering wind looking out at the muddy beach at Cleethorpes in Lincolnshire, he tells me there are at least three ways to get killed here: walking on an unexploded bomb, stepping into quicksand or ignoring the tide timetable. The sea sweeps in behind the dig, cutting off anyone foolhardy enough to venture out at the wrong moment. So why are we here? Well, coastal archaeology has an urgency you get nowhere else. The sea reveals whatever our ancestors left in the mud with no warning, and then, just as quickly, can wash it away forever. That’s why the Museum of London Archaeology began its CITiZAN project, which teaches ordinary people how to keep an eye out for interesting artefacts. The project’s finds include

Light trick foils fake nuclear warheads THERE’S a new way to identify fake nuclear warheads, without revealing what’s inside. The technique offers a way out of a tricky catch-22: to comply with nuclear arms reduction treaties, inspectors need to scrutinise warheads to verify that real missiles, not decoys, are being disarmed. The US and Russia alone 12 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

CITIZAN/MOLA

Joshua Howgego

was something else, too: running straight through the forest was a path that shouldn’t be there. That is, if you subscribe to the conventional idea that Stone-Age people were uncultured nomads, eking out a subsistence living in the wild. It’s clear that is not the case – take Stonehenge, for instance. But there is sparse evidence to the contrary, Sherman says, because Neolithic people had an oral tradition and left behind few artefacts. That makes the trackway a valuable discovery. “This is the best thing we’ve found,” says Clement of the CITiZAN project. It’s not much to look at – just a few metres of rough strips of intensely black wood, cresting out of the peat. But the strips have been arranged carefully, a bit like a wooden boardwalk. Sherman sees it as evidence that the Neolithic people who made it were organised. “This isn’t just a path, it’s a wide track, which means they were taking the time to grow the wood and maintain it,” he says. “It would have been a lot of effort.” Sherman and Clement think this section of the trackway will be washed away by tides within two years. But as the peat is eroded further, more of the track should be revealed. During the Stone Age, this section of land would have been nowhere near the coast. As I stand there with the mud squelching over my wellingtons, I wonder if we’ll eventually –It’s a Stone-Age highway– be able to work out where it went. ■

I put on two fleeces, a coat, two pairs of socks and wellington boots and stick tight behind Clement and Sherman as they pick their way through the shin-deep mud. The residents of Cleethorpes knew there was something out here – the strange black objects that I can now see sticking out of the mud were a giveaway. When Clement and Sherman got wind of the rumours last spring, they went to investigate. They found that the black shapes were the petrified tree trunks of a 4300-year-old forest. But there

have thousands of nukes slated elements, right down to their for dismantlement between isotopes. A hoax warhead won’t them. But to protect state secrets, pass the test. governments won’t allow tests But that’s only half the trick. that reveal a bomb’s blueprint. To preserve secrecy, instead of R. Scott Kemp at MIT and his detecting the light passing colleagues used computer through the warhead directly, the simulations to show that shining team focused it onto a foil – a slice a particular beam of light through of material made of the same a warhead can scrutinise its elements as a bomb. The foil innards. The light makes the absorbs some of the light, and nuclei of the warhead’s atoms “To protect state secrets, vibrate, then relax, releasing governments won’t allow photons. The wavelength of examinations that reveal the released light allows us a bomb’s blueprint” to determine the warhead’s

the rest is reflected onto detectors that measure its wavelengths. The foil’s exact make-up is kept secret from the inspectors. But they can compare their results to the scan of a confirmed missile, to prove that the weapon isn’t a fake (PNAS, doi.org/bmqh). “They’re taking a very big step in the right direction,” says Glen Warren at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Washington – but he worries that too many measurements could still give the warheads’ contents away. Emily Benson ■

EXPLORE THE QUANTUM WORLD From parallel universes to photosynthesis, entanglement WRbHQFU\SWLRQFRPSXWLQJWRFDWVDQGbPXFKPRUH %X\\RXUFRS\IURPDOOJRRGPDJD]LQHUHWDLOHUVRUGLJLWDOO\ )LQGRXWPRUHDWnewscientist.com/TheCollection

CHRIS WHITTIER

IN BRIEF

Baby stars grow by bursting bubbles

Gorillas are one up in an arms race against trickster plant FOOL me once, shame on you. Fool me twice… Well, it looks like gorillas don’t get fooled twice, at least not by a cheating plant. The fruit on the Pentadiplandra brazzeana plant is packed with a protein called brazzein, which mimics the taste of high-energy sugary fruits but is less resourceintensive for the plant to make. Brenda Bradley, an anthropologist at the George Washington University in Washington DC, thinks the plant is probably producing cheap, sweet proteins to “trick” primates into eating the low-calorie berries and

dispersing their seeds. It seems to work, she says, seeing as the berries are sought by primate species. But now, Bradley claims, one ape is fighting back: gorillas seem to have lost the ability to taste brazzein, which Bradley thinks has evolved as part of an arms race against the plant. Her team analysed the DNA sequence of the gene TAS1R3, which codes for a sweet taste receptor, in 51 primate species, including humans. They found that only the gorilla has two mutations that seem to prevent them from detecting the sweetness of brazzein (American Journal of Physical Anthropology, doi.org/bmk7). Monkeys and bonobos have taste receptors primed to find the protein sweet, says Bradley. “But gorillas – who are not known to eat the plant – have species-specific mutations that likely prevent the false signal.”

Continuous light weakens bones TOO much light is bad for your health. So suggests research in mice, which found that six months of continuous lighting led to a range of health problems. In the experiment, 134 mice experienced no dark for half a year. By the end, they had lost about half their strength, some parts of their bones were thinner and they showed signs of increased inflammation usually 14 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

associated with stress or infection. These effects may be connected to the disruption of the animals’ internal clocks (Current Biology, DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2016.05.038). The findings are worrying for people who experience prolonged light exposure – such as shift workers and hospital patients – but fortunately, some of the effects seem to be reversible. Johanna Meijer of Leiden

University Medical Center in the Netherlands and her team found that the mice – and their disrupted circadian rhythms – recovered when dark night-times were restored. “The clock recovered near instantaneously,” says Meijer, while muscles and bones recovered in about two weeks. However, the findings may not directly apply to humans. Mice are nocturnal, so may suffer more than us from a lack of darkness.

THE same physics that makes mushroom clouds might build the universe’s most massive stars. According to simple equations, a star shouldn’t be able to grow to more than 20 times the mass of the sun – the radiation it emits should hold back gas arriving late in the process and stop it adding mass. But we see baby stars that are 150 times the sun’s mass. Now, a simulation shows the most complete account yet of one way stars can suck in more gas. As radiation rises from the star, it inflates bubbles that push against the surrounding gas, holding that material at bay. Anna Rosen at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and colleagues show that those bubbles can pop, letting tendrils of gas drift down towards the star (arxiv.org/abs/1607.03117). A similar process is responsible for mushroom clouds around nuclear explosions.

Kiss of death marks ants for kill squad PAINT a target on his back. Instead of dispatching their young competitors directly, adult male ants smear them with bodily fluids, leaving them with a bullseye marking them for assassination by worker ants. Most ants seek out mates from other colonies, but ants in the genus Cardiocondyla breed within their nests. By staying at home, males vie with one another for a chance to reproduce; so they give young rivals the kiss of death before they are big enough to fight back (Entomological Science, doi.org/bmmb). “They let the workers do the dirty job of finishing off all the rivals,” says Jürgen Heinze at the University of Regensburg, Germany.

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DOMHNALL MALONE

GIVE graphene a diamond and you’ll get a flower in return. Poking a sheet of atom-thick graphene with a diamond tool prompts tiny ribbons to peel away from the surface, like flower petals opening. “I don’t think anyone ever expected it,” says Graham Cross at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. Graphene sheets, which are made of a single layer of carbon atoms, are both super-strong and highly flexible. Other teams have folded graphene into origami shapes using chemical reactions, and made tiny tools. Cross and his colleagues accidentally discovered graphene’s hidden talent while trying to measure its friction by piercing it. Once their diamond tip punctured the sheet, the energy from ambient heat kept the ribbons tearing into a tapered strip – a process that took less than a minute. By changing the initial width of the tear, the researchers could control the length of the ribbons, which tended to grow to five times their initial width (Nature, DOI: bmqd). Graphene’s self-folding ability could help make better electronics, says Cross. By setting off ribbon formation in careful patterns, the sheets could be turned into sensors and even transistors, allowing for nanoscale electronics.

Pulsars feel swoosh as companions whizz past TWO strange celestial bodies might have the clingiest friends in the cosmos. If a pair of pulsars are orbited by very dense objects once every few minutes, that might explain a strange repeating pattern interrupting the stars’ radio signals. Pulsars, aka spinning neutron stars, normally emit radio pulses like clockwork. But Joanna Rankin at the University of Vermont in Burlington noticed another pattern she calls a “swoosh”, when signals from certain pulsars arrived sooner than expected.

Minutes later, the signal drifted back to normal. Further observations showed these swooshes sometimes repeat. Now, a study led by Rankin’s student Haley Wahl suggests companion objects orbiting the pulsars at close range could trigger the swoosh. These unseen neighbours, if they exist, must orbit the pulsars at breakneck speed once every few minutes – a shorter orbital period than for any known pair of objects in the universe, says Rankin. By passing through the pulsar’s

magnetic field at such a rapid pace, these companions could create the swoosh by disrupting the radio signal we see (arxiv.org/ abs/1607.01737v1). Such a companion must be something special, though, like a small black hole or a hunk of white-dwarf matter. Most ordinary objects would be ripped to shreds by the pulsar’s gravity. “It has to be something incredibly dense to stay together,” says Rankin. “Even a rock of normal material couldn’t do anything but turn into dust.” ATLANTIDE PHOTOTRAVEL/GETTY

Graphene unfolds into nano-flowers

Ducklings dabble in abstract thought THERE once was a brainy duckling. It could remember whether the shapes or colours it saw just after hatching were the same as each other or different. This feat surprised University of Oxford researchers, who initially doubted that ducklings could grasp complex concepts such as “same” and “different”. The fact that they could do so suggests that the ability to think in an abstract way may be more common in nature than we might expect, and not just restricted to humans and a handful of animals with big brains. Ducklings instinctively follow the first things they see, usually a mother and siblings. So Alex Kacelnik and Antone Martinho presented them with a pair of objects that were either the same or different in shape and colour. Later, they offered the ducklings the choice of following combinations of “same” or “different” objects. Of the 113 ducklings in the experiment, 77 trailed the colour or shape pairing that corresponded to the combination of “same” or “different” they were primed with after hatching (Science, doi.org/bmk9).

Perfect harmony? It’s a matter of taste THERE’S no such thing as a nasty-sounding chord: it all depends on what you’re used to. The ancient Greeks discovered that musical harmony seems to be rooted in mathematics, and today we know that many cultures worldwide use mathematically neat chords. But Josh McDermott at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his team have evidence that a preference for mathematically simple harmonies is not innate. They played “consonant” note combinations – such as perfect fifths – and dissonant combinations,

which are not so mathematically simple and sound harsher to Western ears, to 160 people from the US and Bolivia, and asked them to rate how pleasant each one sounded. The participants from the US found consonant combinations more pleasant than dissonant ones. But people who belonged to the Tsimane – a native Amazonian society in Bolivia – showed no such preference (Nature, doi.org/bmk3). “The preference for consonance over dissonance varied roughly in line with the degree of exposure to Western music,” says McDermott.

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 15

ANALYSIS MENTAL HEALTH

Psychiatry’s last taboo Assisted suicide for those who are not terminally ill is a complex issue, says Clare Wilson campaign group Dignity in Dying. Wootton points out that a 2007 independent survey found that 80 per cent of people supported assisted dying for the terminally ill, but only 43 per cent did for those who are not terminally ill. “If we see depression as an OK reason to help someone kill themselves, then why bother to put rails on bridges for suicide prevention?” says Drake.

