Bbcknowledge201206

Electric Dreams

Will electric power soon go wireless in our homes? p72

www.knowledgemagazine.in

you did Tell us what

this summer!

ndar INSIDE Fill the Cale & WIN A

r! gift hampe

Volume 2 Issue 4 June 2012 ` 100

SCIENCE • HISTORY • NATURE • FOR THE CURIOUS MIND

How to make anything

INVISIBLE

Is science on the verge of creating a real invisibility cloak? p45

Plus: The Evolution of Language - How languages metamorphosed to their present state p57

R.N.I. MAHENG/2010/35422

gamma-ray bursts unveiled p32

Into the Creepy World of the bugs p66

Plus: Introducing PIXELS. A photo contest for students p27

A History of Science in 10 Objects p70

Contents

June 2012

76

Nature Science Science History

40 Portfolio: Mountain Gorillas

Andy Rouse peeks into the intimate details of a mountain gorilla’s daily life Cover story

45 How to make anything Invisible

Will bending lights around objects help physicists create a real invisibility cloak? Paul Parsons reveals more on this technology

66 Bugs and Us

52 How to Live Online

Should you befriend you boss on Facebook or google before a date? JV Chamary solves such digital dilemmas

Fascinating facts about bugs’ relationship with humans

ON THE COVER

57 Evolution of Language

Guy Deutscher traces the emergence of language and how it derives influences from biology and culture

64 What do Your Hands Say About You? From personality traits to medical complaints, your digits can reveal a lot about your physical well being, explains Kieron Allen ON THE COVER

Nature Science Nature

Find out how this herpetologist rescues snakes and saves human lives

Robert Matthews demystifies the secrets about the Gamma-ray bursts, also called Death Stars

History

Science

32 The Biggest Bang

70 The History of Science in 10 Objects

4

The Snake Charmer

ON THE COVER

66 The Weird World of the Bug

Nature

Oxford Museum of Natural History, Getty X2, Thinkstock, Corbis, Imagebroker/FLPA, Sue Daly/naturepl.com, Andy rouse, Penny Tweedie/Corbis, Janaki Lenin

Science

FEATURES

Peter Marren explores the amusing and occasionally revolting meeting ground between bugs and humans

40 Portfolio

Peek into the daily life of a gorilla family

24

Update The latest news in a flash

ON THE COVER

The objects that have transformed human understanding of the world over the past 500 years ON THE COVER

72 Electric Dreams

Paul Parsons explains the new technology that can finally transfer power across our homes without wires

76 Black Mamba

Thea Litschka handles these snakes, one of the most venomous species on Earth efficiently, conserving them and saving several human lives

82 Romulus Whitaker

This world renowned herpetologist and conservationist talks about conserving the King Cobras and the Gharials June 2012

12 Q&A

Answers you thought you would never get

82

The wild call

Living with snakes and crocs

Science

86 The Big Idea: The Game Theory

From card games to nuclear deterrance, game theory is the mathematics that can help to work out a strategy to lead to the best possible outcome

Regulars 6 Inbox

Read what’s on the editor’s mind and a selection of your letters on topics covered in our recent issues

11 Think & Win

Stretch your mind and win a cash prize

45

12 Q&A

Invisibility Science The technology that you won’t see coming

Questions that boggle the mind until they’re answered

18 Snapshot

Three amazing pictures from the world over to enlighten, tantalise and amaze

91 Edu Talk

Grace Pinto from Ryan Group of Schools talks about the state of the Indian education system

96 Gadgets

Explore the latest gadgets and apps in the market

UPDATE 24 The Latest Intelligence

57 Evolution of Language How human languages originated and developed

70

History of Science

PIXELS

Student Photo Contest

Calling

All St

Theme: n environment. in midst of an urba Nature’s beauty e: Who can participat age. under 18 years of the last 6 months ents stud ol scho here in Open to may be taken anyw e/digital camera.

The photographs device, such as a mobile phon al digit any gh throu e: page How to participat ledge Facebook Know BBC the 1-3 images on a).

Upload between wledgemagazineindi (facebook.com/kno st: conte . the 2012 of Duration lasts until June 10, April 30, 2012 and Contest starts on will them gst amon Winners: 1 entry from decided on the will be chosen and 6 weekly winners bumper prize. The winners will be the decision of and be selected for a the photo receives on Facebook ’ ‘likes of number es. the in-house judg exciting Prizes: weekly prizes of Digital Camera and Grand Prize of a goodies.

BBC Knowledge book page.

T&C, visit our Face and ils deta For more

s

rapher

hotog udent P

27 Get Pixelated

Put those mobiles to good use.

Shoot a photograph and win a prize

10 scientific objects that have changed how we saw the world

Keep abreast of the latest developments from the worlds of science, nature and history

28 Comment & Analysis

Invisible computing wizard, Pranav Mistry, tells how human interaction with future technology is set to change

30 World News in Context

David Keys unravels the causes of the Cold War in the Middle East between Iran and Israel

Resource 92 Reviews

Recommendations of books and websites to keep the little grey cells well-nourished

98 Last Word

Astrophysicist Dibyendu Nandy explains the science behind the recent solar storms

27 PIXELS - Student Photo Contest

Can urban environment excite the shutterbug in you?

Prove it and win this photo contest June 2012

5

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Welcome

There was a time when communication devices on the uniforms of the Star Trek crew were fantastic examples of sci-fi fiction but it took only a couple of decades to realise that fiction into fact.

Wireless telecommunication was as foreign a concept then as wireless electricity is now but as Paul Parsons reveals on page 72, this science is closer to realisation than you think.

we will live in the immediate future.

But I believe a strong future is built on a part well understood.

In this issue we also look back at the origin of communication through language and how culture and biology play a pivotal role in the development of different dialects.

I am certain you will enjoy this edition of BBC Knowledge - and if you are under 18 - must see is PIXELS - our new photo contest created especially for students.

Have a great summer.

Almost as close as the technologies that can make things disappear!

Read Parsons’ article (story on page 45) that unravels extraordinary innovations already taking shape that will be key in shaping how

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Preeti Singh

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Experts this issue Paul Parsons Parsons is often baffled when people say Science is boring. He’s authored Science 1001 - a single reference volume on modern science. In this issue, he talks about the science of invisibility and how the technology that we won’t see coming is developing around the corner. See page 45

How to subscribe To subscribe online, visit: mags.timesgroup.com or SMS: KNOWSUB to 58888 Subscription Centres: • North 011 – 39898090 • East 033 – 39898090

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Guy Deutscher An Israeli linguist, Deutscher’s interests lie in the evolution of various languages and the cultural influences that have transformed it across ages. His authored books include The Unfolding of Language and Through the Language Glass. See page 57

Romulus Whitaker World-renowned herpetologist and wildlife conservationist, Whitaker’s boyhood fascination with snakes has developed into a glorious career. Winner of the Whitley Award and the Associate Laureate Rolex Awards for Enterprise, he has authored several articles and books on reptiles, including Snakes of India - The Field Guide. In this issue, he speaks about the King Cobra and Gharials. See page 82

6

June 2012

Enjoy your favourite magazine wherever you are India • Editor: Preeti Singh • www.knowledgemagazine.in UK/USA/Canada • Editor: Sally Palmer • www.knowledgemagazine.com Asia • Editor: Ben Poon • www.regentmedia.sg/publications_bbc.shtml Brazil • Editor: Cáren Nakashima • www.revistaconhecerbbc.com.br Bulgaria • Editor: Hristo Dimitrov • www.knowledge.bg Sweden • Editor: Jonas Berg • www.bbcknowledge.se Taiwan • Editor: Hui-Wen Lan

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CorrespondencE  Religion and science

I really liked the article ‘Pushed to the extreme’. It was nice to know that the largest hairball I can survive is 5 kg and also 2243 are the greatest number of bee stings ever survived!

The article by Dr. Susan Blackmore who spoke about the mysteries of consciousness, particularly in Buddhisim where ‘I’ is not separate but interwoven with the rest of the world made for an interesting read.

The Snapshot and Portfolio sections in the magazine are as informative as they are picturesque.

Dikshita Rupani, Mumbai

 The knowledge canon

I find the magazine very informative and interesting. It consists of everything from general knowledge, science to history and current affairs. The articles are written in an easy to understand language I particularly find the pictures very attractive and captivating.

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BBC Knowledge magazine always keeps me informed about the latest developments in science and current affairs. Some articles tend to be a bit comprehensive, but the attractive illustrations do help in understanding the matter. The articles based on history are amongst my favourite ones.

Akash Purande, Mumbai

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June 2012

The theme of the BBC Knowledge is very appealing and it provides the reader good amount of information on whichever topic it talks about. Staying up-to-date

Y We welcome your letters, while reserving the right to edit them for length and clarity. By sending us your letter you permit us to publish it in the magazine and/or on our website. We regret that we cannot always reply personally to letters.

Star LETTER  Moctezuma defender or collaborator?

In my opinion Moctezuma was a seasoned conqueror and a true defender with many flaws one of which was his traditional beliefs. The Aztecs had never faced foes like the conquistadors; they were accustomed to their older warring neighbours - the Tlaxcala, Tlaloc, etc, and who usually fought for honour rather than wealth.

Tenochtitlan respected such behaviour, but were unaware of the Spanish greed for gold regardless of honouring the age old methods of war.

