Q&A

Why do so many men, despite hair colour, have ginger beards?

Beard hair is quite different to head hair; it is coarser, curlier and doesn't fall out as we get older. Comparatively little work has been done on the genetics of human hair colour, but it is...

Why don't you ever see dock leaves near nettles anymore?

It was only ever coincidence that nettle and dock were found together. There's no symbiotic relationship between them, any more than there's any truth that dock can help with nettle stings....

Why are particle physicists so keen to find the Higgs boson?

Particle physicists are just eager to find out whether the Higgs boson actually exists or not. We now know where to look and, if it does exist, the Large Hadron Collider project at the European...

Blog

Megapixel Extra

10/03/2010 - 12:38

Here is a collection of some of the best images that have caught my eye this month. First up is an image of the last test firing of the reusable rocket that will power NASA’s shuttle into...

Especially for you

05/03/2010 - 14:39

The news that Google "personalises" up to one in five web searches using our web history, location and online contacts is a rare insight into the mighty search engine’s mysterious...

House made from recycled rubbish

04/03/2010 - 15:57

As I drove the last car load of old kitchen units and various other bits of junk to the tip the other day, I couldn't help wondering where all that waste would actually end up. The local tip is...

Features

The science of sin

25/02/2010

We now have the technology to reveal the root of our darkest impulses, deep within our brains. And, says Andy Ridgway, the evidence is clear: nature wants us to be bad