TROELS GRAUGAARD/GETTY

Not taken lightly

LIKE many psychiatrists, Paulan Stärcke sometimes sees patients in such mental torment that they have tried to kill themselves. Where Stärcke differs is that occasionally, after much discussion with the patient, their family and other doctors, she helps them to do it. Stärcke prepares a lethal dose of barbiturate sedatives, either in the form of an injection or a medicine that can be drunk. She sits with her patient as they die and, at the end, certifies their death. She considers this her final professional duty to them. Stärcke practises in the Netherlands, one of three countries – along with Belgium and Switzerland – that permit 16 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

Stärcke says that accepting assisted suicide for psychiatric reasons in principle does not mean that logically we should cease all suicide prevention efforts, because only a minority of requests are granted. For instance, in 2012 to 2013, only six out of 121 requests from people with a psychological condition were granted at the clinic where Stärcke works. At a Belgian psychiatric hospital, they granted 48 out of 100 requests, although only 35 people completed the act. –Ethical minefieldThe decision is never taken lightly. Psychiatrists must believe there is a long-standing movement the person is mentally competent, assisted suicide for non-terminal to legalise assisted dying, although has had a long-standing wish to illnesses that are causing a high-profile bill was rejected by unbearable suffering, which has die and that there is no prospect MPs last September. In the US, been taken to include mental of treatment. Typically they such legislation is being suffering. For many, this is a have more than one psychiatric considered by individual states, step too far. diagnosis, which may include with five currently allowing it and depression and a personality “This is not compassion – a campaign to expand it to the rest. disorder. it’s abandonment,” says Stephen In the main, the UK and US Drake of the US group Not Dead “The suffering from a Yet, which opposes assisted suicide. campaigners steer clear of any psychiatric illness can be as So how do doctors navigate suggestion they want assisted unbearable as the suffering from this ethical minefield? Is mental suicide approved for people who a physical illness,” says Stärcke. illness any less justifiable as a are not terminally ill. “This is But even so, and despite growing reason for assisted suicide? Or is where the public draws the line,” campaigns for mental illnesses to it a slippery slope? says Sarah Wootton of the UK be taken as seriously as physical Switzerland was the first ones, there remain some country to permit assisted suicide, “The mind is a black box. important differences between We still don’t know enough psychiatry and other areas of in 1942, and since then has been to be able to say how a joined by several other countries, medicine that colour the debate. condition will progress” most recently Canada. In the UK Unlike with most physical

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illnesses, there are no blood tests or brain scans that can give someone a definitive diagnosis of a psychiatric problem. Also, people with mental illnesses are frequently given different diagnoses at different points in their life, and no one knows if that means their first diagnosis was wrong or their condition has genuinely changed. If someone is dying from cancer or heart failure, their doctor can make a reasonable prediction about the course their illness will take and roughly how long they will live. Many people who go to Dignitas, the Swiss organisation for assisted dying, do so because they have a degenerative condition that they know will leave them physically helpless. By comparison, the mind is a black box. We still don’t know enough to be able to say how a condition will progress. The US government-funded National Institutes of Health has said that the whole system of classifying mental illness is flawed and needs to be based more on neuroscience. It has launched a major research effort to base diagnosis and treatments on the underlying problems at the levels of genes, neurotransmitters and brain circuits. This project might lead to more insights about who is likely to recover from mental illness and who isn’t, but it is many years from bearing fruit. For now, psychiatrists can only grant requests of assisted suicide for patients who have been at rock bottom for years, or more usually decades, and have exhausted all potential remedies, such as antidepressants and electroconvulsive therapy. Stärcke argues that the fact someone is not terminally ill means their situation could be seen as even worse than if they had just weeks to live. “The unendingness can be unbearable,” she says. Dignitas says that for some people, just having the option of

Reasons for not-living Psychiatric conditions were the least-reported reason for euthanasia or assisted suicide in the Netherlands in 2015 Cancer

4000

Other diseases

417

Nervous system disorders Cardiovascular diseases

311 233

Lung diseases

207

Age-related diseases

183

Dementia Psychiatric conditions

109 56 SOURCE: EUTHANASIECOMMISS E.NL

assisted suicide can help, even to Along with religious groups, the extent that they may choose disability rights activists are the not to take it. “It may sound main campaigners against paradoxical: in order to prevent euthanasia and assisted suicide, suicide attempts, one needs to say whether for those with mental or ‘yes’ to suicide,” the organisation physical suffering. They believe said last year in evidence to an that legalising assisted dying Australian inquiry into end-of“We are many years away life choices. from better understanding If the patient does go ahead, who is likely to recover this is still preferable to most from mental illness” methods of suicide, says Stärcke. “There’s a huge difference between this and a violent, lonely, sends a message to people who unplanned death,” she says. are disabled, sick or elderly that But Drake dismisses that their lives are worthless, and they argument as society being selfish. see people with psychiatric “They’re talking about the mess. illnesses as another such group If we’re going to have suicide, let’s whose rights they must protect. have it neat and tidy,” he says. “If help is helping someone to die,

“It was inevitable” A father whose daughter was granted her request to die says it was the right decision for her “IT WAS inevitable that she was going to end her life – this was the best way.” So says the father of Ellen, a Dutch woman in her 30s, who was recently granted her request for physicianassisted dying. Ellen had several complex psychiatric problems including a personality disorder, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, after being raped when she was 10. “She was very unhappy,” says her father. Ellen frequently cut herself and made her first suicide attempt at 20. There were so many others over the

years her father lost count. Several times the police had to bring her home after she had been spotted about to attempt suicide. Her father lived in dread, expecting the police to knock on the door and say she had finally done it. By the time Ellen sought assisted suicide, she had tried every treatment: talking therapies, antidepressants, electroconvulsive therapy. Nothing helped long term. Ellen chose to die at her family home, with her parents and brother and sister present. A doctor brought a

I don’t see that as help,” says Dennis Queen of the UK branch of Not Dead Yet. “For us, this is about human rights.” Even in the Netherlands, a country with broadly liberal attitudes, two-thirds of doctors have difficulty accepting assisted suicide for psychiatric reasons. Stärcke works for a clinic called End of Life, in The Hague, that provides second opinions for people whose request has been denied by their doctor or psychiatrist. Stärcke understands that some of her colleagues do not feel comfortable agreeing to requests of assisted suicide for psychiatric reasons, but calls for them to make their views clear to patients. If doctors aren’t transparent then patients may make a request and submit to a lengthy assessment process, only to be turned down at the end because their doctor objects on moral grounds. “Some psychiatrists would rather not think about this because they’re only human after all,” she says. “What I do scares people.” ■ * Need a listening ear? UK Samaritans: 08457 90 90 90 (samaritans.org). Visit bit.ly/ SuicideHelplines for hotlines and websites for other countries.

drink containing barbiturates; she drank it without hesitation, and the family waited in silence until it took effect. Within 5 minutes, Ellen was unconscious. Within 20 she stopped breathing. Beforehand, her brother could not help hoping that she would change her mind – her father felt differently. He expected that if she didn’t go through with it, she would simply attempt suicide by other means in the following days. “It was very sad. But we all agreed it was the right thing for her. “ he says. “I was so happy that the suffering was over for her and we had a real goodbye. It was the most acceptable outcome in these difficult circumstances. And we were happy we could support her in her last moments,” he says. 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 17

COMMENT

Still evolving The idea that modern humans have transcended the influence of natural selection is crumbling, says John Hawks NOT so long ago there was a consensus on recent human evolution, or the lack of it. The belief was that culture had elevated our species above Darwin’s “hostile forces of nature”, stopping natural selection in its tracks 50,000 years ago. Today that view is increasingly questioned. Those who say selection has ceased point to big gains in life expectancy. However, to pass on genes, people must not only survive, but reproduce. Differences in reproduction are differences in fitness, in the evolutionary sense. This idea underpins a new study by Jonathan Beauchamp at Harvard University, looking at genetic variants associated with traits including educational attainment (PNAS, doi.org/bmnn). It suggests that natural selection has been at work on US citizens

in the 20th century. Beauchamp tapped into the 20,000-person-strong US Health and Retirement Study, which includes genetic information. Looking at people born between 1931 and 1953, he found that in men and women, educational attainment was correlated with having fewer children. That much may seem obvious. For a century, Americans have foregone family size and early child-rearing for more education – part of what is known as the demographic transition. What’s new here is the link to genetics. Educational attainment is not strongly heritable, with genes accounting for perhaps no more than 20 per cent of the variation in attainment. But Beauchamp found that gene variants predictive of attainment were nearly as strongly predictive of reduced reproduction.

Be afraid... Alarm bells ring when we bust a global limit for safe biodiversity loss, says Georgina Mace AS EARTH’S population grows, so too does our use of the land, converted from its natural, pre-human state to farms, roads, quarries and more, with an inevitable loss of species. At what point does this threaten the sustainability of society? Scientists have speculated about this for decades, but finally 18 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

result of human impact, and relate them to a revised planetary biosphere boundary proposed last year. It turns out that 10 per cent of native species have gone from over 58 per cent of all land. Why worry about species loss? There are moral and aesthetic reasons, but here the focus was species’ functional role – sustaining plant growth rates, for example, or nutrient cycling and decomposition. We know that many of these

it is possible to start answering that question. A major study published last week shed much needed light on how we are doing (Science, doi.org/10/bmnr). The outcome should worry us all. It analysed more than 2 million “The planetary boundary records on around 39,000 species. may not be perfect… but Researchers were able to work out we should still worry about breaching it so widely” changes at the local scale as a

roles are best maintained with greater diversity of species, and the global extinction rate is estimated to be at least 100-fold that of prehuman times. These metrics underpinned the first biodiversity boundary set in 2009. That was revised last year to reflect several factors: that the global extinction rate does not translate straightforwardly to the local scale (it is local diversity that is important), and that variety of functional types of species may be more vital than the total number. How definitive is the new snapshot? The findings are slightly improved if non-native species are included, while a less

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John Hawks is a professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison

precautionary approach suggests biodiversity could dip more than 10 per cent before being unsafe. On the other hand, the situation may be worse, as some of the most vital ecosystem functions are in biomes where data is sparse but sensitivity to species loss may be very high, such as tundra. Clearly, we need to refine this planetary boundary. But even if it is not perfect, it is all we have, and we should worry deeply about breaching it so widely. ■ Georgina Mace is professor of biodiversity and ecosystems at University College London

INSIGHT Police shootings

LAURA BUCKMAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

He concluded that natural selection was at work on those variants, albeit slowly. Its impact is equal to a decline in attainment amounting to a month and a half less school per generation, and is swamped by other factors driving up attainment at the same time. Of course, Beauchamp’s study only covers a limited sample of US citizens. In addition, participants could be women aged 45 or men in their early 50s, which seems too young to judge lifetime reproduction. It’s also possible that the number of grandchildren or great-grandchildren is a better measure of fitness. However, it is not outlandish to imagine that natural selection may still be acting in this way, given the pace of change. In 1940, only a quarter of adults born in the US finished high school. By 2000, this was nearly 90 per cent. Our distant ancestors never knew environments where it made sense to delay reproduction to reap the rewards of an extended education. Education policy may be doing more than shaping tomorrow’s workforce. It may be shaping the course of our evolution. ■

–Protests are sweeping the US–

Smarterinterviewsmay reduceracialtension Conor Gearin

officers as a result. Too often, police officers are sent out with insufficient information. The problem starts when dispatchers don’t ask witnesses the best questions, says Vickie Mays at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA). “We’re not priming people to look for anything beyond saying what the person’s skin colour is.” People who have just seen a crime don’t always know which details are relevant. So asking closed questions like: “Did the suspect have light or dark skin?” doesn’t yield useful information. It may even play a role in racial

THE US is boiling over. Protests are sweeping the country after the latest in a string of police shootings of black men: Philando Castile in Minnesota and Alton Sterling in Louisiana. Shortly after, a sniper killed five police officers in Dallas, reportedly telling police he was targeting white officers. Three more officers were killed in Baton Rouge this week. In the wake of these tragedies, debates are raging about racial profiling and police brutality. These huge, systemic problems will require sweeping changes. But there are smaller measures that, while “We’re not priming people they won’t stop the shooting, might to look for anything over time have far-reaching effects. For example, why was Castile pulled beyond saying what the person’s skin colour is” over in the first place? According to audio from the officer’s call to the dispatcher, the description he had profiling. According to a 2013 study by been given was to look for a robbery the US Department of Justice, police suspect with a “wide-set nose”. are 31 per cent more likely to stop Much ink has been spilled over the black drivers than white drivers and role of police training and the extent more than twice as likely to search to which it affects behaviour and them. Republican senator Tim Scott attitudes. Less visible is the role of recently described being pulled over the person answering the phone seven times in one year. to emergency calls and dispatching “What did the suspect look like?” can

elicit better information. Dispatchers could follow up by asking witnesses to focus on more specific characteristics – speech patterns, jewellery, tattoos – to give patrolling cops more to go on. This open-question technique forms part of a strategy called the cognitive interview, pioneered by Edward Geiselman also at UCLA. Other tricks include asking the witness to describe the scene first in chronological order, then backwards, which can trigger further recollections. Geiselman and colleagues described the technique in 1984. Field tests showed that it held up: detectives using cognitive interviews in Florida in 1989 and England in 1996 elicited 63 per cent and 55 per cent more information from witnesses, respectively. But this method has limitations – it may be difficult with an agitated emergency caller on the line, and some aspects are time consuming. Still, elements of the technique could help. Dispatchers could be trained to talk to callers in a way designed to calm them and prime them for more accurate recall. No one has yet studied whether the cognitive interview can specifically rein in racial profiling. Still, anything that provides better information can hopefully help lessen the effects of institutional racism. Better interviews won’t stop people dying, but if institutional racism arises one decision at a time, perhaps it is vulnerable to death by a thousand cuts. ■ 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 19

ILAN WALD, TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY

TECHNOLOGY Walter Reed Army Institute of Research – the US Department of Defense’s largest biomedical research facility – and the US National Institutes of Health. They then asked 719 Israeli soldiers to play the game in four, 10-minute sessions, as part of an advanced training programme. In July 2014, 14 months later, the same troops were involved in the Israel-Gaza conflict. The team measured symptoms of PTSD in the four months following combat. They found that after 50 days of intense fighting, only 2.6 per cent of the soldiers who had played the game developed PTSD compared with 7.8 per cent of their peers (Psychological Medicine, doi.org/bmk6).