Secondly, the native Americans of the Yucatan peninsula relied heavily on infantry and close combat archers whereas the Spanish relied on cavalry and use of gunpowder which was largely superior and most effective against the Aztecs, though they were outnumbered by the Aztecs several times.

The final flaw was the Aztec’s beliefs and the ritual of holy sacrifice to please their Gods. Their rituals of sacrifice also gained them several enemies who were willing to cooperate with the foreigners for the demise of the Aztec empire.

Putting these flaws aside I would side by Moctezuma for he was a skillful general, successful in defending the empire from its

with everything going on in the world has become a necessity in today’s world where all-rounders are more in demand than specialists.

It is a versatile magazine which provides information about almost every sphere of life. Next time no curious reader would go and buy 10 magazines on 10 different subjects. Instead, he will opt for your magazine. What I liked the most about your magazine are its pictures.

equally proficient neighbours, though the act of inviting the Spanish into the capital was a daft idea, this was his only strategic error. Thus the records of the conquest of Tenochtitlan (mostly Spanish) have portrayed Moctezuma as a coward and dim tactician.

But the earlier exploits of the Aztec “representative of the Gods” WRITE show otherwise.

Kishore Pavan, Bangalore

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They look real and fascinate the reader, motivating him to read the context.

The websites links given for further information are an added advantage because sometimes after reading an article, hundreds of questions are left unanswered. I am a young reader who has not been into reading for that long.

I hope my opinion about your magazine stays the same.

Vaishnavi Pahwa, New Delhi

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Editorial, advertising and subscription enquiries BBC Knowledge Magazine, Worldwide Media, The Times of India Building, 4th floor, Dr. D. N. Road, Mumbai 400001 www.knowledgemagazine.in Printed and published by Joji Varghese for and on behalf of Worldwide Media Pvt. Ltd., The Times of India Building, 4th floor, Dr. D. N. Road, Mumbai 400001 and printed at Rajhans Enterprises, No. 134, 4th Main Road, Industrial Town, Rajajinagar, Bangalore 560044, India. Editor- Preeti Singh. The publisher makes every effort to ensure that the magazine’s contents are correct. However, we accept no responsibility for any errors or omissions.

Unsolicited material, including photographs and transparencies, is submitted entirely at the owner’s risk and the publisher accepts no responsibility for its loss or damage. All material published in BBC Knowledge is protected by copyright and unauthorized reproduction in part or full is prohibited.

BBC Knowledge is published by Worldwide Media Pvt. Ltd. under licence from Immediate Media Company Bristol Limited. Copyright © Immediate Media Company Bristol Limited. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part prohibited without permission. The BBC logo is a trade mark of the British Broadcasting Corporation and is used under licence. © British Broadcasting Corporation 1996

Think n win

Crossword NO.10



Your Details Name: Address:

PostCode:

Tel:

School/Institution/Occupation:

Email:

E Across

1 They’re with you on the job! (9) 6 For an object to be invisible it has to be 100% _____ (11) 12 Baltic land (7) 13 Ebenezer Scrooge for one? (5) 14 Expected, anticipated or looked forward to (7) 15 Word used to indicate the maiden name of a married woman (3) 16 Mecca of cricket (5) 19 Mythical bird of enormous size and strength (3) 20 Relating or belonging to the whole country (8) 22 Priestly robes (4) 23 Disperse from a gathering together (11) 24 Small bay; bloke (4) 27 A period of thirty days - thirty one days at a maximum? (3,5) 29 ___ questions : believe implicitly, in a way? (3,2) 31 Prize or medal; decision (5) 33 Part of movie or video film on with audio recording? (10) 35 Increment or development by successive stages (10) 37 Ward off (5) 38 Groups of countries with common aim (5) 40 The unknown one or more unusual one? (8) 43 Watery component of milk (4) 44 __ in : ending in, reaching it’s highest point in? (11) 46 The ability to control ____ was early man’s most important discovery (4) 49 Overlooking, ostracising or neglecting (8) 50 “Stomach”, shortly and slangishly? (3) 51 Clutch (5) 55 Public Sector Unit, in short (3) 56 Exactly thousand grammes? (3,4) 57 Accept without objection; put up with or tolerate (5) 58 Popular online backup service which employs cloud computing (7) 59 Tending to become outdated (11) 60 Buying and selling of goods online (1-8) Solution NO. 09

How to enter: Post your entries to BBC Knowledge Editorial, Crossword No. 10, Worldwide Media, The Times of India Bldg, 4th floor, Dr Dadabhai Navroji.

Road, Mumbai 400001 or email edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

by June 10, 2012. Entrants must supply their name, address and phone number.

How it’s done: The puzzle will be

familiar to crossword enthusiasts already, although the British style may be unusual as crossword grids vary in appearance from country to country. Novices should note that the idea is to fill the white squares with letters to make words determined by the sometimes cryptic clues to the right. The numbers after each clue tell you how many letters are in the

answer. All spellings are UK. Good luck!

Terms and conditions: Only residents of India are eligible to participate. Employees of Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. are not eligible to participate. The winners will be selected in a lucky draw.

The decision of the judges will be final.

SOLVE & WIN An exclusive gift worth

`500

H Down

1 Probably one of the most important early inventions (5) 2 Revolving mechanism (5) 3 Take away in arithmetic (5) 4 They convert sound waves into electric waves for sending them over long distances? (12) 5 It is said to be the oldest known written language (8) 6 Trials that create precedents, should we say (4,5) 7 Word formed from initial letters of other words (7) 8 Sparsely; not densely (8) 9 One of the largest online retailers in the world (6) 10 Examining unknown values (13) 11 ___ person over : helps person through temporary need or difficulty (4) 17 Eye; sphere or globe (3) 18 Genetic identification (3) 21 Upper part? (4) 22 It may take __ : it may take indefinitely long period of time? (5) 25 Caressed or petted (7) 26 Caribbean island group (7) 28 An intelligent, random opinion (8,5) 29 Biblical boat made by Noah (3) 30 Naval air station, acronym (3) 32 2004 French Open Champion (6,6) 34 Calorie in short or Calcutta in short? (3) 35 Greek goddess of the dawn (3) 36 She is trained to look after the patients in the hospital (5) 37 Scatters seeds etc. for planting (4) 39 Make smaller (9) 41 Gamma-ray bursts are the most ____ electromagnetic events known to occur in the universe (8) 42 A sudden panic, causing a headlong flight or rush, as of animals (8) 45 Tycoon (7) 46 Federal Aviation Regulations (3) 47 ___ and Garba : folk dances from Gujarat ? (3) 48 __ Networks: Facebook, twitter, etc (6) 51 Sadness or depression (5) 52 Brownish-yellow (5) 53 Fairy; esp : a gay mischievous sprite (5) 54 I have __ __ : departing words? (2,2) announcing the winnerS of crossword No. 9

NEHA MATURI - Hyderabad Rohit Chadha - Delhi jude winston vaz - Mumbai

June 2012

11

QA &

Your questions answered

edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

P Why can’t we see underwater without wearing goggles? p14 P What is the time zone at the North Pole? p15 P Why can’t we feel the rotation of the Earth? p16 P Will future telescopes enable us to see the Big Bang? p17

EXPERT PANEL

Will robots ever be special enough to serve us?

Stuart Blackman

A zoologist-turned-science writer, Stuart is a contributor to BBC Wildlife Magazine.

Susan Blackmore (SB)

A visiting professor at the University of Plymouth, UK, Susan is an expert on psychology and evolution.

Robert Matthews

Robert is a writer and researcher. He is a Visiting Reader in Science at Aston University, UK.

Gareth Mitchell

As well as lecturing at Imperial College London, Gareth is a presenter of Click on the BBC World Service.

Nick Rennison

An editor and writer based in the UK, Nick is also a regular contributor to BBC History Magazine.

Luis Villazon

Luis has an MSc in zoology from the University of Oxford.

He is a freelance science journalist based in the UK.

VITAL

STATS

Corbis, IllUstratioN by patrick mUlrey

6000

KNOW SPOT The Socotra buzzard (Buteo socotraensis) became the most recently discovered bird of prey when it was named in 2010. The buzzard is only found in tiny islands that form the Socotra archipelago in Yemen.

12

June 2012

Q A

Will robots be doing all our jobs in the future?

Robots will certainly do many of our jobs in the future. There are already robots, including the commercially available PR2 by Willow Garage, that can perform tasks like making cookies, folding towels

and serving drinks. It may not sound all that exciting but they’re considerable robotic feats compared to the predictable, repetitive world of the factory production line.

It’s hard to envisage tasks that ’bots will never accomplish, but the long-term challenge is achieving human-like physical

s of time umber is the n e Earth is th t tha tning by ligh struck minute ry e v e

agility and adaptability.

Robots are getting better at many specific tasks but general-purpose intelligent artificial beings are still way off, and may never be produced. It reminds us that the human condition is special and impossible to replicate fully. GM

HOW IT WORKS A skyscraper with revolving floors The Dynamic Tower, planned to soon be built in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, will bring a whole new twist to skyscraper design. Each of the building’s 80 storeys will rotate independently, constantly changing the tower’s shape and treating those living in its upper reaches to panoramic views of the city.

But the Dynamic Tower will also be a green power plant, generating enough energy to power itself and the buildings around it, thanks to wind turbines fitted on every floor.

Hoped to be completed in early 2011, the tower will be constructed using pre-fabricated parts that are made in a factory and then hooked onto the central core on site. Each floor should take only seven days to complete.

