The Conversation

The aviation industry is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions. In 2011 aviation contributed around 3% of Australia’s emissions. Despite improvements in efficiency, global aviation emissions are expected to grow 70% by 2020 from 2005. While the industry is seeking new renewable fuel sources, growing biofuels takes up valuable land and water that could be otherwise used to grow food.But what if you could grow biofuels on land nobody wants, using just seawater and sunlight, and produce food at the same time?

The discovery by an undergraduate student of tubes of plasma drifting above Earth has made headlines in the past few days. Many people have asked how the discovery was made and, in particular, how an undergraduate student was able to do it.The answer is a combination of an amazing new telescope, a very smart student and an unexpected fusion of two areas of science.

Much media attention is being given to the rising toll of methamphetamine-related harm in Australia, fuelled by the increased availability and use of high purity crystalline methamphetamine (crystal meth or ice).Unlike other forms of methamphetamine available in Australia (speed or base), ice (crystalline methamphetamine or crystal meth) can be smoked. This gives a rapid drug effect because it gets into both the bloodstream and the brain quite quickly.

Physicists around the world (myself included) are hoping that this week will mark the beginning of a new era of discovery. And not, as some fear, the end of particle physics as we know it.After 27 months of shutdown and re-commissioning, the Large Hadron Collider has begun its much-anticipated “Season 2”. Deep beneath the Franco-Swiss border, the first physics data is now being collected in CERN’s freshly upgraded detector-temples at the record-breaking collision energy of 13 teraelectonvolts (TeV).

Amateur cook-offs like the hugely popular MasterChef series now in its seventh season in Australia have been part of our TV diet for almost two decades.These shows celebrate the remarkable lengths we humans will go to to whet the appetite, stimulate the senses, fire our neural reward systems and sustain the body.Yet, few of us pause to reflect on the hugely important role diet plays in the ecology and evolutionary history of all species, including our own.

Mindfulness as a psychological aid is very much in fashion. Recent reports on the latest finding suggested that mindfulness-based cognitive therapy is as effective as anti-depressants in preventing the relapse of recurrent depression.While the authors of the paper interpreted their results in a slightly less positive light, stating that (contrary to their hypothesis) mindfulness was no more effective than medication, the meaning inferred by many in the media was that mindfulness was superior to medication.

A growing number of colleges and universities are emerging as multinational organizations – creating start-up versions of themselves in foreign countries.Those vacationing in western France may drive past a campus of Georgia Institute of Technology. Similarly, those visiting Italy may come across a Johns Hopkins nestled in Bologna; or if you are a visitor to Rwanda, you may come across a Carnegie Mellon University campus.

There was something unusual about our recent research collaboration on the science of light, colors and the perception of rainbows: one member of the team wrote his best science in the 1220s.The Ordered Universe Project sees humanities scholars and scientists come together to carefully read the 13th century scientific treatises of the English polymath Robert Grosseteste. It was set up in the hope that the work’s technical content might receive a deeper analysis than previous scholarship.

Humans can discriminate tens of thousands of odors. While we may take our sense of smell for granted, it adds immeasurably to our quality of life: the aroma of freshly brewed coffee; the invigorating smell of an ocean breeze or a field of wildflowers; the fragrance of a lover or the natural smell of a baby. Our olfactory sense also warns us when milk turns rancid, when a baby’s diaper needs changing and when there’s a gas leak. In animals, the sense of smell is essential for detection of predators and other dangers, food sources and mates.

I dissected a Tyrannosaurus rex in front of television cameras.That may be the most surreal sentence I’ve ever written. So let me explain. I’m part of a team that built a life-sized model of Tyrannosaurus rex and then cut it up. The spectacle is a bloody, gory two-hour television special called T. rex Autopsy. The premise may seem absurd. But this is a whole new way of communicating science to the public, and it has been one of the highlights of my career.

An advisory committee to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recommended the approval of the drug, flibanserin, for premenopausal women who are distressed by a lack of sexual desire. The little pink pill has been hailed as “Viagra for women”.

When a space hurricane was unleashed from the sun on January 7 2014, space-weather centers around the world sent out warnings. The hurricane was heading directly for Earth and was predicted to produce a strong geomagnetic storm. But then an unexpected thing happened: the storm bypassed Earth and headed for Mars instead.