–Zoning in–

Brain training for troops Soldiers in Israel will soon be playing a brain-training game to prevent PTSD as part of their combat training, says Oded Carmeli THE Israeli army has announced not the first time a game has that by the end of the year all been shown to tackle PTSD. new infantry soldiers will play A 2015 study showed that playing a computer game designed to Tetris after a traumatic experience prevent post-traumatic stress could prevent the onset of disorder. The US military is also flashbacks. But the new game reported to be testing the game. seems to work differently. Blocking out the details of a The game itself is simple. traumatic event is thought to be Players must press a key whenever one of the causes of PTSD. The game is designed to train soldiers “Soldiers who did not pay attention to threats on a not to do this. computer screen were at “On a psychological level, greater risk of PTSD” a soldier that does not process threats in real time is more likely to develop PTSD later on in life,” a dot appears on the screen next says Yair Bar-Haim at Tel Aviv to one of two images. One of the University. “Flashbacks, images is always threatening – overstimulation and an attempt angry faces and negative words to avoid anything that resembles like “explosions” and “wounded”– the traumatic experience are all and the other neutral. results of the inability to properly The game is based on previous process events as they unfold.” work by Colin MacLeod at the The roll-out is based on the University of Western Australia, game’s success in a small trial. It’s who was one of the first to use 20 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

such a game to test for attentional biases in people with anxiety disorders. People react more quickly to dots that appear next to images they are already looking at, he says. So, if someone is slower at responding to dots near threatening images, it suggests they are avoiding them. Bar-Haim adds a twist. Rather than testing for bias against threatening images, his game trains soldiers to focus on them. That’s because preliminary work in 2008, which tracked infantry soldiers from basic training to deployment, “found that soldiers who did not pay attention to potential threats on a computer screen were at greater risk of developing PTSD after actual combat”, Bar-Haim says. To develop the technique, BarHaim teamed up with the Israel Defense Forces’ Medical Corps, the

No boosters That a single round of training showed an effect after 14 months is surprising, says Bar-Haim. “Given the nature of the training we thought it might be necessary to provide booster sessions imminently prior to combat,” he says. “However, the effects are deep and basic.” Bar-Haim says that the training procedure targets a very specific neuro-functional system involved in threat monitoring – and that neuroimaging shows that such training, even if brief, can induce changes in both brain structure and function. “More research is needed to elucidate the underlying mechanisms of change in our preventative intervention,” he says. MacLeod thinks the results are exciting. The value of such cognitive training could extend across a wide range of situations where people are exposed to traumatic events, he says. However, there may be longterm consequences of heightening a person’s attention to threats, he warns – especially when soldiers return to civilian life. “Perhaps the training should be reversed once deployment has been completed.” ■

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FIELD NOTES Daejeon, South Korea

House-training Hubo What’s next for the winner of the world’s toughest robot challenge? At an event like the DARPA Robotics Challenge, teams of engineers spent days preparing their robots just to get them to function for a few minutes. Oh wants Hubo to be different. He has been tweaking it continuously, making it more reliable. He has written accessible instruction manuals. And he has addressed the problem of storage:

Hal Hodson

HAL HODSON

THE last time I saw Hubo, it was zipping around an assault course on wheeled knees and hacking through walls with a saw. Today, its 80 kilograms hang lifeless from a bright yellow gantry, arms limp by its sides. It’s been a year since Hubo won the DARPA Robotics Challenge – the “Unlike other robot hardest robotics competition ever demos, I’m standing right staged – and I’ve come to the Korean next to Hubo. There is no Institute for the Advancement of safety harness” Science and Technology to catch up with Hubo and its creator Jun-Ho Oh. Oh has been busy, getting his lifeHubo can be taken apart into five size humanoid robot ready for an even pieces and packed away into suitcases. tougher challenge: making the leap Some of Oh’s team winch Hubo from assault course to your home. down from the gantry and switch it An unassuming single-storey on. They guide its feet to the floor and, construction, Building N9, houses one with the click of a mouse, instruct it to of the most advanced robotics labs in the world. Inside, there are monitors everywhere, buckets filled with bolts, and reams of cabling. In a side room, Hubo clones stand around in varying stages of completion. Some are just legs, wires and metal joints poking out of robot hips. Since winning the competition, Oh’s spin-off company Rainbow Robots has been churning out Hubos for the international market. Most recently, it has shipped four to labs in the US. Now the company is working on consumer robots, including domestic and medical models. And this means making Hubo simple enough for anyone to operate. Robots like Big Dog, made by US firm Boston Dynamics, create buzz. They are flashy, scary and look good in promo videos. “These days there are many fancy robots,” says Oh. “But can they be used by normal people, without a team of engineers?” Typically not. Robots are still specialist playthings. They go wrong often and need debugging constantly.

walk over a path strewn with rubble. Hubo walks slowly and steadily, like a human would if their life depended on stepping in exactly the right spot. Then Oh hands me a thick beam of wood as long as my leg. “Hold that right at the end,” he says. “It’s difficult, isn’t it?” I pass the beam to Hubo, who grasps it at the other end, then twists its wrist through 360 inhuman degrees, wielding the wood like a sword. “He’s strong,” says Oh. Unlike other robot demos I’ve seen, I’m standing right next to Hubo. There is no safety harness. Such is Oh’s confidence in Hubo’s reliability. Oh chuckles as I grasp Hubo’s outstretched manipulator and shake it. In years of writing about robots, this is the first time I have ever properly met one. ■

–No laughing matter–

Hundreds of skulls sold on eBay for up to $5500

HERE’S a heads-up: don’t shop for skulls on eBay. Over seven months, a team at the Louisiana Department of Justice in Baton Rouge tracked human skulls being advertised on the site and found that 237 people listed 454 skulls, with opening bids ranging from one cent to $5500. Following the release of their findings, eBay has banned sales of all human body parts except hair. It’s hard to tell where the skulls were sourced. Not all were donated to science, the team suspects – some are probably archaeological specimens or from forensic investigations, for example. Tanya Marsh at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, North Carolina, thinks that many could have originated from India and China. Although both countries have now banned the export of human remains, Marsh suspects that many imported skeletons could still be on the US market. “We should have strong moral problems with that,” she says, as it’s not clear how old each skeleton is and a visual inspection can’t reveal much either. “It’s possible that some of them are disinterred human remains.” A US law bans the sale of Native American remains, but there is no other federal restriction on the sale of human skulls online. Tightening up the law might not help as it could divert the trade to less visible –Meet the robot champion– locations on the web. Conor Gearin ■ 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 21

ONE PER CENT

TECHNOLOGY

Help, my yard’s a Pokéstop Pokémon Go‘s success raises tricky questions, says Aviva Rutkin

22 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

as the Auschwitz-Birkenau and the author of Augmented Memorial and Museum, and the Reality Law, Privacy and Ethics. Holocaust Memorial Museum in “Digital objects aren’t really Washington DC. there,” he says. “You might see “We do not consider playing Pokémon on your little screen ‘Pokémon Go’ to be appropriate portrayed as if they’re in the decorum on the grounds of ANC. middle of a street or in the We ask all visitors to refrain from middle of a park, but all you’re such activity,” tweeted the seeing is data that’s stored in a Arlington National Cemetery, a server somewhere, displayed US military cemetery in Virginia. on your phone.” The game has brought to the Instead, displeased parties fore a number of once-speculative might find more success focusing questions about augmented “Past court cases have reality. Past court cases have debated the physical debated the physical boundaries boundaries of property – of property, from the air above to the dirt below – what about digital what about digital ones?” boundaries? You do not have a right to any on the impact the game has in the of the virtual space in and around physical world. Repeated visitors your home, says Brian Wassom, a can cause a nuisance, interfering commercial litigator in Michigan with the owner’s right to enjoy their property and perhaps giving them the grounds for a lawsuit. And trespassers are still liable to be arrested, even if they just clambered into your backyard to get a little closer to a rare snorlax. In addition, there’s a potential case for negligence if a company doesn’t act on a problem that their augmented reality game has created, says Emily McReynolds, programme director of the Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington. Designers might take a hint from virtual message board Yik Yak. After numerous bullying incidents, it put up “geofences” to block access in and around schools. “I think in cases like this, lawsuits are very likely,” she says. “The question is whether or not they would be successful.” Niantic, the software company behind Pokémon Go, has already proven responsive to concerns, she adds, and it’s in the best interests of the firm to work out issues ahead of time rather than –A wild tram appeared!– see them go to court. ■

Wireless wounds Now that cut on your arm has a voice. A new thread has been developed for stitching wounds that can relay data to doctors about the state of an injury. The thread can gather pressure, stress, strain and temperature information to create a picture of how a wound is healing. Its developers, at Tufts University in Boston, tested it on rats, beaming data wirelessly to a computer or phone.

20 The average number of messages sent before a phone number is exchanged between people on online dating apps

Safety overseas Microsoft does not have to hand over data held on servers in Ireland in response to search warrants from US authorities. The ruling, made at the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York, is a big moment for the application of privacy rights under the rules of the country where personal data resides, limiting the reach of government data collection.

C.LYTTLE/FUSE/GETTY

MUHAMMED ENES YILDIRIM/ANADOLU AGENCY/GETTY IMAGES

GOTTA catch ‘em all – but not in my backyard. Since Pokémon Go’s release on 6 July, the augmented reality app has become a smash hit. Players walk around hunting for hidden monsters superimposed on the world around them, and visiting real-life locations tagged as stops or gyms in the game. So far, it has been downloaded an estimated 15 million times. But all this enthusiasm has led to more than a few uncomfortable interactions in the real world. A police station in Australia asked people to stop coming in to visit a Pokéstop – a place where free items can be found. Homeowners have had players loitering outside their property day and night. Others were aghast when Pokémon began showing up at sensitive sites such

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APERTURE

24 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

What a rubbish picnic IT MIGHT not look that appetising to us, but for white storks, this dump is like an all-you-can eat buffet. White storks traditionally make an epic annual migration from Europe to West Africa, flying thousands of kilometres to find food. But the prospect of an easy meal much closer to home is starting to replace the long-distance pilgrimage. Vast landfills in southern Europe and North Africa are too tempting to pass up. Photographer Jasper Doest has been taking pictures of the birds for years. “They are elegant and brutal at the same time,” he says. His latest project involved following storks along their western migration route from Europe, over the Sahara to their wintering grounds. These birds were snapped on a dump near the city of Beja in Portugal. Recent studies using tracking sensors have shown that, in the short term, birds who winter on the rubbish dumps in southern Europe have better survival rates than those who reach West Africa. But although food might be plentiful, it can be dangerous too. Toxic metals lurk among the scrap, as well as objects that can choke the birds. The long-term impact on the storks is uncertain. Doest spent weeks on landfill sites in Portugal, capturing a different story to the one he set out to document. “I was shocked to see so many birds foraging on the remains of our consumer society,” he says. “This story is not about storks. It’s not even about birds. It’s about us.” Greta Keenan

Photographer Jasper Doest jasperdoest.com

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 25

THE WEB WE WANT

COVER STORY

26 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

Convenience has made us the pawns of the companies that run the web - but there are ways to seize back some control, says Hal Hodson

MUTI - FOLIO ART

A

T THE heart of the internet are monsters with voracious appetites. In bunkers and warehouses around the world, vast arrays of computers run the show, serving up the web – and gorging on our data. These server farms are the engine rooms of the internet. Operated by some of the world’s most powerful companies, they process photos of our children, emails to our bosses and lovers, and our late-night searches. Such digital shards reveal far more of ourselves than we might like, and they are worth a lot of money. They are not only used to target advertising and sell stuff back to us, but also form the building blocks for a new generation of artificial intelligence that will determine the future of the web. “Very big and powerful companies own a huge chunk of what happens on the web,” says Andrei Sambra, a developer with the World Wide Web (W3) Consortium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the main standards organisation for the web. But we – the ones producing this valuable data – have lost control. The time has come to push back. Sambra is part of a growing movement to wrest back control over our digital lives by breaking the monopolies of the server farms and the people who own them. Tweak the technology on which the web runs and we can each keep our own little part of it in our pockets, they say – and determine who or what makes money out of who we are. In a sense, that would be just getting back to the way the web was always intended. The original World Wide Web, invented by Tim Berners-Lee at the particle physics centre CERN near Geneva in 1989, was a “decentralised” affair. There were no central servers; websites ran on individual machines in universities, offices and bedrooms. Hosting a site just meant plugging a computer into your internet connection and having it serve up the HTML code to anyone visiting.

No one company ruled the roost. Simple open protocols meant that anyone who knew what they were doing could be a part of the burgeoning network. “A lot of the things that made the early web wonderful were these open standards,” says Harry Halpin, also with W3C. “This allowed a level of decentralisation, and lack of monopoly control of the web.” It sounds utopian, and in many ways it was – but far too fiddly for most people to faff about with. Those open protocols are still there. But we were lured away by convenience. Hotmail launched in 1996, allowing anyone with an internet connection to have an email account with none of the hassle of running their own mail server. Within a year, 8.5 million people had signed up and it was bought by Microsoft. In 2004, Google launched Gmail, helping us manage our personal lives as well as the web, which it had dominated since the late 1990s.

“THE EARLY WEB WAS UTOPIAN – BUT FAR TOO FIDDLY FOR MOST PEOPLE TO FAFF ABOUT WITH” Facebook also launched in 2004. It made finding and keeping in touch with friends easier and more convenient than earlier social networks like Bebo and Myspace. A decade later, Facebook is used by almost a quarter of the people on the planet. For many, it is all the web they want. It’s where they conduct their social lives, get their news and find entertainment. Despite its seemingly infinite nature, the web is largely centred on just a handful of companies. Instead of a proliferation of independently run sites, the web is dominated by global firms with which we have made a Faustian pact. In exchange for convenience, > 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 27

“ PEOPLE AREN’T TOO SURE HOW THEIR DATA IS USED. THIS MAKES THEM NERVOUS AND FRUSTRATED” we let companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon – and, more recently, start-ups like Uber and Airbnb – conduct their business by siphoning up and profiting from our data. Why should we get worked up about this? After all, the most useful things you can do on the modern web rely on this data. Companies use it constantly to tweak the services they provide. Our data also feeds the machinelearning algorithms that are behind the many recent breakthroughs in artificial intelligence. There are some well-rehearsed objections. One is privacy. Surveys conducted by organisations like Pew Research in Washington DC, for example, which has been studying this issue for 15 years, repeatedly show that people have low levels of confidence in how their personal data is handled by internet companies. “A lot of people aren’t too sure they know what is collected about them and how the data is used,” says Lee Rainie at Pew Research. “This makes people nervous and frustrated, but they still need to live in the modern world and many feel it is not an option to be offline.” Leaving our digital lives in so few corporate hands also makes us easier to spy on. PRISM, one of many US government surveillance programmes revealed by the whistleblower Edward Snowden, consisted of government agents walking into the premises of large web companies with a secret court order and taking what data they wanted. A set-up based around servers that store our data makes life ridiculously easy for hackers. No matter how good the defences, the fact that the internet stores its data at actual physical locations makes those computers targets. Servers are honeypots.