Once the tower is fully up and running, residents can control the speed of their floor’s rotation, so a full 360o view of the skyline can take anywhere between an hour and a day. All this high-concept design doesn’t come cheap though – flats will be on the market at prices expected to be anywhere between $ 3- and $ 30 million.

Wind Turbines

Mounted horizontally between floors, these carbon-fibre blades will power the whole building – and possibly its neighbours

Drive-In Elevators

Solar Panels

Covering 20 per cent of the roof of each floor, solar panels will catch rays as the building turns. This gives it a larger surface area for power generation than a conventional building

Located in the central core, drive-in elevators will let residents park outside their own front doors

Left and above left: the Dynamic Tower will allow residents to rotate their own floor independently of all other storeys

June 2012

13

QA &

Your questions answered

edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

It’s clear to see why goggles offer an underwater view

Q

Why can’t we see clearly underwater without wearing goggles?

Thinkstock x3, US Air Force. Illustration by Jonty clark

A

In air, light is refracted as it passes through the cornea at the front of the eye, and then again as it travels through the lens. The lens is mainly there to provide fine adjustment because the cornea is fixed; in fact, twothirds of the focusing power of the eye is supplied by the cornea.

Underwater, however, the refractive index of the cornea is virtually the same as the water in front of it, and so it loses almost all of its focusing power. The lens has a higher refractive index but it can’t compensate enough, so you become extremely longsighted.

If you’re shortsighted, the effect is diminished but nobody is shortsighted enough to eliminate it completely.

Goggles or a mask restore focus by putting air in front of the cornea. Light is still refracted when it enters the goggles but, 14

June 2012

as the glass or plastic is flat, it doesn’t change the focus of the image but only makes things look larger and nearer. LV

Q

When will we see the first commercial scramjet?

A

A scramjet is a Supersonic Combustion Ramjet. Seen as the future of hypersonic travel, these planes have engines that burn oxygen and liquid fuel. But Scramjets won’t be whizzing you around the globe just yet

unlike rockets, which store liquid oxygen in bulky tanks, scramjets draw the gas out of the air.

In 2010, the X-51A unmanned test scramjet – jointly developed by the US Air Force, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne and Boeing – managed just three minutes of flight at Mach 5. The Australians and Russians are known to be working on their own aircraft that use scramjet technology too.

KNOW SPOT The Pantanal is the world’s largest swamp, covering a gargantuan area of 150,000km2 (58,000 sq mi).

That’s greater than the total surface area of England. Much of the Pantanal (Spanish for ‘marshland’) is found in southwestern Brazil but it also stretches into Bolivia and Paraguay.

DARPA has also test-flown two of its own hypersonic HTV-2 vehicles. The craft are essentially high-speed gliders and, though not driven by scramjet engines, are seen as proof-of-concept vehicles for future powered hypersonic flight. Both HTV-2 craft failed midflight. The reason for the second failure is unknown, but the first became aerodynamically unstable.

It seems that there is still a way to go before scramjets will fly reliably, let alone commercially.

It took eight years to develop the Airbus A380, based on relatively familiar subsonic technology. It will almost certainly be a few decades before passengers fly on scramjets. GM

Q

How old are the oldest diamonds?

A

Most of the diamonds found on Earth were formed below the Earth’s crust, in the upper mantle. This is the only place where the pressure and temperature are high enough to allow diamond to crystallise. To reach the surface, they must be carried up by the surrounding rock in deep volcanic ‘pipes’ that extend down into the mantle.

STATS VITAL This journey normally takes the between one and of th g n s) is the le in (26.4 mile wan road bridge 3.3 billion years, ai -H ce

42.4km

Qingdao angdong Provin h China’s S est bridge over – the long the world. water in

w

QuicKFIRE

Did you know?

Four-and-twenty rhinos baked in a pie

What is musical ear syndrome?

This happens when people with impaired hearing experience talking, singing, or other noises such as traffic or birdsong, inside their heads. It occurs because the sensory areas of the brain need meaningful input, and without it they try to make sense of random noise by fabricating these once-familiar sounds. These aren’t true hallucinations because the person knows they’re unreal, but they can be very irritating. SB

Are chemical elements still being identified?

A 19th-century naturalist had an arrangement with London Zoo that, after the death of an exotic animal, he would be given the opportunity to cook and eat part of it. Frank Buckland was a popular writer but his real passion was what he called ‘zoophagy’, the eating of unusual animals – a taste he had inherited from his father, geologist and palaeontologist William Buckland. Abraham Bartlett, the superintendent of London Zoo, allowed Frank to access the corpses of a number of the zoo’s late inhabitants, including an elephant, a rhinoceros and a giraffe. Buckland cooked some of the rhino in a pie, which he served to members of the audience at one of his lectures. NR

but in 2007 tiny diamonds were found embedded in a 4.25 billionyear-old piece of zircon.

But even those aren’t the oldest because diamonds have been found embedded in a meteorite that’s at least five billion years old. That’s older than our Solar System and means that the diamonds were formed during the death throes of another star, or in a planet that disintegrated when its star exploded. LV

Q

Do babies around the world babble in the same language?

A

Yes and no. From around four to six months of age, babies from different cultures all tend to make similar strings of sounds such as ba-ba, da-da, and ga-ga-ga. But this isn’t language.

These sounds are a stage in vocal development – a kind of vocal play in which the baby practises making different sounds and trying out their effects without yet knowing how to use sounds as words. This gradually changes into ‘conversational babbling’, as some of the sounds and stress patterns of adult speech are imitated.

By about 10 months, babies exposed to different languages are therefore babbling in

increasingly different ways, and by the time they’re a year old most babies begin to use words to communicate. SB

Yes, but it’s getting harder. Every element heavier than lead (element 82) is unstable, and the heavier they are the shorter their half-life. Ununoctium (element 118) has a half-life of just 0.89 milliseconds. Since 2002, just three or four atoms of it have been produced. More stable elements may exist but making them is difficult because you need to smash very rare, short-lived elements together. LV

What time zone is it at the North Pole?

All the world’s lines of longitude converge at the geographical North Pole. The notion of east or west is meaningless as the Pole is in all time zones at once. Most of the Arctic region uses UTC (Coordinated Universal Time).

Though strictly a time standard and not a time zone, UTC is essentially the same as GMT. So, in the northern hemisphere winter, North Pole time is the same as in Britain. GM

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Your questions answered

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Strange but true Double vision

The sunburst diving beetle has a unique ocular ability

It is said that bifocals were dreamed up a couple of centuries ago by Benjamin Franklin. But the larva of the sunburst diving beetle (Thermonectus marmoratus), an attractive native of Mexico and the southwestern states of the US, might stake an earlier claim to the invention. It is the only animal known to have naturally bifocal vision.

With 12 eyes and a fearsome array of biting and slicing mouth parts, the beetle’s hunting prowess is only matched by its ocular abilities.

The magic happens in the beetle’s four largest eyes – long, tubular, forward-facing structures that allow it to focus on its mosquito prey, both when stalking it from afar and when close enough to strike.

What’s more, behind each lens are two light-sensitive retinas, one positioned behind the other, which enable the beetle to focus simultaneously on both the foreground and background without having to adjust when flitting between them.

This is, arguably, nature’s best-looking beetle – in more ways than one. Stuart Blackman

Q

SUPERSTOCK, corbis, Thinkstock x2

A

A spin on a roundabout will make you dizzier standing on the spinning Earth 16

June 2012

Why can’t we feel the rotation of the Earth?

With the Earth spinning at almost 1700km/h (1056mph) at the equator, you’d think everybody would be feeling queasy – after all, imagine a playground roundabout doing that sort of speed. But it’s not speed that affects us, it’s acceleration – as anyone who’s done a racing start in a sports car will tell you. And the ‘leisurely’ spin of the Earth means it produces an acceleration around 100 times lower than that experienced on a roundabout.

Even so, the rotation of the Earth can still make its presence felt via a phenomenon called the Coriolis Effect, named after 19thcentury French mathematician

Gaspard-Gustave Coriolis.

Anything that moves across a rotating object will appear to anyone standing on the object to be nudged off-course by a mysterious ‘force from nowhere’.

For example, a person on a spinning roundabout who tries to throw a ball into a bucket on the other side of the roundabout will find the ball is constantly deflected off-course.

The ‘force’ doesn’t really exist.

Anyone watching the scene from nearby will see it’s simply the result of the bucket moving round while the ball is in the air. But to those on the spinning object, it seems real enough – and its effects have to be taken into account in calculating the paths of moving objects ranging from missiles to hurricanes. RM

VITAL STATS

379

Q

Why can owls turn their heads so far?

A

Because they hunt in near darkness. To capture more light, owls have evolved very large eyes with a tubular shape that prevents movement inside their head, so they have to swivel their whole head instead. Extra bones in their necks increase flexibility, allowing them to turn their necks through 270°. This is enough to look behind without making a noise that might scare off potential prey. SB

Q A

How does night vision work?

There are two main types of night-vision equipment.

One variety uses light in the visible and near-infrared parts of the spectrum. A lens focuses the light onto a tube containing a photocathode.

This converts photons of light into a stream of electrons that are aligned corresponding to the pattern of the incoming photons. A secondary device then amplifies the flow of the electrons and fires them at a phosphor screen. When these charged particles hit the screen, the phosphor gives off green light, replicating the image.

The other type of night vision operates in the infrared range further down the spectrum. It uses thermal imaging, relying on the fact that all objects give off heat. A heat-sensitive detector in the night-vision goggles creates a thermal map of the scene being viewed. This is converted into an electrical signal that refreshes up to 30 times per second. The resulting image is digitally enhanced and then viewed on a pair of small displays within the eyepieces. GM

Q A

Could we terraform Mars or Venus?

hales r of fossil w is the numbe i Al-Hitan in ad W found in tern Desert, Egypt’s Wes to the ck ba g datin Eocene era

Mars is too cold and has an atmosphere that’s too thin. If we used CFCs, which are powerful greenhouse gases, it would take about 39 million tonnes to raise the temperature enough to melt the CO2 glaciers at the poles. Firing enough rockets to transport compressed CFCs to Mars isn’t practical but it might be possible to manufacture them locally from Martian minerals.

Venus has the opposite problem – it’s 460ºC (860ºF) at the surface and 93 times the atmospheric pressure of Earth.

To lower the pressure you could bombard the surface with refined magnesium to react with the CO2 atmosphere and create magnesium carbonate rocks.

But you would need five hundred thousand trillion tonnes of magnesium to remove enough CO2

to bring the greenhouse effect under control.

And you’d still need to add oxygen to both planets. There isn’t enough water on either to make splitting it into oxygen and hydrogen practical. LV

KNOW SPOT Native to central and west China, the empress or foxglove tree can grow up to 30cm (12in) in three weeks and 6m (20ft) during its first year, making it the world’s fastest-growing tree. But that’s eclipsed by the world’s fastest-growing plant: bamboo.

Certain species of bamboo can grow by as much as 91cm (36in) in a single day.

QuicKFIRE Which animal has the biggest brain?

The sperm whale with its 8kg (18.6lb) brain. An elephant’s weighs around 5kg (11lb), a bottlenose dolphin’s is 1.5-1.7kg (3.3-3.7lb) and a human’s is 1.3-1.5kg (2.9-3.3lb).

But although brain size correlates with intelligence, neither absolute size nor size relative to the body predicts an animal’s intelligence.

Some crows and African grey parrots are very intelligent but have tiny brains – around 6g and 9g (0.2 and 0.3oz) respectively. SB

Ask the Experts?

Ever wondered… well, anything?

Email edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in We’re sorry, but we cannot reply to questions individually.

Will future telescopes enable us to see the Big Bang?

The Big Bang took place around 13.7 billion years ago, and since then the Universe has been expanding. As a result, not only is the light from events back then incredibly faint, it’s also been stretched by the cosmic expansion to even longer wavelengths, putting it forever beyond detection by conventional light telescopes. RM

What makes things cute?

It’s in the way our minds are designed. In order to pass on our genes we must care for our young, so evolution has given us an automatic emotional reaction to things that look like our babies.

Critical features include big, forward-pointing eyes, a large head relative to the body, soft hair or fur and little fingers and toes. SB

June 2012

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Snapshot

History

Voyage of disaster RMS TITANIC, 1912

June 2012

Corbis

Proudly standing beneath two of RMS Titanic’s enormous bronze propellers 100 years ago, this group of Belfast shipbuilders could not have foreseen the tragedy that would strike the ship mere months after their photograph was taken. On 14 April 1912, around 640km (400 miles) into her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York, the largest passenger steamship of the time struck an iceberg south of Newfoundland and sunk, killing 1517 people.

A catalogue of events made the tragedy inevitable. One much-debated contributing factor is said to have been the use of cheap rivets, made from sub-standard iron and used to fasten the sheets of the ship’s bow, which popped after the collision.

19

Nature

Eagle v gull Flatanger, Norway

NaturePL.com

While this common gull (Larus canus) may appear to be hitching a ride on the back of a white-tailed sea eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla), it is actually on the attack. Such aerial battles usually occur when gulls feel threatened, and peak during the breeding season as they try to protect their young from predators. In a process known as mobbing, a flock works together to repel a threat. Although this picture was taken off the Norwegian coast, gulls have been witnessed mobbing eagles around the world, including the bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) in Nova Scotia, Canada, which is around twice the size of the gulls.

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June 2012

Science

Boiling over Nevada, US

gerhard schulz/bios/specialist stock

It might look like something you’d find on another planet but the Fly Geyser is actually in Nevada. And it was created by accident when a well dug in 1916 penetrated a geothermal reservoir (an underground store of hot water).

“This is not a true geyser, which would erupt at more-or-less regular intervals due to a build up of steam pressure followed by a release during each eruption,” says Dr W George Darling, a hydrogeochemist with the British Geological Survey. Here there’s a continuous flow thanks to the pressure of the steam and the pressure of the hot water itself.

Calcium carbonate and silica from the underlying rocks are deposited, giving rise to the chimney structures. It’s likely the different colours are created by algae and metal deposits.

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June 2012

Update

The latest intelligence

P Will plasma generated from lightning help us fight diseases? p24 P Why cooking is a matter of chemistry p25 P Did Columbus bring syphilis to Europe? p26 P Can an algorithm predict when a driver skips the red light? p26

So far, no disease-causing microbes have been found to be resistant to plasma

Lightning generates plasma, the ‘fourth state of matter’

Can stars fight disease?

Plasma has potential to kill off even the toughest of viruses lasma – the substance that makes up the stars and is generated by lightning – is set to revolutionise the way lifethreatening viruses such as SARS are treated, as well as fighting less dangerous complaints ranging from food poising to acne.

Plasma is often described as the ‘fourth state of matter’.

Neither solid, liquid nor gas, it is a collection of charged particles that takes the form of a gas-like cloud. A growing body of research indicates that plasma could serve as a microbe-fighting tool, in addition to disinfectant and antibiotics. Unlike many other

eyevine, thinkstock X3, Fpla, getty

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treatments, plasma appears to be relatively harmless and, thus far, no disease-causing microbes have been found to be resistant to it.

In their latest research, physicists at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE) and the Technical University of

which is responsible for conditions such as pneumonia and bronchitis.

Plasma has several components – charged atoms and molecules, electrons, UV light and highly reactive molecules, or ‘reactive species’ – and its modus operandi is still under investigation. “How it

Unlike many other treatments, plasma appears to be relatively harmless Munich in Germany have discovered just how effective at fighting diseases plasma could be. It can even kill adenoviruses, one of the most difficult viruses to inactivate,

kills off microbes is one of the most frequently asked questions and we are still trying to work that out,” explains Julia Zimmermann, a biophysicist at MPE. “It has

to be the interplay between all these different components that makes it so effective at killing microbes.”

While the plasma within the Sun rages at hundreds of thousands of degrees Celsius, at room temperature it is a ‘cold plasma’ whose diseasefighting capabilities are being investigated in Germany.

Clinical trials have already taken place at German clinics, using plasma to treat complex and slow-healing wounds by killing off bacteria such as MRSA. Here, a refrigeratorsized device generates the plasma. In addition, much smaller, electric toothbrushsized devices are being developed to generate plasma in the same way that lightning does – by ionizing molecules in the surrounding air. These could be used on skin to treat acne, or on food to kill off E. coli and other foodpoisoning microbes.

With industry support, Zimmerman expects the devices to be in use in hospitals in the next two or three years.

News in Brief Milestones

A chef is essentially a chemist who favours the kitchen over the science lab

Cooking with chemistry

Traditionally, palaeontologists have only been able to make educated guesses as to where fossils lie. Researchers at Washington University in St Louis and Western Michigan University have now developed a computer model that can predict where preserved remains are located. Crucially, the system uses artificial neural networks – computer networks that imitate the workings of a human brain – and can be ‘trained’ to use characteristics of existing fossil locations to identify others.

Why certain foods work well together

Worm-eating plant

Helen Keller feels the face of her dedicated teacher Anne Sullivan

125 years ago G 3 March 1887: Anne Sullivan begins teaching sixyear-old Helen Keller, who is blind, deaf and mute. After arriving at Keller’s house in Alabama, Sullivan starts teaching her to finger-spell.

It’s only when Sullivan pumps water over Keller’s hand at the same time as spelling ‘water’ on the other that Keller realises that every object has a name. From then on, progress is rapid. Keller goes on to become an author, political activist and the first deaf-blind person to gain a BA degree. Keller’s abilities earn her worldwide fame.

150 years ago H 20 April 1862: French chemist Louis Pasteur and physiologist Claude Bernard complete the first test of pasteurisation. Their first test is carried out on dogs’ blood and on urine, which are heated to 30ºC. The process is initially conceived as a way of preventing wine and beer from souring. It is only later that the technique is applied to milk.

Louis Pasteur and the discovery that still bears his name today

Finding fossils

hefs of North American and Western European cuisine tend to pair certain ingredients because they contain the same flavour molecules, while chefs of Asian cuisine do the exact opposite. These are the findings of research that analyses a vast number of recipes from across the world at molecular level for the first time.

Sebastian Ahnert, a physicist at the University of Cambridge and an amateur molecular gastronomist, was intrigued by the theory that foods are often paired on the same plate because they have flavour molecules in common. As well as revealing a fundamental difference between Western and Asian dishes, his research also predicts that some apparently incongruous combinations of foodstuffs – such as olive and raspberry, coffee and garlic or chocolate and blue cheese – should prove agreeable to Western palates.

“To our knowledge, this is the first large-scale quantitative test of the hypothesis that foods taste well together because they share flavour molecules,” says Ahnert. “People haven’t ever really taken a step back and looked at the whole spectrum of recipes.”