GIVING OURSELVES AWAY Andy Clarke, a philosopher studying artificial intelligence at the University of Edinburgh, UK, says that our loss of control goes even deeper. “When we use the internet in the ways it’s mostly available – through big nodes like Google and Facebook – we are giving ourselves away,” says Clarke. They are making big bucks out of us, and we don’t get a penny. Aral Balkan, founder of Swedish tech democratisation movement Ind.ie, calls such companies “people farmers”. If you’re not paying, you’re the product. This is worse than you think. The increasing numbers of connected devices in our lives are all sources of data. Soon our data trails won’t begin and end with the time we spend at our screens, they will continue via the smart 28 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

devices in our homes and offices, on our bodies and in public places. The artificial intelligences being created by internet companies will make us ever more dependent on their services. Coupled with this is the rise of decision-making software, which firms are increasingly using to help make calls about loans, job applications and health insurance based on your data. “The public really does need to be aware of what this means,” says Mohamed Sayed, CEO of German start-up Heuro Labs, which develops health AIs. Our data is being used to train these systems, he says. “How does society get back some of that?” It’s going to require a radical rethink. That’s just what Sambra and his colleagues at W3C are pushing for. The aim is to combine the control and personal autonomy of the early

Web 3.0 The new vision for the internet involves going back to the old ways. Doing away with the server farms means we can connect directly and control our data better

Current system

Easy target for hackers

Companies can proit from stored data

Government agencies can potentially access data without our knowledge

Maidsafe

Files split up and shared across a network make it harder for others to access our data

web with the ease and usefulness of the one we have today. Sambra is working on a project called Solid, which is led by none other than Berners-Lee himself. The idea behind this prototype software is to separate our data from the apps and servers that process it. With Solid, you get to decide where your data lives – on your phone, a server at work, or with a cloud provider, as it probably does now. You can even nominate friends to look after it. “We want to put the data in a place where the user controls it,” says Sambra. Instead of sucking up your data by default, apps will first have to get your permission. And rather than having its own database to draw on, an app will pull in data from as many sources as it needs. In Solid’s vision, web email and social networking sites would cease to handle personal data and focus instead on building the type of flexible software that can draw on data from anywhere . In particular, Solid aims to give you ownership of one of your most important pieces of data: the list of the people you know, and the people they know – what’s called our social graph. A big reason we get locked in to certain sites and services is that it is hard – often impossible – to take this social graph with you if you leave. Quit Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn and all of your connections and contacts are lost. With Solid, you carry your social graph with you from site to site, freeing you from becoming locked in. “You have one social graph and you can reuse it in any app,” says Sambra. You control which parts to plug into which networks. In Solid, your social graph is a key personal possession, a digital Rolodex not to be handed over to anyone. It’s important not just as a list of who you know, but as a list of who you trust. This comes into play when deciding how to distribute your data. You could carry this social graph in your phone, says Sambra. But it is impractical to have crucial pieces of data stored only in one place. So, like leaving sets of house keys with neighbours, you can choose to entrust sensitive data to close connections in your social graph. Web services will then need to adapt to such fluid arrangements. Solid is still at an early stage. But it is not alone. This year, UK start-up MaidSafe launched a peer-to-peer network that relies on encryption and the blockchain – the distributed ledger technology that underpins bitcoin – to divorce data from servers. It already has a few thousand users. MaidSafe’s approach is pretty radical. Where Solid would operate as a virtual layer

GOOGLE/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK

Hackers’ paradise: Server farms are the heart of the internet

on top of the existing structure of the internet, The difference this time is that the slick MaidSafe’s network does away with servers interfaces of smartphones and web apps are completely. Instead, it asks everyone who joins much better at hiding the technical details. to contribute a little computing power and Things just work. Better technology means storage (see graphic). To join, you simply that from our point of view, the way we use download their software, and it is this, rather the web won’t appear to change. We can have than central operators like Facebook, that convenience and decentralisation. encrypts your data and keeps track of it. “We have tech that Tim Berners-Lee didn’t A big advantage of this approach is with no have 25 years ago,” says Brewster Kahle of the servers, there are no targets for attackers. No Internet Archive in San Francisco. “There’s a system today provides physical security for real shift going on. The internet’s plumbing your private data, says MaidSafe’s founder is a distributed system, the World Wide Web David Irvine. is not. I think we could make that jump.” Getting rid of servers throws up some very Indeed, decentralisation is in the air. basic questions, however. For example, how Drawn by the promise of a more reliable and do you log in to a website if there’s no server at more secure internet, IBM, Samsung and the other end to deal with the request? Irvine’s the US military’s research arm, DARPA, are answer is to log into the network itself – which all working on their own versions of such consists of whatever computers happen to be online at the time. “WE HAVE TECH THAT TIM For contributing to the running of this BERNERS-LEE DIDN’T HAVE serverless internet, users earn a bitcoin-like 25 YEARS AGO. THERE’S cryptocurrency called Safecoin. This can be exchanged for services on the network or A REAL SHIFT GOING ON” converted to other currencies. MaidSafe’s fledgling community has already developed a handful of apps, including a blogging networks. But building a distributed web that platform, a file-sharing application and a basic better serves those who use it is hard. It won’t social network. Email and video conferencing happen soon. The internet companies that are in the works. control the web spend billions of dollars a year Solid and MaidSafe are far from the first on the infrastructure and engineers needed to attempts to gain some control over the way keep their centralised systems running. Folding we use the web. The social network Diaspora that all into something that can run across lets you keep hold of your data, and so-called many machines controlled by you and the personal clouds provide online storage but people you trust is not just a massive technical let you keep your files and photos on a hard challenge – it’s a social and political one too. drive at home. Yet nothing quite matches the The answer, says Halpin, is for the convenience of the web we have. developers working on different parts of the

distributed web to start talking to each other about their work, something that doesn’t currently happen. “The community has to get together with the adequate expertise and solve these hard problems and push open standards,” he says. Open standards will make it easier for talented developers to build applications without having to go through existing networks. We might even find ways to take back a tiny stake in the fortunes being made. Sayed sees a system in which we retain ownership of the small pieces of data generated as we move through this sensor-laden world. Whenever our data is used in a way that makes revenue for someone else, we would get a tiny fraction of that money, a small reward for our part in creating value. The same scenario is also championed by tech guru Jaron Lanier in his 2013 book Who owns the future?. “There is an emerging vision that if people could control their data themselves, not just a few companies, it would have a massive positive impact on society,” says Halpin. The ways of the web are entrenched. Is it too late to change them? It’s hard to say for sure. The incumbents will take some pressure before they budge. The result may be that they adopt their own version of Solid or MaidSafe. But that would still be good for most of us. It’s also worth remembering that the internet is only a few decades old – still young enough to learn new tricks. Until recently we simply hadn’t any viable alternative to how things are done. That’s about to change – if we want it to. ■ Hal Hodson is an editor and reporter at New Scientist 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 29

ANDRE DA LOBA

30 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

People are leaving it later to have children, not knowing if the gamble will pay off. What’s the truth about fertility, asks Jessica Hamzelou

The pregnancy pause

WHY ARE SOME WOMEN MORE FERTILE THAN OTHERS? Aside from age, there are biological differences, but these are poorly understood. However, we do know that lifestyle matters. All the things you might typically associate with general well-being also have an impact on fertility. Alcohol, caffeine and smoking – even passive smoking – have been linked to a longer time to conception. Obesity is associated >

Later and later still Across Europe in 2013, the average age of irst time mothers was 28.7 30 25

15 SOURCE: EUROPEAN UNION

Age

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UK

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Ita ly S Sw pa itz in er la nd Ire la Ge nd rm an No y rw ay

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Between 2000 and 2014 there was a shift in the US towards having children later in life

2000

2014

Average age 24.9

Average age 26.3

SOURCE: US CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION

30 Percentage of irst time mothers

IS THERE A “RIGHT” AGE TO HAVE A BABY? Men produce new sperm throughout their lives but women are thought to have a limited supply of eggs. In fact, the number peaks at the fetal stage – a 20-week-old fetus has about 6 million – and dwindles to around a million at birth. Some 300,000 eggs are left at puberty. The rate of decline increases around the age of 32 and is more rapid still from 37 until about 50 when menopause occurs (see chart, page 33). Age also affects egg quality. Older eggs are less likely to be successfully fertilised, to implant in the uterus or develop successfully. According to the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, our best reproductive years are our 20s. But in the developed world the average age for having a first child is pushing towards the 30s (see graphs, right). A woman in her 30s has about a 1 in 5 chance of getting pregnant each month she tries. That

drops to about 1 in 20 in her 40s. And infertility usually starts four or five years before the menopause. At least that’s what the biggest population studies reveal. They were carried out decades ago before contraception was widely available and studies of natural fertility became very difficult to do. Things may have changed since then because fertility is influenced by many lifestyle factors, some of which have dramatically altered in the intervening years (see “Why are some women more fertile than others?”, below). Still, older couples are more likely to have problems conceiving and face more problems during pregnancy and birth – even if only the male is older. Their children are also more likely to have a genetic condition. Women over the age of 40 have a 1 in 100 chance of conceiving a child with Down’s syndrome, which is more than three times as likely as for a 35-year-old, for example. Older fathers have a higher chance of having kids with schizophrenia, as well as disorders linked to single gene mutations, such as achondroplasia – a cause of dwarfism. Autism also becomes more common. But there are also perks to being older parents. With age tends to come higher income and greater job security, so older parents are often better able to provide for their children. There is even evidence that postponing becoming a mother until after the age of 40 can have positive long-term outcomes for offspring in terms of health and education. Older parents may be more secure in their relationships, too. And some studies indicate they experience less parenting stress.

25 20 15 10 5 0

Un de r2 20 0 25 24 35 3 29 an 0-3 d 4 ov er Un de r2 20 0 25 24 35 3 29 an 0-3 d 4 ov er

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AST year, I attended a conference about reproduction. The take-home messages were very clear. If you want children, you have to start early. Women think they can wait to have kids, but they can’t. Older women who conceive are probably secretly having IVF or using donated eggs. And IVF isn’t as reliable as people think it is. As a woman approaching 30, I couldn’t help taking this personally. Chatting about my concerns with one doctor at the conference only made matters worse. She gave me this advice: “Don’t worry about finding the perfect man – you’ve got time to do that. Just focus on finding a good father for the time being.” I’ll admit it, my musings on my own fertility temporarily turned to panic. I know I’m not alone. Across the developed world, people are increasingly choosing to delay starting a family. The reasons are complex and various, but as a result many women – and men – around my age are anxiously questioning their fertility. When should I start trying for a baby? How do I optimise my chances? Is it worth taking a fertility test? It’s surprisingly difficult to find answers. So I set out to look for some.

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 31

with irregular periods, miscarriage and poorer IVF outcomes. Stress might also be important: women who have higher levels of an enzyme associated with stress in their saliva take longer to get pregnant, for example. Then there are sexually transmitted infections such as chlamydia and gonorrhoea, which can cause physical damage that makes it harder to conceive. Many common disorders can affect fertility too. Polycystic ovary syndrome, for example, is thought to affect around 7 per cent of women worldwide. Here, the follicles that surround the eggs can be unusually large or high in number, swelling the ovary and making it difficult to release the eggs properly. Nevertheless, with treatment, most women with this condition can get pregnant. Endometriosis, in which cells that should be in the uterus migrate to other parts of the body, can also influence female fertility. I must declare an interest here. Five years ago, when I had surgery to remove a rotten appendix, I awoke to be told that the surgeon had also removed a patch of endometriosis he’d found. Until then, I had no idea I had the condition. I’ve since discovered that endometriosis often goes undetected, and we still don’t know what causes it, or the best way to treat it. Doctors can remove the offending tissue, but it can return. They often prescribe oral contraceptives and painkillers. Endometriosis affects around 1 in 10 women. It can reduce your ability to conceive and increase the likelihood of a miscarriage and other pregnancy complications. It can also cause a great deal of fertility anxiety. WHAT FACTORS INFLUENCE A MAN’S FERTILITY? A man’s ejaculate can contain up to 1.8 billion sperm, which wriggle and writhe in their race towards the egg. Well, sometimes. For most healthy men, the figure is closer to 300 million. And most of these will have deformities that leave them unable to compete. In fact, the World Health Organization states that a fully fertile man need only expect 4 per cent of his sperm to look normal. Like women, men become less fertile with age, though it doesn’t have much effect until after 40 – and many men father children into their 60s and beyond. Nevertheless, several factors can affect fertility in younger men. Obesity has been linked to erectile dysfunction and poor sperm production. Stress reduces sperm production. Smoking and drinking can have adverse effects too. And it is true that 32 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

MYTH OR FACT? Women can increase their chances of getting pregnant by lifting their legs in the air after sex. Not so. Sperm can swim against gravity and there are plenty to get the job done even with leakage. Men should refrain from sex outside their partner’s fertile period to save up their sperm. No! If you do this, the older sperm can damage the newer ones. Being on the pill for too long affects a woman’s fertility. False. Your cycle and fertility should get back to normal soon after you stop taking contraceptives. Tight trousers curb sperm numbers. Possibly. Anything that overheats the scrotum limits sperm production for a couple of days. So avoid hot baths and laptops on laps. IVF can extend a woman’s fertile years. No. Egg quality declines with age and women aged 44 or over who use IVF have just a 1.3 per cent chance of having a baby.

overheated testicles – whether from illness, a hot bath or a laptop – can temporarily lower sperm counts. So if you are trying for a baby, it makes sense to eat well and exercise. But ignore the locker-room myths, advises Allan Pacey of the University of Sheffield, UK. For example, he has heard men say they will “save up” their sperm and abstain from ejaculating for weeks or months before trying for a baby. This isn’t a good idea. “If you store it up, the older sperm can degenerate and damage the newer sperm,” says Pacey. He recommends having sex regularly. SHOULD I TAKE A FERTILITY TEST? The use of fertility tests appears to be on the rise. In the UK, the National Health Service

offers free tests to couples who have been trying to get pregnant for a year or more, but anyone can opt for one of several tests carried out by private clinics. I decided to give it a go. After a bit of online research, I found a company offering a general fertility check-up. This consists of a semen analysis for the man – counting his sperm and seeing how healthy they look – and two tests to assess the woman’s ovarian reserve – how many eggs she has. First I gave a blood sample, which was tested for levels of anti-Müllerian hormone (AMH) produced by egg cells. Then I had an ultrasound scan to count the number of egg follicles in each ovary around the time of ovulation. It’s all quite straightforward, but after taking the tests I discover they are not as enlightening as I had hoped. At best, they provide a snapshot of a woman’s egg reserve, and my results could look totally different in a matter of months. In fact, the tests aren’t designed to measure fertility at all – they are meant to inform doctors how many eggs a woman might produce for IVF. Although AMH results indicate how many eggs you have, it’s not a precise measure because levels of the hormone can fluctuate by about 13 per cent in an individual. And the healthy range is huge. The follicle count is even more problematic. During ovulation, several follicles grow and expand 500 times in size to between 2 and 10 millimetres wide. The egg cell in only one of these will eventually be primed for fertilisation – we still don’t know how the selection is made. These follicles are visible on the ultrasound scan, and doctors count them by eye, which leaves room for human error. But it’s worse than that: we don’t know whether the number of follicles a woman produces correlates with fertility at all. And numbers tell us nothing about egg quality. “The real crux of fertility is: can egg and sperm meet, fertilise and produce a quality embryo?” says Nick Raine-Fenning, a gynaecologist at the University of Nottingham, UK. “The only way to test that is to try for a family.” So where does that leave fertility tests? They may help pinpoint a problem if a couple is having difficulty getting pregnant. Even then, many causes of infertility are unknown and about a third of couples never learn why they cannot conceive. But for people like me, wondering if they can put off parenthood, fertility tests simply can’t provide concrete answers. As Adam Balen, chair of the British Fertility Society, puts it: “These tests don’t tell you anything about the future. They are appealing, but they don’t tell the full story.”

PLAINPICTURE/C12

“Being in an expensive housing market delays first births by three to four years”

CAN I EXTEND MY FERTILITY? There are many reasons to put off starting a family. One study, for example, found that being in an expensive housing market delays first births by three to four years. Another report found that in 21 European countries women who had studied in male-dominated disciplines were more likely to have their first child later. Whether from choice or necessity, many people are delaying parenthood. For women in particular, this means risking childlessness if they leave it too late. Can technology help by extending the reproductive window? People are certainly making more use of it. In the US, the number of cycles of IVF and similar procedures increased 25 per cent between 2004 and 2013. According to the

latest statistics compiled by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 208,000 cycles of these assisted reproductive technologies were carried out in the country in 2014, resulting in about 57,000 births. Recent research in Spain suggests that for women under the age of 35, some 41 per cent of IVF cycles are successful, which compares well with natural conception rates. However, the success rate falls to 23 per cent for 38 and 39-year-olds. And those who were 44 or older had only a 1.3 per cent chance of giving birth following a cycle of IVF. By comparison, the average women in her 40s has a 1 in 20 chance of conceiving naturally each cycle. IVF is clearly not a reliable way for a woman to extend her fertility. So what about egg freezing? Its promise, to allow people literally

Down but not out

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In today’s world there are more reasons than ever to delay becoming a parent

to put their family plans on ice, has been seized on by companies including Apple and Facebook, who started offering it to female employees a couple of years ago. One fertility specialist has even suggested that it would be the perfect 30th birthday present for a woman. Egg freezing starts like IVF – women take rounds of hormone treatment that make them release a higher than normal number of eggs. These are surgically removed and stored in deep freeze. To date, an estimated 5000 babies have been born from frozen eggs. However, the technique (and its younger sister ovarian tissue freezing) has mostly been used to help women with cancer conceive after chemotherapy. We know little about its effectiveness in older women. What we do know suggests egg freezing is not a reliable backup for women wanting to delay parenthood. Success depends on the number of eggs obtained, how many survive freezing, and what proportion can make it through the thawing process. Then they’ve got to be successfully fertilised, grow into a healthy embryo and manage to implant and survive in the uterus. There is a lot that can go wrong. If technology is not the answer, there is still hope. New research suggests your ovaries can be rejuvenated using chemicals derived from your blood (see this week’s News section). But even without that, the risks of waiting to have a baby may not be as big as you think, provided you are healthy. ■ Jessica Hamzelou is a medical reporter at New Scientist 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 33

ERS

I

T’S the summer of 2012, and in a field outside the French Alpine city of Grenoble, a group of civil engineers are doing what they do best: boring. Each of the 30 or so holes they are drilling into the soft sediment would support a telegraph pole. But Sébastien Guenneau, the researcher directing the operation, has more ambitious plans in mind. He’s come here today to start an earthquake. Guenneau, a physicist at the Fresnel Institute in Marseille, France, is one of a band of researchers aiming to shake up the way we deal with quakes. Rather than designing cities and their buildings to withstand them – with all the cost and potential for failure that implies – they believe we can engineer the ground so that destructive seismic waves never reach cities at all. From underground musical pipes to swaying metal rods to strategically planted trees and, yes, even the right sort of holes bored in the right places, they think some simple tools could help us conquer quakes once and for all. Now they’re setting out to test the idea on a grand scale. Seismic waves come in two types: body ectly waves, which travel underground directly which from the source, and surface waves, w e the ripple along Earth’s surface. These are most damaging to buildings, turning the ground beneath into a bucking bronco. For the last few thousand years, earrthquake protection has involved finding ways to ride pskin in out the tremors. From layers of sheep the foundations of temples – as described by o more the Roman author Pliny the Elder – to ball modern solutions involving springs, b hods all bearings and special pads, these meth aim to isolate the foundations of a building so it can remain stable while the ground shakes.

34 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

But in 2001, French seismologist Philippe Guéguen realised that getting buildings to sway could have unexpected benefits. He was studying the effect on Mexico City of a magnitude 7.4 quake that hit it in September 1995. While various parts of the city should have responded in the same way, some neighbourhoods shook for nearly twice as long as others. Softer sediments wobble more than solid rock, but underlying geology wasn’t enough to account for the discrepancy. Instead, it turned out that tall buildings were creating secondary waves in the ground around them, prolonging the shaking but muting the original surface waves. This suggested that the swaying high-rise towers were redistributing the earthquake energy, and providing some protection. The idea that the waves themselves could be modified, rather than simply withstood, turned earthquake engineering on its head, says Guéguen, who is based at the Institute of Earth Sciences in Grenoble. The key is controlling the way in which the ground responds to incoming waves. Guenneau had a surprising idea for how

BOTTOM : G.ZUILI / AGENCE VU / CAMERA PRESS RIGHT AND TOP : TED SOQUI/CORBIS VIA GETTY IMAGES

Could we manipulate the properties of matter to stop earthquakes in their tracks, asks Kate Ravilious

A magnitude 6 quake releases as much energy as an atomic bomb

this could be achieved. While simply drilling holes in the soil may not seem like it would have much of an impact, he knew that the principle on which it was based had already achieved the impossible. That was with very different waves in a very different setting. A decade ago, Guenneau was working with John Pendry, a physicist at Imperial College London, when he showed that it was theoretically possible to guide light waves around an object, effectively rendering it invisible. Pendry and a team from Duke University in North Carolina soon went on to demonstrate the concept in the lab. The invisibility cloaks they made were designed to bend the path of microwaves so that they flowed smoothly around the object,

like water flowing around a boulder in a stream. Making this happen involved building a metamaterial – a substance with a physical structure designed to give it unique properties not usually found in nature. Their material was a lattice of thin metallic wires, separated by gaps smaller than the wavelength the device was built to deflect. That set Guenneau wondering if the invisibility cloak principle could be scaled up to work on seismic waves. In 2009 he floated the notion in a paper. “When I heard about this

“SIMPLY DRILLING A FEW HOLES INTO THE SOIL COULD ACHIEVE THE IMPOSSIBLE”

I thought it was a daring idea. Seismic waves obey rules similar to electromagnetic wave equations, so in theory there is no reason why it shouldn’t work,” says Pendry. The work also caught the attention of Stéphane Brûlé, a civil engineer with the French firm Menard, who had a long-standing interest in the way earthquakes interact with subsurface structures. “I realised that what they were talking about was close to my research and could be tested,” says Brûlé. Working together, Guenneau and Brûlé began to think about ways to mimic the super-thin wires Pendry used to disrupt electromagnetic waves, but tuned to wavelengths billions of times longer. “Our first attempt was simply to drill rows of >

23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 35

TAMING TSUNAMIS Building an invisibility cloak to shield cities from seismic waves is a challenge in itself, but Sébastien Guenneau from the Fresnel Institute in Marseille, France, doesn’t want to stop there. Mirroring the success of his land-based experiments (see main story), he envisages forests of artificial trees planted on the ocean floor, rising above the surface ready to calm mighty tsunamis. “My wife was born in Sri Lanka, which was heavily affected by the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and after this event I started to think about ways to protect coastal towns,” he says. Back in 2008 Guenneau and colleagues tested their first prototype tsunami cloak, measuring just 10 centimetres across. It comprised an arrangement of metal rods in seven concentric rings, with a greater spacing between rods in the outer rings. They exposed it to a mock tsunami wave made of a slippery organic compound even less viscous than water, seeing as the ordinary wet stuff would have been too sticky on such tiny scales. The approaching wave flowed through the gaps between the rods, but then swirled around them to produce forces that pulled the water along the concentric “corridors”. “We are encouraging the waves to travel in curved trajectories rather than straight lines,” says Guenneau. The increasing density of rods made the turning forces progressively stronger towards the centre, ensuring that the water was eventually diverted around the ring of rods, keeping the centre dry. In 2014 the team revisited the idea on a scale 10 times larger. Using the wave tank facility at La Seyne Sur Mer near Marseille, they subjected their “invisibility carpet” to water waves and showed that it successfully reflected them back – a step on the road to redirecting them completely. This summer, Guenneau and his colleagues are scaling up their tsunami cloak yet again, testing a 2-metre-wide arrangement of rods at the same facility. But not everyone is convinced that tsunami waves can be tamed. “Tsunamis carry a vast amount of energy and the structures capable of controlling that energy would have to be very substantial – kilometres across. Engineering such a thing seems implausible,” says John Pendry of Imperial College London, who designed the world’s first invisibility cloak for electromagnetic radiation. Guenneau agrees that for now the construction challenges associated with protecting an island or stretch of coastline are prohibitively expensive, but he believes that smaller structures, such as oil platforms, are a more realistic proposition. 36 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

holes in the soil,” says Guenneau, a project they undertook over three days in August 2012. They used an industrial crane to plant a large vibrating probe underground, where it emitted a deep bass rumble at the upper frequency limit of seismic waves. Without any holes, the team found the shaking could be detected up to 50 metres away. With the holes in place, however, the

“CITIES COULD CONVERT AN EARTHQUAKE’S ENERGY INTO LESS HARMFUL FORMS” shaking died out by the second row, just over 3 metres from the source. The scientists had stopped their mini-earthquake in its tracks. But there was a problem. Sensors in front of the row of holes recorded vibrations twice as intense as those produced by the probe. “In this case we reflected the seismic waves instead of deflecting them around the area. We created a seismic mirror,” says Guenneau. If this technique were used to protect a hospital or a vital power plant, the surrounding houses would end up being shaken twice as hard. Guenneau’s more recent results suggest that this problem can be solved by narrowing the spacing between holes in subsequent rows. This way, he says, “the path of the seismic wave is gradually bent, rather than reflected”. Later this year Brûlé and Guenneau intend to put this idea to the test, drilling a new network of holes and dropping a 35-tonne weight from a 40-metre-high crane to simulate a magnitude 3.5 quake. This all sounds promising, but truly devastating earthquakes are a different kettle of fish entirely. A magnitude 6 quake can

release as much energy as the 1945 Hiroshima atomic bomb. The earthquake that hit Mexico City in 1995 was over a hundred times more powerful than that (see “Bad vibrations”, below). “Seismic waves that are dangerous for buildings are generally more than 100 metres long. This means that the seismic barrier would need to be several hundred metres wide, or extremely heavy, to be effective,” says Chiara Daraio, who designs metamaterials at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. “It isn’t practical for protecting buildings in a dense urban area.” Daraio proposes a more sophisticated way to modify earthquake waves. Together with her team, she has designed a cylindrical steel resonator, containing a vertical steel rod that sways back and forth when a seismic wave arrives. These resonators increase the stiffness of the soil, says Daraio, meaning a comparatively small barrier can have an impact on waves much larger than itself. When faced with an array of differently sized resonators, each tuned to respond to a different frequency, the surface waves will lose energy and be deflected downwards where they pose less of a threat. In 2015 Daraio and her team tested their idea by inserting cigar tube sized resonators into a tray of sand and inducing mini earthquakes with an electromagnetic shaker. They then modelled how the system might perform for a real earthquake, using the magnitude 6.7 Northridge quake in California in 1994 as an example. “We showed that a barrier consisting of 35 resonators would have functioned as an efficient shielding mechanism,” says Daraio. Now the team is scaling up the experiments and using more realistic materials. But when it comes to really large earthquakes, Daraio