Ahnert and his research team developed a vast database of the flavour molecules in different ingredients. They also developed software that could trawl recipes online and hunt for patterns in the ingredients used together. In all, over 56,000 Western and Asian recipes were ‘data-mined’. Combining the two sets of data revealed molecular patterns in the combinations.

The avoidance of the same flavour compounds in Asian dishes presents something of a mystery to the scientists, but tradition could be an important factor. “It could be that there is some strong cultural tendency to pair certain foods, such as soy and ginger or lime and coriander, and that dominates,” Ahnert explains.

He now plans to refine his research, finding out how much of each flavour compound is present in specific ingredients.

He hopes chefs will use his findings to create new exciting ingredient pairings, or even provide an online resource for fellow molecular gastronomers at home.

C

The underground leaves of Philcoxia plants, which thrive in the nutrient-poor sands of Brazil’s mountain savannah, trap and devour tiny nematode worms. An international team of biologists found that when nematodes that had been fed bacteria containing a heavy isotope of nitrogen crawled onto the plant’s leaves, the heavy nitrogen was absorbed into the plant, indicating the worms had been consumed.

How snakes hear Snakes appear to ‘hear’ sounds through the vibrations they make in their skulls. They lack external ears but have an inner ear. Biologist Christian Christiensen of Aarhus University, Denmark, has found that sound waves cause vibrations in the skull of the ball python (Python regius).

At the same time, nerve cells linking its inner ears to its brain relays an electrical pulse.

No visible ears, but this Royal Python (Python regus) can still hear you

Update

The latest intelligence

EEE ROUND UP The top science, nature and history research from around the world

BIOARCHAEOLOGY

Alamy, naturepl.com, getty, purdue university, dreamstime, David Harasti

New evidence supports the theory that Christopher Columbus’s crew brought syphilis from the Americas to Europe.

Anthropologists studied reports on European skeletons said to have predated Columbus’s 1492 voyage that showed syphilis symptoms, but found most didn’t meet all the diagnostic criteria. The remainder came from coastal areas where seafood was important in the diet. Seafood contains ‘old carbon’ from deep ocean waters that can skew radiocarbon dating. Adjusting for this suggests the first syphilis victims lived after 1492.

NEUROSCIENCE Age-related memory loss has been linked with deterioration in the structure of brain cell connections in regions such as the hippocampus.

Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, have found that the hippocampi of older rats have less BDNF, a protein that promotes the formation of new brain cell links. Treating them with a chemical that rejuvenated a coating around the BDNF gene restored the speed that new links could be formed. It is hoped the work will lead to the development of new anti-ageing drugs.

MARINE BIOLOGY

ANCIENT HISTORY

The humble sea cucumber is thought to be contributing to damage to coral reefs. A study of One Tree Reef, part of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, shows that the creature is not only abundant, but its digestive system also contains acids that partially dissolve the carbonate minerals in sand and rubble. This allows the sea cucumber to live off bits of organic matter inside the sand and rubble, as well as meaning that it is responsible for about half the night-time dissolution of the calcium carbonate reef.

Deformed slaves were such a valuable commodity during the Roman Empire that ‘monster markets’ were set up for their sale. Research at Wilfried Laurier University, Canada, reveals these individuals were presented as curiosities at parties. At one lavish banquet, Emperor Commodus displayed two hunchbacks smeared in mustard on a silver platter. The deformed and the powerful tended to gravitate towards one another; some with deformities were employed as informers, spies and lovers.

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June 2012

TECHNOLOGY

Nanoantennas – microscopic v-shaped structures made from gold – can compel light to behave in strange ways. Last October, scientists proved nanoantennas could dramatically alter the way the light is refracted and reflected at one wavelength. Physicists at Purdue University, Indiana, have now found that the effect of nanoantennas applies across a range of near-infrared light.

This opens up the possibility of telecommunication advances, as information is passed along optical fibres using near-infrared light.

Computing

Experts at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US have developed an algorithm that can predict when a driver is likely to ignore a red traffic light. The algorithm makes more correct predictions than earlier versions, and uses parameters such as a vehicle’s speed to quickly make its calculations. Car manufacturers are exploring the kind of vehicleto-vehicle data communication systems that would allow it to provide an early warning system for drivers.

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Comment & Analysis

Retrieving any information or data from the Cloud will become seamless through invisible computing says Pranav Mistry

“The priest puts a mark on a devotee’s forehead. In a way, that’s transferring data” nvisible computing is set to change the way humans interact with technology.

Invisible computing is not about a technology or a device. It’s about information.

Computing becomes a part of the environment, part of the cloud. We are connected to the information all the time, and not only data, we are connected to each other.

This is the overall concept of invisible computing.

There is work going on related to invisible computing technologies like the netsurfing cameras; we’re all using the power of the Cloud. And Cloud computing isn’t new.

What we call Cloud computing today was earlier called the Internet. Today, the power of the internet has gone beyond, and the speed of connecting to that Cloud is so fast that we don’t need to realise that we’re acquiring the data from which Cloud or that we’re accessing the data from our device. Earlier, the computer had to have everything from the processing power to the data needed. Now the world has changed. Now the data can be on the Cloud. Not just that, even the computing power of the windows to operate on the data can be on the Cloud.

So your device doesn’t need to be very powerful. While earlier, cables connected each terminal amongst a group of

Pranav Mistry X7

I

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computers, today; this cable has disappeared since we can connect to the Cloud.

Everyone is speaking about gesture computing these days ‘augmented reality’ is invisible computing where we interact with the data directly.

So moving beyond gesture

beyond gesture computing.

You can just tell your car that you wish to go to the airport and your car takes you there immediately. Such technologies are making the future much more exciting than what we can even imagine.

In that sense, all new

Now not just the data but the computing power to operate on it can be on the Cloud computing, a friend of mine from Google who’s also a professor at Stanford University has developed a car with his team. This car is much

products are amalgamation of various technologies. In Google, for example, when you use the search engine you have data processing, binary

algorithms and artificial intelligence going around it.

All of this comes together to give you the experience. It is the same thing in the car that I am talking about. It is not only about artificial intelligence there but there are several cameras in the car, a GPS device giving the location of the automobile. It also gives information about the next car and its location. All of these come together to give you one complete experience.

All the present digital mediums are great. They’re fast, compact and help connecting people easily. The only limitation they carry with them is that they’re indirect.

Which means that in order to access information, I need the support of another device computer, etc. Earlier mediums like books, sculptures, paintings or even music, all of them were direct mediums leading to an experience. For a long time, and in fact all my projects fall under that umbrella, I have been trying to explore the next level of the direct medium that still has the power of the digital medium.

My effort is on how can we use the power of the digital medium i.e. the new medium, and still have the directness and the intuitiveness of the old medium so that I do not need another medium in between to experience that information.

In my lifetime, I want to see

The SixthSense technology is a wearable gestural interface that augments the physical world with digital information and lets one use natural hand gestures to interact with it

a medium that’s more direct.

This is my long-term goal from the very beginning.

This is why our own Indian culture inspires me in my work. Sparsh is inspired by an act in the Indian temples.

The priest puts a mark on a devotee’s forehead. In a way, that’s transferring data. Take for instance; the big battle in the Mahabharata began because of the Palace of Illusions. The word ‘illusion’ in itself is a form of augmented reality.

I am working on several technologies on the same lines, that I cannot disclose presently.

Telepathy is one of them.

India is an extremely interesting place for any new technology. If you’d notice, India has skipped the computing age. A large segment of Indians haven’t used computers but have moved on directly to the mobile phones. In the western world at the same time, people went through various cycles-from desktop computers, laptops and then to mobile phones.

But here, in India and in some other countries with similar demographics, it is possible for us to introduce amazing new technology to people directly. So taking the instance

of the SixthSense device or of augmented reality, they can directly be introduced to the Indian consumers without going through the other cycles.

In fact, it’s more efficient that way. Indians are usually very open to technology and do not have any fixed mindset about using QWERTY keypads or touch-screens or anything like that.

Someone once said that technology is not about tools but about how humans work.

This is what will happen in every industry. I believe that when any industry matures, it looks for the human touch.

Now, the computing industry has become mature and is now thinking about the human aspects. That is why everyone is talking about design specifications or the brand of the laptop they own rather than its technical specifications. This is what will happen more and more. Thanks to the human touch, today technology is more about customisation.

The interface could inform you about the status of your flight on the air ticket itself

Just by holding a book in your hand, you can refer its ratings on sites like Amazon; or have calculations literally on the tip of your fingers

Weather status can be received just by holding a map in your hands

Pranav Mistry is a PhD student at the MIT Media Lab and has invented invisible computing technologies like Sparsh, TeleTouch and SixthSense that integrates digital experience with the real world.

What do you think?

Will invisible computing drastically change human interaction with technology?

Email: edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

Live news videos could be streamed and viewed against a newspaper

World News in context Cold War in the Middle East

5 October 2007: An Iranian boy with a plastic gun during demonstrations to mark Jerusalem Day in Tehran

Relations between Israel and Iran are steadily deteriorating. David Keys examines the factors behind the hostility cold war between Iran and Israel – the Middle East’s two top military powers – has been gathering pace, and observers are increasingly worried about its potential for escalation.

Towards the end of 2011, Israel tested a ballistic missile. Around the same time, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) bolstered suspicions that Iran has secretly been developing technologies that could in the future be used to make nuclear weapons. Inexorably, a dozen different historical threads are slowly coming together to produce greater tension – or worse – in the Middle East.