Bad vibrations The damage caused by earthquakes depends on the strength of the surface waves

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earthquake vibrations to lose energy

and Das envisage creating smaller structures, with roughly the same stopping power as Guenneau’s network of holes. Unfortunately, their concrete saxophones have not yet been put to the test. “I live in Korea – an almost earthquake-free country – and nobody wants to spend money on this experiment,” says Das. Although Guenneau stands with Daraio in conceding the challenges associated with deflecting the largest earthquakes, he argues that seismic cloaks don’t need to be perfect to be effective. “We don’t need to completely stop the seismic wave – reducing shaking by 10 to 15 per cent would be enough to preserve

DAVID HUME KENNERLY/GETTY IMAGES

doubts her system could hold up. “The structural integrity of the resonators would be hard to maintain,” says Daraio. It is a criticism that she also levels at Guenneau’s system of holes, insisting that they too would collapse when shaken by a massive quake. Daraio envisages her earthquake cloak being used to shield areas from small and medium-sized earthquakes, or from earthquakes induced by human activities such as fracking. “Fracking can induce seismicity in regions that don’t have natural seismicity, and so buildings are vulnerable because they were not designed to cope,” she says. But the dream of rerouting the largest of earthquakes remains. One way of doing this might be to convert the earthquake’s movement energy into a less harmful form. With this in mind, Sang-Hoon Kim from the Mokpo National Maritime University in South Korea and Mukunda Das from the Australian National University in Canberra have designed a system of subterranean perforated concrete cylinders that would resonate when struck by surface waves. “It would be like thousands of underground concrete saxophones being played with seismic energy,” explains Kim. For a magnitude 8 earthquake, Kim and Das calculate that their underground saxophones would produce a 160 decibel roar – equivalent to the noise level of a shotgun firing. However, the structures would have to be impractically large – perhaps 100 metres long. Instead, Kim

convert seismic energy into sound

buildings,” he says. And with this in mind he has recently teamed up with Guéguen and Philippe Roux, a geophysicist at the Institute of Earth Sciences in Grenoble, to try yet another seemingly outlandish idea. The trio believe that just as the shaking of tall buildings in Mexico City redistributed the energy of the 1995 quake, tall trees might also be able to modify surface waves. To test this idea, the three got together last summer and recorded ground tremors passing through a pine forest on the outskirts of Grenoble. At certain frequencies, rumbles recorded inside the forest were found to be six times smaller than those recorded outside. This summer, the trio intends to scale their experiment up, deploying a larger network of sensors and investigating how tree size and spacing affects seismic wave absorption. With the right configuration of trees, says Guéguen, “we can start to make self-resistant cities”. But even the tallest of pine trees resonate at frequencies too high to disrupt the most dangerous seismic waves. A forest of recordbreaking giant redwoods would be needed to do the job, although a ring of uninhabited buildings in a city’s suburbs might be more practical. With experiments under way to test the same principles on tsunamis (see “Taming tsunamis”, page 36), Guenneau’s days of shaking up the field are far from over. ■ Kate Ravilious is a freelance writer based in York, UK 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 37

PEOPLE

EBOLA The bloody beginning Forty years ago, Peter Piot raced to the scene of an outbreak of an unknown killer disease

38 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

BRYAN SCHUTMAAT

W

E DIDN’T know it would be in a Thermos flask, but we were warned by telex that a sample would be arriving from Zaire. It was blood from a nun who had died from a mysterious disease. Was it yellow fever? Something else? The nun worked at a mission hospital in the north of the country, but had been evacuated to the capital Kinshasa before she died. Her doctor put the samples in a small blue Thermos – the kind people use for coffee – and gave it to a pilot. He carried it in his hand luggage, and brought it to us at the Institute of Tropical Medicine in Antwerp. He did it all without gloves, without anything. Today he’d go to jail. But he didn’t know what he was carrying – nobody did. We opened the flask and found two glass vials swimming in water and ice. One had cracked, so there was also some blood in the slush. We were certified to work with viruses transmitted by insects, like yellow fever, but we weren’t equipped for highly dangerous pathogens. We took precautions: wore rubber gloves, lab gowns and so on, and manipulated the samples in a way that was as sterile and safe as possible. But we were lucky, frankly. Today, isolating viruses is straightforward – biologists go straight to the genome. But in 1976 it was more craft than science: injecting samples into mice and waiting for odd behaviour; putting sample fluids on to cell lines and looking for tell-tale gaps in the tapestry they form, like a hole in a stocking. We did tests to rule out known viruses and viewed the inactivated virus with an electron microscope. That’s when we saw it was something new: most viruses are spheres or cubes, but this was like spaghetti. The only other virus with a similar shape was Marburg virus, so we called it “Marburg-like virus”. We weren’t able to do more work though. A

telegram from the World Health Organization said the nun appeared to be part of an epidemic of a haemorrhagic fever, and it had a high death rate. The samples went to the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, which had the highest biosafety rating. There Karl Johnson’s team checked to see if Marburg antibodies would react to the Marburg-like virus. They didn’t, confirming it was a new virus.

Into Africa I was excited that we had isolated something new, but even more eager to find out how it was transmitted. What does it cause? And how? I wanted to go to Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) to have a look. Within a week I got a call from the Department for International Development in Belgium asking me to fly to Kinshasa to investigate the epidemic. Now, I definitely

wasn’t qualified. I had never been to Africa, I had never investigated an epidemic, and I was still very young. I immediately said yes. On arrival, my colleague Stefaan Pattyn and I went straight to a meeting of the commission investigating the epidemic. The big worry was that the epidemic could spread in Kinshasa, a chaotic city of about 3 million people. Later that day it was decided that some volunteers should fly to the epidemic zone, to ground zero – a village called Yambuku where the mission hospital was. I raised my hand. Six of us went out to Yambuku, led by Joel Breman of the CDC. Our aim was to stop the epidemic. First we had to work out how it was transmitted. Pierre Sureau and I teamed up to examine sick people, taking blood and gathering information about age and gender, date of symptoms onset and exposure to other infected people. When you don’t know the cause of an epidemic, you must define it in terms of three things: time, place and person. For time, where are you in the epidemic? Has it peaked? For place, where are the victims coming from? And person: who is coming down with the virus we would later call Ebola? When we arrived, the epidemic seemed to be declining. So what had happened? We learned that the hospital where the nun had worked had been closed down. That was one clue. Then we found out that the closer people lived to that hospital, the higher their risk of dying from Ebola. And when we looked at age, we saw that it was mostly fairly young adults who were affected, and also some newborns. So it probably wasn’t transmitted by mosquitoes – they bite everybody. Also, twice as many women were infected as men. We wondered what was different about the women. As a group of six men it took us longer than it should have done to realise –

JOEL BREMAN

PROFILE Peter Piot is a clinical microbiologist and director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. He has been undersecretary general of the United Nations, and executive director of UNAIDS. He is the author of No Time to Lose: A life in pursuit of deadly viruses (W.W. Norton, 2012)

Peter Piot (second left) was the youngest of the Yambuku team

women get pregnant. Indeed, many of the women who became ill were pregnant or had just given birth. These women had been to the antenatal clinic at the hospital, where just about every woman got an injection – with constantly reused needles and syringes. We also saw that a large number of those who became ill were healthcare workers. So after a frantic 72 hours or so, we were putting the puzzle pieces together: time, place and person all pointed to the mission hospital. We learned one other thing, too. The people in the villages kept telling us that about a week after a funeral of someone who had been sick, several cases would develop among the family members or other funeral attendees. Later, it was documented that the traditional funeral rites – when the corpse is washed with bare hands – are very high risk because the corpse and bodily fluids are full of virus. So, after

those few days, we reached a few conclusions (later confirmed): the virus required very close contact or injections to be transmitted.

Personal peril We saw several people in the final stages of their lives, but we had no way to provide intensive care. That was tough. We were also aware of the risk to ourselves. The mission hospital employed about 18 nurses; 11 of them died from Ebola. In the 2014 outbreak in West Africa, over 500 hospital workers died. We didn’t have the kind of safety gear that you see now, but we did protect ourselves with latex gloves and paper masks and motorcycle goggles. I wasn’t really scared at the time, but afterwards I got scared looking back on it. About 300 people died during that first outbreak. Since that first time, there have been about

25 outbreaks. Only the 2014 outbreak really got out of control. The difference then was that Ebola was in big cities, and when that happens we are in deep trouble. We needed a quick mobilisation, but the world did not react fast enough. When it finally did, there were rapid results. That’s a lesson for next time an outbreak threatens to become an epidemic. And outbreaks will keep coming, despite what my professors warned me in 1974 when I graduated from medical school. They said there was no future in researching infectious diseases, because they were dying out thanks to antibiotics, vaccines and improved sanitation. I did it anyway. Then the arrival of that Thermos changed everything. Those few months I spent racing against an epidemic gave me the beginnings of my purpose in life. ■ As told to Tiffany O’Callaghan 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 39

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SOME weeks ago, my flight was delayed due to a malfunction of the braking computer. A little later, the plane had to wrestle its way through some turbulence generated by a pre-alpine convection cloud that had eluded the weather radar. While I contemplated my tomato juice, the on-board Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS) purred away down in the intestines of the fuselage, preventing a collision with another aircraft. Evading the flight path of another plane in a contingency situation is a complex business. And as Samuel Arbesman points out in Overcomplicated: Technology at the limits of comprehension, the systems we have built to handle such problems have become black boxes. The rules by which the TCAS functions have evolved over decades and are so massively interwoven today that they escape the understanding of everyone, apart from the ubiquitous yet elusive “handful of experts”. This challenge is not unique to aviation. It applies to finance, infrastructure, power plants, launch vehicles and other technological systems. They share some key traits: their elements and interactions may make sense individually, but their wider interdependencies are dynamic and unpredictable. Even if our individual and 42 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

GUY BROWN / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

Overcomplicated: Technology at the limits of comprehension by Samuel Arbesman, Current, $23

collective cognitive faculties were up to the task of understanding massive complexity and its emergent behaviour – and they’re not – then there is the question of legacy. Much of what we use today has been designed incrementally and has been operating for a long time. It has been upgraded, patched, repaired and maintained. So, on top of everything else, the insoluble puzzle we have set ourselves is always changing. The fact that Arbesman uses the term “overcomplicated” in reference to such systems should invite us to listen carefully. He is not someone who didn’t read the manual. A trained computational biologist, Arbesman uses quantitative models to explore

the chaos around us. And because the “entanglement” he diagnoses today is more akin to an evolving ecology than a carefully configured and managed machine, Arbesman encourages us to adopt the attitudes and methods of field biologists. These people delight in anomaly and embrace diversity. They derive intrinsic satisfaction from the observation, description and collection of “bundles of facts”, even if a full picture or generalised model is not immediately evident. By invoking the repertoire of the field biologist, Arbesman argues, we are in a better position to confront our systems. This practice – observing and making sense of the sometimes

Hardly anyone knows how collision avoidance systems work

contradictory interplay between actors and processes – smacks strongly of another field-based approach: ethnography. And it’s no coincidence that ethnographic field research has become an essential tool in understanding our relationship with technology, and a key player in applied domains as distinct as healthcare design and bespoke defences. Ethnographers have explored and explained institutions ranging from weapons laboratories to particle accelerators, utility regulators and Mars mission control rooms. Overcomplicated is not an advertisement for ethnography.

For more books and arts coverage, visit newscientist.com/culture

“Many of our systems were designed incrementally: they are insoluble puzzles that are always changing” which to observe the subtle imperfections and, here and there, the fundamentally flawed logic of our systems. True to the remit of the field biologist, Arbesman stops short of calling for the decommissioning or prevention of overcomplicated systems. One can see why. There is much value to be had in looking at technology through a naive lens. Suggesting how one should actually respond to the burgeoning and powerful machine ecology Arbesman describes is a task for another book. Still, how we respond is an urgent issue. We face some consequences of complicated tech today – think of the debris lacing Earth orbits, or the world’s stockpiles of nuclear weapons – and these are likely t0 haunt our political lives for generations, needing more than a field biologist’s inquisitive tinkering and cautious optimism to solve. To its credit, Overcomplicated gives the reader the tools necessary to make this very

argument. The governance of technology, so often an arcane business, is dissected here with aplomb, as Arbesman strings together the key concepts that describe overcomplicated systems. Readers armed with notions of interoperability (the ability of different systems to talk to each other and exchange information), kludgeyness (the relative likelihood that a system fix will cause trouble later) and other arcana can at least begin to argue on equal terms with systems analysts and designers. This is important: I would argue that acquiring fluency in systems-speak is fast becoming a civic duty. In any event, Arbesman’s freshly elucidated concepts are excellent field tools: they are the translucent sampling containers you take with you as you wade through the glitch-infested shallows of an algorithm; the night vision camera you employ when stalking incompatibilities through the primordial thickets of a code forest; the head torch for abseiling into the crevasses of operating systems; the depthmeter for a cave dive into the murky world of automation. You will only catch a glimpse of what’s going on. But you will begin to discern and respect patterns, and orient yourself in a landscape that would otherwise remain opaque. The warning implicit in Overcomplicated is clear: if you ignore the intricacies of intractable systems, refuse to engage with the anomalous underbelly of concealed electronic complexity, or fail to attribute due importance to minute but critical parts, then those ever-sofleeting “edge cases” will sooner or later resurface as freakishly bizarre incidents, and catastrophes as inevitable as they are unanticipated. ■

Northern lights Finland’s starry art show knows the limits of its universe, says Simon Ings The Starry Skies of Art, Serlachius Museums, Mänttä, Finland, to 8 January 2017

A FEW hours north of Helsinki, Finland, on the shores of a lake, sits an art museum, opened in the 1930s and much expanded since. Now one of its galleries is filled with 200 years’ worth of artistic visions of the skies, the work of Helena Sederholm, an arteducation professor, and science writer Markus Hotakainen. Scientific approaches to the cosmos are affectionately parodied in Andy Gracie’s Drosophila Titanus – a breeding project to adapt fruit flies for life on Titan, Saturn’s largest moon – and Agnes Meyer-Brandis’s Moon Goose Analogue: Lunar migration bird facility (MGA), which tries to realise, NASA-style, English bishop Francis Godwin’s story The Man in the Moone, whose hero flies to the moon in a chariot towed by “moon geese”. Reductive approaches to the cosmos reach pathological levels Sunset songs: Flickr pics archived by Penelope Umbrico

in Marko Vuokola’s Been There, Seen It, Done That, in which the phases of the moon are reduced to a pattern of shadows cast by glass discs resting on a glass shelf. A more elegaic exploration of the same idea (that we murder to dissect) lies in Petri Eskelinen’s 2016 installation Dying Star. After a few minutes, the viewer’s darkadapted eye makes out a beautiful and convincing cloud of stars. At regular intervals, lights come on, revealing the cloud for what it is: smeared, worn Perspex sheets stuck with scraps of Post-it note and scrawled over with whiteboard pens: “Yes”; “No”; “No life field”. The night sky is reduced to a bitterly precise, tiresome, anthropocentric hunt for an earthlike planet. The lights go out. The magic reasserts itself. To comprehend the world, we must reduce it. But as Penelope Umbrico ably reveals in 30,400,020 Suns from Sunsets from Flickr, the world is big enough to take our abuse. And in the moonlit landscapes by 19thcentury artists Fanny Churberg and Hjalmar Munsterhjelm, it swallows us whole. ■

PENELOPE UMBRICO, 30,400,020 SUNS FROM SUNSETS FROM FLICKR

It does not explicitly address human agency at all. Even systems with evident political dimensions, such as tax law or the Challenger shuttle loss, are understood as technological rather than sociotechnical. This is an uncanny omission: do humans not inadvertently contribute to, passively allow, or even actively promote overcomplication? Not any more: Arbesman suspects that our tech truly has outgrown us. This is a big claim, and many readers may balk at the idea of discounting the role of humans in how technology works. But at the very least, they will have to concede that the approach is entertaining, and provides us with the necessary external vantage point from

Regina Peldszus is a research associate with the German Aerospace Centre Space Administration 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 43

CULTURE

Revolutionary, and wrong Give folly its place in the history of science, says Michael Doser

IT HAPPENED before, of course. At the end of the 19th century, Victorian spiritualists challenged the strictures of science, driven by the hope of establishing a richer fabric of reality. The leavings of that movement – N-rays, mitogenetic rays, Joseph Banks Rhine’s newly minted extrasensory perception, and many others – are patently pathological, but all, in the first heady days, represented legitimate pathways of enquiry. At least as much can be claimed for the “groovy science” that held sway a generation later. Think of John Lilly’s attempt to communicate with dolphins (with its obligatory diversion through LSD), the parapsychology studies of physicist Peter Phillips, and Immanuel Velikovsky’s “catastrophism”. This, at any rate, is the argument of Groovy Science, though the task of evaluating the intellectual and cultural worth of these escapades is anything but easy. While the military-industrial complex is entertaining (and funding) experiments in sensory deprivation, dolphin training and space colonisation, we may as well abandon any attempt to distinguish between the establishment and its counterculture. Indeed, look hard and you will find that there is no counterculture – only a loose overlapping of opposed A good idea at the time? John Lilly’s attempt to talk to dolphins 44 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

subgroups, each with its own of the personal computer. expectations, each interacting Less obvious, but equally odd, rather warily with the others. is the way the book satirises the Psychologist Abraham Maslow picture of the scientist as “a whitelectured at Esalen, a retreat in Big coated man in a laboratory, bald, Sur, California, but kept away from tired, and unfit to marry”, but the New Age movement that then singularly fails to celebrate Esalen spawned; psychedelia’s very many non-white non-males. champion Timothy Leary and Yes, there are cameos about space-colonisation prophet Gerard natural childbirth and K. O’Neill shared almost nothing cheesemaking, but given the huge beyond their avid readership. “We may as well abandon The explorations and the distinction between experiments discussed here the science establishment hardly rivalled the mainstream and its counterculture” breakthroughs of the time (recombinant DNA, the quark model, the creation of societal changes taking place at buckminsterfullerene) – but their the time – the women’s liberation prevailing ethic of curiosity and movement, the Black Panthers, iconoclasm had a historical Stonewall – I expected more. If influence that this volume, these huge segments of society unexpectedly, sells rather short. were really not involved in There is, to pick the most glaring “groovy science”, their wholesale example, no discussion of the absence might well be the homebrew computing scene, subject for another, as-yetwhich appeared in the early unwritten book. 1970s and led to the development Reading Groovy Science leaves

the reader enthused, but daunted at the work still to be done. The authors’ chosen focus on the US leaves whole traditions of “groovy science” unexamined. (Explorers Thor Heyerdahl and Michel Siffre are conspicuous by their absence.) This compendium of individual scholarly articles is a trove of information, and the references are useful and exhaustive. But the prose of several of these pieces wobbles uncertainly between the academic and the popular, as if a community of scholars was not quite ready to distil its research into a mainstream account. That account is, for my money, well worth looking forward to. In the meantime, we have this frustrating but always enthralling archaeological travel guide to an epoch that, although only 40 years old, already feels like an alien continent. ■ Michael Doser is a particle physicist working at CERN

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Groovy Science: Knowledge, innovation, and American counterculture edited by David Kaiser and W. Patrick McCray, University of Chicago Press, $75

Take a Chance Explore the science and secrets of luck, randomness and probability in the latest book from New Scientist, available now from all good bookstores. newscientist.com/chance

Executive Director, North Pacific Research Board Congress created the North Pacific Research Board in 1997 to recommend marine research initiatives to the U.S. Secretary of Commerce, who makes final funding decisions. Primary Responsibilities: Under the direction of the North Pacific Research Board (NPRB), provide leadership for a nationally recognized scientific organization to maintain and enhance the organization’s reputation for excellence in marine research. To meet this goal, manage the staff and established processes to administer sub-awards with funds made available to the Secretary of Commerce from the Environmental Improvement and Restoration Fund (EIRF). EIRF funds provide for Federal, State, private and foreign organizations or individuals to conduct; research activities for cooperative marine research projects and activities on, or relating to, the fisheries or marine ecosystems in the North Pacific Ocean, Bering Sea, Gulf of Alaska and Arctic Ocean (including lesser related bodies of water) as set forth at 43 U.S.C. §1474d(e)(1) and in accordance with criteria and priorities for grants established by the North Pacific Research Board, as set forth at 43 U.S.C. §§1474d(e)(2) and (e)(4)(B).

Specific Duties: Work jointly with the parties of the Memorandum of Understanding pertaining to the North Pacific Research Board (NPRB) and the North Pacific Marine Research Institute; the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the Alaska SeaLife Center to meet the overall objectives of the EIRF. Employ and manage NPRB staff and contractors in accordance with relevant laws and regulations to assist in achieving the duties and responsibilities outlined in this scope of services. Develop the annual work plan formulation process to generate budgets for the operation and administration of all research, education, and administration activities, and submit these timely for NPRB approval, together with all proposals for grant funding; track and report on the work plan in synchrony with Board meetings. Manage the overall NPRB budget, and track and report on the budget in synchrony with Board meetings. Provide NPRB with all information necessary to approve research, education and demonstration projects in accordance with 33 U.S.C. §2738 and oversee implementation and monitoring of all approved grants to ensure compliance and timely conduct; report to Board timely on issues associated with grant implementation. Work with and for the Board, including working at the direction of the Board to develop standard operating procedures, science and strategic plans, and other policies for ultimate NPRB approval and oversee their implementation by staff, consultants, and contractors. Provide oversight of scientific guidance provided to the Board and scientific peer review of grant requests via the Science Panel; implement and administer grants, programs and projects, and perform such other science review functions as may be required by the Board. Coordinate Advisory Panel meetings and reports to the Board and foster community and public input to the Board as appropriate. Oversee a public process of communications and outreach and develop a biennial report of NPRB activities for Board approval. Oversee, in

conjunction with the ASLC HR manager, performance appraisals of NPRB staff; submit to the Executive Committee an annual performance report for this position and meet annually to agree on personal business goals and priorities for the year ahead. Represent the Board at appropriate public, professional, and scientific meetings and symposia. Ensure compliance with applicable laws and regulations and work with the Fiscal Agent for the NPRB (the Alaska SeaLife Center) to ensure compliance with all Federal, State and local regulations pertaining to NPRB operations; comply with all NPRB policies, procedures, and programs and all ASLC financial agent requirements relating to human resources, fiscal management, risk management, etc. Perform other related duties as assigned from time to time by the Executive Committee. Physical Requirements: The physical demands described are representative of those that must be met by the employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this position. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Minimum Skills and Qualifications: Proven/strong managerial and leadership skills; team building; and strong interpersonal skills; At least 10 years experience at a senior level in research and/or organizational management with 5 years of program-level supervisory experience; Proven communication and interpersonal skills - must be able to communicate effectively, internally and externally, to multiple audiences; Leader and facilitator – ability to motivate, influence, and develop capacity in others to create conditions that elicit passion, commitment, and best in class work that builds the reputation of an organization; Proven emotional intelligence (i.e., ability to appropriately perceive, use, understand, and manage the emotions of oneself and others); and a Bachelor’s degree in a field related to science, business, law, administration, fisheries, or environmental research.

Preferred Skills and Qualifications: A postgraduate degree in a field related to science, business, law, administration, fisheries or environmental research; A record of accomplishment with a particular emphasis on oversight of multidisciplinary research that has management applications; Solid understanding of issues relating to marine ecosystems, including current, key, and developing issues; Experience working with and for a board of directors; Ability to work effectively with key government, private and academic institutions; Current knowledge of key government and academic institutions and partners in marine science and management, including fisheries, oil and gas, tourism and other marine industry organizations; Demonstrated experience with business and financial management; Demonstrated partnership-building experience with diverse political environments at State, National and International levels; Able to work with confidential information and diverse stakeholders; Be alert to opportunities, be innovative, entrepreneurial, and take on new challenges in a manner that supports and reinforces the priorities of the Board; and Be of the highest levels of character and ethical behavior.

This is a regular, full-time position equivalent to the GS-15 level in federal service. Candidates should submit a letter of application, curriculum vitae, a two-page summary of their philosophy on guiding collaborative research and contact information for four references at

http://alaskasealifecenter.gatherdocs.com/apply?listing_id=2382 Applications will be accepted through June 24, 2016 and review of applications will take place in July with an anticipated start date of no later than October 21, 2016. NPRB is committed to affirmative action, equal opportunity and the diversity of its workforce.

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LETTERS EDITOR’S PICK

Luddites’ work is not finished From Ron Burbery Jon White reinforces the concept that the loom-breaking Luddites of early 19th-century England were focused on their own concerns (25 June, p 33). The Luddites were way ahead of their time and the concerns they were raising and protesting about are as relevant today as they were then: to whom does the material benefit of mechanisation accrue? They believed that benefits shouldn’t accrue to just the owners of machinery; rather they should be spread throughout society – to workers and communities as well as, of course, the “owners” of said machinery. Isn’t this the same discussion we need to have today – only this time around artificial intelligence and robotics? Will we again be defeated by the power elites? There is a desperate need for this discussion to be had much more widely than in your pages. But I fear that it will be subverted and be subject to the same orchestrated put-downs and suppression that the Luddites faced. How successful this suppression was is clearly shown by how people view the notion of “Luddite” today. We need another way of looking at how the material benefits of new technology are disbursed. Wellington, New Zealand

To read more letters, visit newscientist.com/letters 52 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

Chilling thoughts on waking in 2116 From Gillian Peall I am rather puzzled over this business of cryonics (2 July, p 26). I have no problem with freezing cells, tissues and organs. But when an entire person is reanimated after perhaps 100 years, are they then at the age at which they died? Would they start living again with a 100-year gap in memory and a chasm in cultural, social and psychological experiences? With no friends or family to guide them, how would they navigate this strange life? Would they end up as interesting specimens of a past age in a laboratory enclosure somewhere? Macclesfield, Cheshire, UK From Margaret Kettlewell Imagine getting a call from Life Extensions R Us in 2116. They have just revived your great-great-great uncle Kevin, who died in 2020. His pancreatic cancer is cured, though he still has some arthritis. Before being frozen, Kevin set up a trust fund on which he proposed to live after his revival, but 90 years of poor investment has left its value after inflation the same as your children’s pocket money. They would like to know when you will be along to collect him. Bournemouth, Dorset, UK From Simon Ritchie If a person close to death is frozen in the hope of being reanimated one day, why should somebody in the far future revive them? If a person frozen in 1816 were revived today, what contribution would they make to society, other than providing source material for social historians? The UK government is reluctant to admit a few thousand Syrian refugees, citing a burden they will place on the state while they find their feet. But they are well-equipped to contribute to modern society, having been brought up in it. That wouldn’t be the case for those who

were revived. As for setting up a trust fund to pay for your revived future: my hypothetical frozen Victorian might have put their money into the East India Company, or maybe that thriving steam engine business run by Messrs Boulton and Watt… Leatherhead, Surrey, UK