At the core of the problem are the mutual distrust, dislike and fear between Israel and Iran. The Shah’s preIslamist regime in Iran was favourably disposed towards Israel, but the Islamic revolutionaries who displaced it in 1979 were not. Partly, their hostility was a reaction to the Shah’s pro-Israeli position.

But it was also because the replacement Islamist government wanted to develop a leadership role within radical Islam across the region, and realised that supporting radical Palestinians against Israel might help in that process. Ideologically, it also

Reuters x2. illustration BY Sheu-KuEI Ho

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Caspian Sea

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Lebanon ISRAEL Gaza

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sees Israel as part of a wider US-aligned ‘neo-imperialist’ threat to the geopolitical independence of some nations in the developing world.

But there was an additional historical factor that conceivably played a role in shaping Iranian clerical anti-Israeli views.

Back in the 1930s and during World War II, Nazi Germany sought to promote anti-Semitism in Iran and elsewhere in the Middle East.

Radio Zeesen The vehicle for the propaganda was Radio Zeesen, a German station broadcasting from Berlin in the Iranian Farsi language.

The transmitter had been upgraded for Berlin’s 1936 Olympics and by 1940 the station, which became extremely antiSemitic, had become one of the most popular in Iran.

The German ambassador in the Iranian capital, Tehran, advised the German foreign office that in order to foster antiSemitic sentiment in Iran, Radio Zeesen should, by quoting the Quran, “highlight Mohammed’s struggle against the Jews in ancient times, and that of the Führer in modern times.” Radio Zeesen’s pre-war and wartime propaganda onslaught started as part of a much broader relationship between Germany and Iran. By 1940, 47 per cent of Iranian exports were to Germany, while 80 per cent of all industrial machinery in Iran came from Germany.

The Iranians’ pro-German sentiments only grew stronger after Soviet and British troops invaded and occupied the country in August 1941.

Radio Zeesen was certainly listened to by some members of the Iranian

clergy, including the man who would eventually become supreme leader of Iran – Ayatollah Khomeini. By 1941, Iranian rural clerics were, according to the German ambassador, suggesting that Hitler had been sent to Earth by God as an Islamic saviour. In the postwar decades, right-wing German influence on Iranian clerics continued in the form of the controversial philosopher and former Nazi, Martin Heidegger.

In 1963, Khomeini told his supporters: “Jews and foreigners wish to destroy Islam.” In his 1971 book The Islamic State, he accused the Jews of being “the first to begin anti-Islamic propaganda and ideological conspiracies”. These anti-Jewish sentiments gradually merged with a more political sounding anti-Zionism. In 1967, Khomeini told his followers “to annihilate unbelieving and inhuman Zionism”.

Holocaust denial More recently, despite the Iranian government having reasonable relations with Iran’s own Jewish community, elements of the Iranian leadership have tried to question the Holocaust as a historical event. In 2006, they convened an international conference on the Holocaust to which they invited substantial numbers of Holocaust deniers and far-right activists – including a former leader of the Ku Klux Klan and a senior German neo-Nazi.

The fall of the USSR in 1991, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)’s recognition of the existence of Israel in 1993, and the decline of the conventional Arab left in the region has created a political vacuum that has been increasingly filled by Islamist ideology.

Iran has been a major beneficiary of this process – as has its client or allied movements Hamas (founded in 1987), Palestinian Islamic Jihad (founded in 1979) and Hezbollah (founded in 1982), which are seen by Israel as threats. In recent years that latter organisation – now a coalition partner in the Lebanese government – has been supplied by Iran with many weapons, including thousands of rockets.

Nuclear weapons Another factor serving to escalate tensions in the Middle East is the Iranian government’s behaviour relating to nuclear issues – evidenced by its frequent clashes with the IAEA. Although Iran denies that it wishes to develop a nuclear bomb, its actions have made Israel increasingly nervous.

Until now, Israel has been the region’s only nuclear power – though it has always refused to confirm or deny this – and Iran no doubt feels intimidated by Israel’s conventional firepower as well as its nuclear weaponry. Iran also fears how the US and Pakistan’s nuclear weapons could be used in the future and no doubt feels it needs a deterrent.

Iran’s nuclear industry goes back to the 1960s, but it was only from 2002 that its nuclear behaviour began to provoke substantial international distrust. Iran has also had a missile development cooperation programme with North Korea.

The IAEA now believes that there is “credible evidence” that Iran was and may still be secretly engaged in “activities relevant to the development of a nuclear device”.

There’s another key reason why Israel is wary of Iran, namely Iran’s capacity and probable willingness to wage long-term conventional war against Israel, should Israel – or indeed the US – try to use military means to neutralise Iran’s nuclear weapons programme.

But Israel’s fear of Iran’s conventional war capability is also, to an extent, based on Iran’s past willingness to sacrifice vast numbers of its citizens in conflict. This was demonstrated in the Iran/Iraq war (1980-88) when Iran fought on for eight years, losing up to 700,000 men. Iraq lost up to 300,000.

Israel’s concerns are massively reinforced by the experience of Jewish history – repeated persecutions and massacres in Europe in the medieval and early modern periods, then the Russian pogroms in the

late 19th century and the Holocaust in the mid-20th century. Few other people on Earth have experienced such fundamental threats to their existence, and Israeli politicians and military planners obviously approach the potential Iranian nuclear threat in the context of that history.

Iran, meanwhile, also has a history unlike any other country in the Middle East. Firstly, it has existed as an independent state for thousands of years – since the 9th century BC – and therefore has a very strong national identity.

Secondly, it had no major internal religious divisions since most of the population converted from Sunni to Shia Islam in the 16th century. And Iran is now the standard-bearer for Shia communities throughout the Middle East.

Thirdly, it is intensely nationalistic – partly a product of at least half a dozen foreign interventions over the past century.

In 1907, Russia and Britain de facto partitioned Iran into economic interest zones. In 1908, the Russians intervened in the country. In World War I, neutral Iran was invaded by the Ottomans, the Russians and the British. After the conflict, British and Russian troops were active there. In World War II, neutral Iran was again invaded and occupied by the British and the Russians.

Western involvement In 1953, the CIA and Britain’s Secret Service helped organise a coup d’état to secure control of the country’s oil by removing its nationalist prime minister.

By 1957, the US and Israel were training the Shah’s widely detested secret police.

In the decade prior to the 1979 Islamist revolution, the US had 15,000 troops stationed in Iran, who were controversially not subject to Iranian law and whose presence often caused much resentment.

Although Iran and Israel don’t share a border, Israel is partly surrounded by Iranian-backed militias – Hamas in Gaza, Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the West Bank and Hezbollah in Lebanon. All three are able to stir up military problems for Israel.

And all came into being directly – or indirectly in the case of Hezbollah – as a result of an issue that has haunted the Middle East for more than 60 years: Israel’s fraught relationship with the Palestinians.

Some 130 years ago, 95 per cent of Palestine (i.e. what is now Israel, the

Tehran, 2006: A banner during a gathering to mark the anniversary of the Islamic revolution

West Bank and Gaza) was inhabited by Palestinian Arabs. In 1948, the Palestinians were offered 43 per cent of the land – an offer they rejected. The Arabs then tried to destroy Israel, but failed. Half a century later, at Camp David in 2000, the Israelis offered the Palestinians 15 per cent of what had been Palestine with the possibility of another four per cent later. The offer was turned down.

Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank has continued for most of the past decade – and it’s likely that the current Israeli government would offer less than was offered in 2000 if negotiations were to resume. With the Israeli occupation continuing and anti-Israeli sentiment high, Hamas – backed by Iran – won the last Palestinian elections, in 2006.

Direct hostilities have not yet broken out between Israel and Iran. The key question is whether Israel is prepared to see a viscerally anti-Israeli enemy develop the ability to carry out a nuclear attack on it.

So far, attempts by Iran’s enemies to slow down its nuclear programme have included the assassination of four top Iranian nuclear scientists and the use of a computer virus. How long it will be before this Middle Eastern Cold War gets hotter is, for the time being at least, an open question.

David Keys has worked on more than a dozen BBC TV history and archaeology documentaries and is a specialist correspondent for The Independent.

find out more E Israel vs Iran: the shadow war

by Yaakov Katz and Yoaz Hendel (Potamac, 2011) www.bbc.co.uk/news/world/middle_east/ E For the latest developments in the Middle East June 2012

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NASA/Casey Reed

Death stars

The Biggest

Bang

ne April morning last year, an orbiting satellite picked up a 10-second burst of radiation coming from deep space. In seconds, the satellite had turned its ultrasensitive telescopes towards the source – and just caught a flash of X-rays from the mystery object. Then it was gone.

Within half an hour, astronomers were using some of the world’s most powerful telescopes to look for the source.

When they found it, they realised they were looking at something truly astonishing: the glowing remnants of a colossal explosion on the very edge of the Universe – so far away that the radiation had taken 13 billion years to reach us. That meant it could have only one possible source.

The radiation had to have come from the single most violent E event in the Universe: the

O

xxx

Gamma-ray bursts – or death stars – are the most violent events in the Universe. They’re also shrouded in mystery.