Mumbo-jumbo, hope and delusion From David Muir You juxtapose two comment articles on the UK’s vote on EU membership and on the futility of homeopathy for animals (2 July, p 18). Both decry a lack of critical thinking and logical discussion. This is no surprise. New Scientist advertises itself with a reminder that “9 out of 10 people hold a delusional belief”. Many people have no truck with rational thought and their decisions are often (mis)informed by emotion. Desperate and disenfranchised people grasp the tripod of mumbo-jumbo, hope and self-delusion to support their views. As you report, science has shown that cogent argument does not sway the irrational but makes their attitudes more entrenched. Scientifically literate politicians need more than facts and solid arguments to carry the majority. They also, sadly, need sound bites and showmanship. Without these they will be trumped by snake-oil sellers and opportunists. Edinburgh, UK From Bryn Glover When then UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher was launching her assault on the trades unions in the 1980s, she first proposed that decisions to go on strike be legal only when supported by twothirds of those entitled to vote in a ballot. This year, the UK legislated that strikes in public services must be backed by 40 per cent of those entitled to vote. Many companies’ rules require that two-

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thirds of those voting back any amendment to those rules. Now, 37 per cent of the UK’s electorate – little more than a quarter of the total population – have imposed a far-reaching constitutional change upon everyone. Surely such changes should need the backing of least half of the possible voters? Kirkby Malzeard, North Yorkshire, UK

Brain models could replace primates From Kathy Archibald (Safer Medicines Trust), Gerry Kenna and Barbara Pierscionek You claim that the Weatherall Report helped to end debate about the validity of primate research (18 June, p 5). Yet the report states that “debate on the use of nonhuman primates in research would benefit from more systematic information on its overall impact on scientific and medical advances”. Models using human tissues, reproducing key features of biochemistry and physiology, have enormous potential in brain research. A 2016 paper in Alternatives to Laboratory Animals concludes: “neuroscience would be more relevant and successful for humans if it were conducted with a direct human focus”. As scientists dedicated to ensuring the best outcomes for patients, we concur. Kingsbridge, Devon, UK; Macclesfield, Cheshire, UK; and Kingston, Surrey, UK

Language escapes from instinct From Christine McNulty Scientist Kristin Andrews has put forward six attributes that she believes would qualify an animal to be considered a person (2 July, p 17). But the crucial and fundamental difference is that

“I say sleeping is the normal state. We just wake up to get some food in order to sleep on” Lisa Blaustein stays awake long enough to propose a different angle on why we sleep (16 July, p 8)

humans are the only animals that can deny the evidence of our senses. We do this with language. Language isn’t an instinct: it is a tool of cognition. Our ancestors developed language in order to escape the constraints of instinct. For example, in an animal, the fight or flight reaction is automatic. Humans, by contrast, can identify phenomena – and a response – with a word and modify our behaviour. Human language, therefore, is the antithesis of instinct. Oxhey, Hertfordshire, UK

Do liveable planets need moons? From Gerald Legg I read with interest the article on planets more habitable than ours (21 May, p 26). But would they be habitable without moons? Many hold that the presence of our large moon is critical to life on Earth, and our planet would be quite a different place without it. The moon’s most obvious effect is on the oceans, producing the daily TOM GAULD

and monthly cycles of tides and influencing deep ocean tidal streams. This tidal effect also pulls on Earth’s crust, causing heating and distortion, which may have triggered plate tectonics. We thus have a dynamic crust with convection currents beneath it dragging material down into the mantle and spewing it out again. This recycling affects many processes, from the saltiness of the sea to the composition of the atmosphere. So do other worlds have moons and are they of a similar size and distance from their planet compared with ours? Hurstpierpoint, West Sussex, UK

Few superflares from the sun From Eric Kvaalen David Copsey calculates that the sun may emit superflares more or less every 184 years (Letters, 18 June). Some sun-like stars produce superflares; others apparently do not. Those that do are much more magnetically active than the sun. Records of

nitric acid and carbon-14 in ice cores show that we have not had a solar flare bigger than the 1859 “Carrington event” since 1561. There are signs of bigger events in the 8th and 10th centuries. A Carrington-like event may be dangerous to our technological civilisation, but obviously there has not been a superflare capable of wiping out life on Earth for billions of years. Les Essarts-le-Roi, France

Clean coal betrayed by governments From Pamela Ross Alec Cawley suggests that shale gas can replace coal (Letters, 18 June). I have been a lay union representative for a coal branch for two decades, and during that time have been involved in initiatives around clean coal. With carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), coal could be an easier and cheaper option than gas and could achieve near zero emissions. However, despite lip service to CCS, successive UK

governments have done nothing to implement it. The technology does exist, but it’s obviously not as good a “get rich quick” option as fracking. Certainly, fracking in the US led to coal being dumped cheaply elsewhere and has been a big factor in the demise of the UK coal industry. Our last deep mine closed in December 2015 with the loss of hundreds of jobs and hundreds of years of tradition. However, we are still burning coal. Sadly, UK governments over many years have failed to put together an integrated energy policy that delivers what the country needs, considers the environment and provides jobs. Cawood, North Yorkshire, UK

A butterfly exists to make caterpillars From Craig Sams You report cooperation between metalmark butterfly caterpillars and ants in Peru and the apparent exploitation of the ants by the butterflies once hatched (25 June, p 15). If the caterpillar supplies ants with its sugar secretions, it is in the interests of the ants that the butterfly produces as many viable caterpillars as possible in order to maintain the supply of sugars for future generations of ants. Hastings, East Sussex, UK The editor writes: ■ It turns out that the butterflies lay their eggs elsewhere, so the ants are unlikely to benefit directly from a relationship with the next generation of caterpillars.

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PAUL MCDEVITT

reflected by skin and cellulite. This will virtually eradicate the appearance of cellulite whilst the garment is being worn.” Until medicine allows us to dispense with skin once and for all, and carousel through life like flayed corpses in a Hieronymus Bosch landscape, Feedback hopes we learn to love our surface imperfections.

HEAPING scorn on the younger generation for their perceived fecklessness is a time-honoured tradition stretching back to the Ancient Greeks. Millennials, with their cereal cafes, selfie sticks and much diminished prospects, make no less an inviting target. The Daily Mail reveals a further crime to add to their list of failings: a lack of “hard work” means grip strength in today’s young adults is significantly less than it was a generation ago, according to a study published in the Journal of hand therapy. It seems a lifetime spent lifting nothing heavier than a smartphone has left Millennials with handshakes like wilted lettuce leaves, which may be why they can’t get jobs. Feedback can only urge young adults to start flexing their muscles, and if in doubt, ask their parents for advice. After all, they come from a generation which knows a thing or two about exerting a vice-like grip on homes and jobs.

IT IS a universally acknowledged fact that people have skin, an issue that many companies have volunteered to take arms against, particularly those of us they declare to have skin of an inappropriate quality or quantity. Monica Backes forwards the latest weapon in this war on encapsulation, Emana, a “polyamide yarn with bioactive minerals” which is said to “absorb the waves emitted by the human body and send them back in the shape of far infrared rays”. The result of this is, of course, “a unique formula which improves skin elasticity and reduces the appearance of cellulite, delivering smoother younger looking skin”. Monica has taken the liberty of rewriting this for Feedback readers into something rather more experimentally verifiable. It goes: “This garment is made from a yarn containing pigments that absorb virtually all visible light

In response to the question, “What is the term for having had that déjà vu feeling before?”, Julie Miles says surely one need look no further than Yogi Berra’s “déjà vu all over again”. 56 | NewScientist | 23 July 2016

THE Beast of Bodmin is a fabulous fabled big cat that stalks the UK’s West Country, slaying sheep and posing for blurry long-distance photographs. Now it may have a rival after a wild lynx escaped from Dartmoor Zoo. Not so much a big cat as a slightly larger than normal tabby, Flaviu is more like to be worrying shrews than sheep. Following an intensive search involving expert trackers and thermal cameras mounted on drones, the Plymouth Herald reported there had been a sighting back at the zoo – but unfortunately, it was only a can of Lynx deodorant glued by some enterprising wag to the sign outside.

BREXIT fever continues apace, with UK citizens demanding that politicians “take Britain back”. Yet Welsh warbler Cerys Matthews perhaps didn’t realise just how far back we’d have to take Britain, and the universe, to see her arable dreams realised. Paul Manson relates that when asked by The Guardian newspaper “If you could bring something extinct back to life, what would you choose?”, the musician and radio presenter proposed “chemical-free farming”. Fulfilling this request would mean making our home at the dawn of the universe, amid an explosive soup of chaotic, highly charged matter. An environment that sounds to Feedback not unlike post-Brexit Britain. ALSO pondering ways to rid one’s land of unwelcome visitors, the secularists penning The Guardian gardening column ignore one notable Creator to report that chemical giant BASF is “the

only UK maker of nematodes”. If this is true, Feedback wonders where the rest of the nation’s nematodes come from? And more importantly, says Luke Caskell, “if BASF can create life, what else are they making?”

MAMA MIA! Italian scientists at the Neuromed Institute in Pozzilli report that, contrary to popular belief, pasta is not fattening. The patriotic scientists surveyed the eating habits of 23,000 people to conclude that the presence of pasta in a person’s diet was associated with decreased body weight – although Feedback notes that the correlation does not take into account exactly how much pasta one must eat to achieve this slimming effect. CLARE MUNKS writes that a quick glance round the kitchen has produced the ideal solution for deflecting mind-control waves (2 July). “It is lightweight, cheap and readily

available from your nearest pet store: a stainless steel dog bowl!” These have the advantage of coming in several sizes, enabling protection for all the family. “However,” says Clare, “I am unable to accept responsibility for any more down-to-earth attacks that may occur in the school playground as a result of any child being so equipped.”

You can send stories to Feedback by email at [email protected]. Please include your home address. This week’s and past Feedbacks can be seen on our website.

Last words past and present at newscientist.com/lastword

THE LAST WORD

■ As a radio producer who has made more than 350 documentaries, I have often observed the distaste we have for how we sound in recordings. The way we perceive our voice directly includes sound percolating through the bones of the skull. Recordings, lacking this component, sound subtly mutated, like uncanny impostors.

Also, to gain time to think while you’ve walked right around the talking, we often use junk words world. So there is no horizontal and sounds such as “sort of”, end to the sky. “like”, “actually” and “umm”. We If you look straight upwards on tend not to be aware of these, but a cloudless night, you will see the on playback we sound painfully, stars. There are more distant stars umm, hesitant and, sort of, that you can only see with a inarticulate. Radio producers telescope, and more beyond that. edit these out, compressing the So there seems to be no vertical duration of speech by as much end to the sky either. as 20 per cent. “If we could travel through We only rarely hear our voice an infinite sky long as others do, so over time enough, we would come to preconceptions may build up a planet exactly like Earth” as to how nice we sound. But a recording reveals all sorts of unflattering details, which can One day, scientists think, the sun will expand and perhaps be a shock. swallow our planet. However, I have worked with certain that’s so far off in the future presenters who are used to that nobody need worry about hearing themselves and have a particular type of vanity, an audio it just yet. The sky we know might seem preening that is best described doomed to end then, but it won’t. as “liking the sound of their own It will still be there, just different. voice”. However, being armed David Muir with this often helps them enjoy Edinburgh, UK long careers in radio. Matt Thompson ■ That depends on what you Radio producer and sound mean by “sky” and what you designer mean by “end”. If, by sky, you North Berwick, East Lothian, UK mean the stuff above our heads that we see as blue/white/grey in the daytime, the answer is yes: Dying light it does end. Does the sky ever end? If you flew up in a rocket, you would pass through dust particles ■ This is a very good question (which scatter sunlight, making coming as it did from a 5-year-old, the sky blue) and the white or grey and the answer is the same clouds. And as you did, what’s however you look at it. If you look above you would become darker sideways, the sky seems to end at and darker as the air becomes the horizon. But if you walk thinner and thinner, carrying less towards the horizon, you’ll find water vapour to form clouds and the sky keeps on going until fewer dust particles to scatter

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Playback payback Why, as a general rule, do we not seem to like the sound of our own voices when we hear them in recordings?

■ It’s because you don’t hear your own voice like other people do. To them, the noises made by your vocal cords and lungs, and shaped by your lips, tongue and nasal cavity, are what you sound like. But what you hear when you speak is mostly conducted to your ears through bone and flesh. So it’s profoundly disturbing when you hear your external, recorded voice and it sounds nothing like the internal voice you know. Your internal voice is usually more resonant, deeper and has less nasality, so for most people their external voice is less attractive. However, if you listen to yourself enough you can train yourself out of this. You will even find yourself changing your voice to sound more attractive – you could almost call it an example of biofeedback. Ron Dippold San Diego, California, US

light. You can see this beginning to happen if you are flying in a commercial airliner at 30,000 feet and you look upwards through a window. At somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 feet, what is above turns black. So the daytime sky that you see from the ground would effectively have ended. But if you mean everything above our heads (relatively speaking) during both day and night, the answer is that we can’t be sure because we just can’t see that far. Some people believe that the sky, also known as the universe, goes on and on forever, to infinity. If that is the case, then every possible combination of fundamental particles will occur, and recur. That means that if we could travel through the infinite sky for long enough, we would come to a planet exactly like Earth, with a country on it called South Africa, where a 5-year-old called Sabine is asking “Does the sky ever end?” Alistair Scott Gland, Switzerland

This week’s question SLEEP TIGHT

The articles in “A user’s guide to sleep” (28 May, p 31) set me thinking. How do people in polar regions, where there can be up to 24 hours of daylight or night, cope physiologically? Wendy Akers Pearce, ACT, Australia

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