Robert Matthews investigates…

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Death stars

Birth of a GRB What lies behind a gamma-ray burst

A GRB unleashes as much energy in a few seconds as an entire star emits during its lifetime. To account for such cosmic violence, astronomers have had to invoke some of the most exotic members of their cosmic menagerie: so-called neutron stars and black holes. Formed when huge stars much more massive than the Sun run out of nuclear fuel and collapse under their own gravity, both are incredibly dense and have intense gravitational and magnetic fields. Astronomers suspect that there are at least two different types of GRB, explained by the diagram (right). Watch the two different scenarios come to life by following these steps…

SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, GRB ILLUSTRATIONS X2: PAUL WOOTTON, LOS ALAMOS

A black hole is left where a star used to be after a gamma-ray burst

detonation E of a ‘death star’ or Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB).

Astronomers later estimated that in that 10-second blast, the object they later code-named GRB 090423 had unleashed more energy than our Sun will emit during its entire lifetime.

Every form of radiation, from gamma-rays and X-rays to heat and light, had burst from its core, while debris travelling at 99.99 per cent of the speed of light had smashed into the surrounding space. Even the very fabric of space and time was shaken by the explosion, rippling under its force.

Once the cosmic pyrotechnics were over, GRB 090423 was no more. But astronomers believe there is still something there – something at least as awe-inspiring as the events that spawned it: a gigantic black hole.

Big events trigger big interest Even astrophysicists well-used to dealing with dramatic cosmic events admit to finding the ‘death star’ phenomenon mind-boggling. “Such 34

June 2012

extreme events of energy, distance, gravity and speed stretch the intuition of scientists – and the imagination of everyone,” says GRB expert Dr Brian Metzger of Princeton University.

You don’t need much imagination to hope that cosmic monsters like GRBs died out long ago. But, however comforting the thought is, it may not be the case. GRBs can and do still happen, and not only at the edge of the cosmos. Astronomers have identified potential candidates for future GRBs on our cosmic E doorstep. Some even claim that

One of the Cold War-era Vela satellites

Colliding stars scenario Short-lived gamma-ray bursts are thought to begin with two neutron stars orbiting round each other and emitting gravitational waves. Neutron stars are the incredibly dense remnants of supernova explosions.

The loss of energy caused by the gravitational waves leads the neutron stars to spiral in towards each other. The two collide with immense violence, creating a black hole. The stars’ remnants then form a rapidly spinning ‘accretion disc’ of dust, gas and matter around this black hole.

The disc triggers the formation of jets of incredibly fast-moving gamma radiation and matter, known as a short gamma-ray burst. As the burst smashes into the matter that once surrounded the star, lower-frequency radiation ‘afterglow’ is formed, including visible light.

In less than two seconds, the short gamma-ray burst is over, leaving just the afterglow. Deadly gamma-rays stream out into the cosmos. As in the hypernova scenario, if Earth were unfortunate enough to be in the firing line, the GRB would fry the planet’s life.

Death stars

HYPERNOVA scenario 1. At the core of the dying star a black hole develops

Imagine a huge star that’s 25 times the mass of our Sun, around 12 times as wide and spinning at an incredible rate of one revolution every 90 minutes. As this star ages, it runs out of nuclear fuel and collapses in under its own weight. The remnants of this star form a rapidly spinning ‘accretion disc’ of dust, gas and matter around the black hole. As the gamma-ray burst smashes into the gas and dust that once surrounded the star, an ‘afterglow’ appears in lower-frequency radiation, including visible light. Within just 100 seconds, the whole event is over, though the afterglow can persist for hours or days and deadly gamma-rays stream out into the cosmos. If Earth were unlucky enough to be in the firing line and be hit by such a gamma-ray burst, it would have devastating consequences.

2. The spinning accretion disc triggers the formation of jets of incredibly fast-moving gamma radiation and matter, known as a gamma-ray burst, which smashes through the overlying material in a ‘hypernova’ explosion

1. Two neutron stars on decreasing orbits eventually collide, releasing massive amounts of energy, dust and debris

2. Gamma-rays and matter are ejected from the spinning debris disc after the collision

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Death stars

MASSIVE ATTACK Did a death star previously obliterate life on Earth?

A GRB hitting Earth could wipe out almost all life

The energy released by a GRB eclipses the output of a star’s entire lifetime

SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY X 3, NASA GSFC/ SONOMA STATE UNIVERSITY

Around 450 million years ago, the Earth was devastated by a terrible disaster that annihilated around 85 per cent of all marine species – at the time, the predominant form of life on the planet.

Known as the Late Ordovician Extinction, it was the second most devastating blow to life on Earth during its history – worse even than the notorious impact-related event that forced the dinosaurs into extinction 65 million years ago. Geological evidence points to a sudden plunge in global temperatures, though the cause remains uncertain. But one possibility is the explosion of a death star relatively close to Earth.

Analysis of the effects of a gamma-ray burst by researchers at the University of Kansas and the US space agency NASA suggests it would have triggered the destruction of the Earth’s protective ozone layer, allowing intense ultraviolet radiation from the Sun to reach the surface. This would have wiped out many life-forms in the upper layers of the oceans – including plankton, a key part of the marine food chain.

It’s also possible that the changes in atmospheric chemistry triggered by the blast may, in turn, have triggered global cooling – though whether this would be enough to account for the Ordovician ice age is unclear.

What is certain is that giant stars capable of producing gamma-ray bursts are spread throughout the cosmos. As such, it is not only life on Earth that’s threatened by them. According to research by Professor James Annis of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Illinois, gamma-ray bursts may regularly sterilise their host galaxies; if that’s true, our chances of finding life elsewhere in the Milky Way would be much reduced.

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E Earth itself was once blasted by a GRB, with consequences as devastating as those of a global nuclear war.

Ironically, it was attempts to prevent just such a war that first revealed their existence. During the 1960s, at the height of the Cold War, the US Department of Defense set up a network of satellites codenamed Vela, fitted with radiation detectors to spot any attempt by the Soviets to test nuclear weapons in space. In July 1967, the satellites seemed to confirm the United States’ worst fears, detecting flashes of gamma radiation out in space. However, more careful analysis quickly revealed that the flashes were unlike those expected from a nuclear weapon. Unable to say what they’d detected, Pentagon advisors declassified the data in 1973, allowing civilian scientists to suggest explanations.

It proved far from simple. The problem was all in their name: a burst of gamma-rays would appear somewhere in space, but vanish

before astronomers could get a telescope to examine the source.

Early gamma-ray satellites couldn’t pin down their position accurately, either. It wasn’t even clear if the bursts were relatively minor events close to the Solar System, or colossal explosions on the other side of the Universe.

The breakthrough came in May 1997, when an orbiting satellite detected a GRB and established its location fast enough for groundbased telescopes to study it and, for the first time, measure its distance.

The result was astonishing: GRB 970508 turned out to be three billion lightyears away, yet was still visible from Earth. And that meant that in its 15-second outburst, this death star had unleashed more energy than the annual output of a whole galaxy.

For astrophysicists like Dr Metzger, this immediately ruled out all but one explanation for GRB 970508.

It could only be the result of the collapse of a colossal star into an incredibly dense object – possibly

Death stars

Swift by name…

How the Swift satellite is able to detect death stars

The quest to solve the mysteries of gamma-ray bursts has been transformed by Swift, the aptly named satellite operated since 2004 by astronomers in the UK, US and Italy. By detecting the gamma-rays seconds after a GRB explosion, Swift allows ground-based observatories to turn their instruments on the radiation as it smashes into the gas and dust surrounding the original star. The results can then be compared with predictions of competing theories.

even a black hole. With a mass at least 20 times that of the Sun, such giant stars burn brilliantly and rapidly through their hydrogen ‘fuel’. Then they start to collapse under their own gravity, driving temperatures and densities ever higher until their whole mass is packed into a region barely 100km across, forming a so-called neutron star, or even a black hole.

Recipe for a burst “By studying such GRBs we get a front-row view of them in their crucial formative phase,” says Dr Metzger. “We’re confident that some combination of these objects is ultimately responsible for powering these GRBs – though it gets trickier when one tries to distinguish between a voraciously feeding black hole or a rapidly spinning neutron star with a strong magnetic field.”

Such questions are now being tackled using data sent by purposebuilt satellites like Swift (see above), which are detecting new GRBs at the rate of around one a day. But

1. Swift detects the gamma-rays erupting from the dying GRB

2. Within 10 seconds, it transmits an approximate location of the event to ground telescopes

Every form of radiation surges from the core during a gamma-ray burst

3. Automated ‘robotic’ telescopes take measurements of the effects of gamma radiation

4. Measurements are analysed for clues to the causes of the explosion

5. X-ray and ultraviolet observations of the event made by Swift are then beamed down to Earth

these are adding new mysteries of their own.

One of the most baffling centres on so-called short GRBs, which last barely a second or so. Their fleeting appearance stymied attempts to study them in any kind of detail until 2005, when Swift detected the afterglow of one in a galaxy 800 million lightyears away. Although only a few dozen have since been identified, the evidence suggests they’re the result of a cataclysm even more dramatic than the collapse of a giant star.

“The favoured idea is that they are produced when two compact objects, such as two neutron stars, coalesce,” says astrophysicist Professor Nial E June 2012

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Death stars

EVE OF DESTRUCTION? What a death star explosion would do to Earth

20th CENTURY FOX/EVERETT/REX, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, STScI /HUBBE SPACE TELESCOPE

Such is the power of a death star explosion that even from a distance of several thousand lightyears, the effects would be devastating for life on Earth. But the threat isn’t from radiation sickness triggered by the gamma-rays: these would be absorbed by the atmosphere. It’s the effect of the rays on the gases in the atmosphere that poses the real risk to life. Nitrogen and oxygen molecules would be blasted apart by the radiation – forming nitrogen dioxide, a toxic brown gas that would attack the ozone layer, which shields the Earth from deadly ultraviolet radiation from the Sun. As the nitrogen dioxide spreads, large areas of the atmosphere become darker, driving down global temperatures. At the same time, the gas would combine with rain and seawater, producing nitric acid. Assailed by both intense ultraviolet radiation and acid, life-forms unable to find shelter at least 10 metres below the surface of the Earth’s oceans would be at grave risk from radiation and chemical burns, and longer-term threats including mutations, sterility and death. The decline in global temperatures may also disrupt ocean currents, altering the distribution of heat around the Earth, and potentially triggering a global ice age.

It takes several years for the Earth to begin to recover from the effects of the death star blast. The dark, toxic nitrogen dioxide gradually washes out of the atmosphere as rain. No longer attacked by the gas, the ozone layer starts to recover and the levels of ultraviolet radiation reaching the surface of the Earth starts to fall. At the same time, the atmosphere begins to clear, allowing global temperatures to climb. Some species of organism actually benefit from the fertilising effect of the nitrogen-rich compounds descending from the atmosphere, and start to thrive. Surviving life-forms begin to move into the ecological niches left by those destroyed by the blast.

E Tanvir of the University of Leicester. “It does fit in pretty well with the observations we have, but I think it’s quite possible we’ll find that some short bursts are produced by different means.”

The violence of a gamma-ray burst can travel lightyears across the Universe

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More bursts, more questions And then there are the GRBs that refuse to fit into any neat category – such as GRB060614, discovered

by Swift in a galaxy over a billion lightyears away. Its blast lasted for over 100 seconds, putting it firmly in the long GRB camp, and thus linking it to the collapse of a giant star. Yet when the world’s most powerful telescopes looked for remnants of the original star, they found nothing.

Had everything been engulfed by the final black hole or had something entirely different caused the burst? “The most intriguing

and unexplained mystery is the vast complexity and variety of the fading behaviour of GRBs,” says Professor Carole Mundell of Liverpool John Moores University. “Sudden fades, slow fades, sudden re-brightenings… we need to look harder to find the origin of the observed behaviour.”

Understanding the origin and behaviour of GRBs is one of the greatest challenges facing astrophysicists. But some believe the results aren’t just of academic interest.

They think GRBs have threatened the very survival of life on Earth in the past and may do so again.

In 2003, a team of astronomers led

by Professor Adrian Melott at the University of Kansas announced that a GRB in our own galaxy may have been responsible for the so-called Ordovician Extinction, during which most life on Earth perished around 450 million years ago (see ‘Massive

Death stars

WAVE POWER Can gamma-ray bursts be used to probe space and time?

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are notorious for being the most violent events since the Big Bang itself. But that very violence makes them ideal for scientists trying to fathom the nature of space and time. According to Einstein’s theory of gravity, General Relativity, what we perceive as the ‘force’ of gravity is really the effect of mass on space and time around it, which becomes warped rather like a rubber sheet with a cannonball placed on it. General Relativity also predicts that violent changes in mass will cause ripples in the fabric of space-time, known as gravitational waves.

At least, that’s the theory. More than 90 years after Einstein’s prediction, scientists have yet to detect gravitational waves directly because space-time is very hard to warp. Even so, GRBs might be up to the job. Triggered by the destruction of stars at least 20 times heavier than the Sun, GRBs should set spacetime around them vibrating at around 100-1000 beats

Attack’, p36). Could we face a similar fate today? Astronomers have long known that super-massive stars capable of spawning GRBs still exist in our galaxy. Known as Wolf-Rayet stars, these could collapse to black holes at the end of their lives. And if one exists even several thousand lightyears away, any resulting gamma-ray blast would pose a threat to life on Earth.

per second. But these ripples would still be incredibly small, amounting to the entire Solar System wobbling by the width of an atom.

Despite the challenges, scientists believe they will soon be able to detect such tiny effects at detectors like LIGO – the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory – based in Louisiana and Washington. Consisting of pairs of L-shaped vacuum tubes many kilometres long, these detect the passage of gravitational waves via incredibly small distortions in laser beams sent down each tube.

Following the discovery of GRBs by orbiting observatories like Swift, scientists have already looked for signs of gravitational waves passing through their detectors. So far, however, they’ve come up blank, suggesting their detectors are still not sensitive enough for the task. But they’re hard at work refining their techniques, sure in the knowledge that the first team to succeed will win a Nobel Prize.

Worryingly, astronomers know of several Wolf-Rayet stars close enough to put our planet in the kill zone.

Most attention has focused on a star around 8000 lightyears away, known as WR104. It’s certainly massive enough to turn into a black hole at the end of its life and calculations

by Prof Melott and his colleagues suggest it’s close enough to affect the Earth. “But there’s a caveat,” cautions

team member Dr Brian Thomas of Washburn University, Kansas. “The rotation axis must be pointed directly at us, as the emission from a GRB is strongly beamed – and we must fall in that beam-line in order to receive the full effect.”

The good news is that the axis of WR104 is around 30-40° off, which should protect us from the worst effects. And that’s presuming it even turns into a GRB, which is far from certain, says Prof Tanvir. “One of the things we’ve already learned is that GRBs seem to be more common in galaxies that are chemically more primitive than ours.” Add in the fact that calculations suggest that just a few GRBs may take place in our entire galaxy every billion years and it seems there’s little immediate cause for concern.

Yet even after almost 40 years of study, some very basic questions about GRBs remain unanswered.

Exactly how do they form? How many different types are there? And what lurks in their place after they have exploded?

“We may need to go back to the blackboard and consider entirely different models,” says Prof Metzger.

“But the relevance of GRBs to humans is that they provide an almost daily reminder of the sheer power and majesty that the Universe can create.”

Robert Matthews is a science journalist and Visiting Reader in Science at Aston University, UK. www.robertmatthews.org

find out more E www.tinyurl.com/yj7k9p9 NASA site on the GRB mystery E www.tinyurl.com/5bx8me Find out about a relatively nearby GRB E www.tinyurl.com/yb8lydx How GRBs might affect life on Earth June 2012

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Portfolio

Animal behaviour

gorillas

Mountain

High in the densely forested mountains of Rwanda, Andy Rouse infiltrated a family of gorillas to photograph the intimate details of their daily life

A rare sight An eye stares from the foliage deep in the forests of Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda. It belongs to a mountain gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei), a subspecies of the eastern gorilla (Gorilla beringei). Huge dominant males like this one are known as silverbacks for the sheen of pale fur covering their back and flanks.

The mountain gorilla’s thick fur helps it to survive in the chilly uplands where it makes its home. There are just 700 individuals remaining in the wild, living in groups of up to 30 animals in Uganda, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

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wew Animal behaviour

bundle of joy G A female gorilla cradles her baby, which is less than two weeks old. She is one of several adult females in the band that mate with the silverback. The group also comprises a few subordinate males, who support their leader, and a handful of juveniles and youngsters. Baby gorillas are born at night after a gestation of nine months – further underlining the species’ similarity to humans. Newborns are virtually hairless and so helpless that about 40 per cent perish in the first few days of life. Youngsters begin suckling immediately and may continue to do so for the next two years or more, even once they are well grown.

Black hole E Baring his teeth in a great yawn, a male gorilla reveals the elongated teeth that he uses to bite opponents in the rare event of a fight. The black-stained enamel and tongue are a result of his extremely varied diet, which includes the leaves, fruit and bark of more than 200 different species of plants.

Mountain gorillas are also partial to ants and termites.

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Animal behaviour

Gorillas in the mist F Mountain gorillas prefer to live in this kind of lush montane cloud forest. The species was first documented by German explorer Oscar von Beringe in 1902, but was brought into the public eye through the work of Californian conservationist Dian Fossey. She was murdered in her cabin in Karisoke Research Center in 1985 defending the animals that she loved. Her grave, alongside that of her favourite gorilla, Digit, overlooks the Virunga Mountains and is a sobering reminder of the continuing struggle to save the world’s wild mountain gorillas from continuing habitat destruction and poaching.

Mountain gorilla range

Lake Edward UGANDA

Virunga Volcanoes National Park Lake Kivu

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO

RWANDA

TANZANIA BURUNDI

The photographer Andy Rouse is a British professional wildlife photographer.

His extensive knowledge of his subjects enables him to get extremely close to some of the world’s most dangerous creatures. Passionate about conservation, he has launched his own conservation fund and sponsors projects in Rwanda, India and the United Kingdom.

find out more E www.andyrouse.co.uk Andy Rouse’s website, including his photography and his blog

Invisibility science

How to make anything

getty, Pierre Doucin/Debut Art

invisible With physicists working on ways to bend light around objects, could science create a real cloak of invisibility?

Paul Parsons reveals the tech you won’t see coming

June 2012

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Invisibility science

camouflage

within 10 years

urning invisible can mean hiding in plain sight. Some organisms use camouflage to blend into their environment, thanks to patterns on the surface of their bodies. After using this strategy on combat uniforms, the military is now copying nature’s more complex innovation: the chameleon-like ability to alter appearance quickly. And it’s not just the eyes that can be deceived – psychological quirks can also cause our brains to miss what’s right in front of us.

T

CLOTHES

Create an invisibility cloak using technology Susumu Tachi at Keio University in Japan uses cameras to film behind a subject and then project the scene in real-time onto a reflective cloak (see http://j.mp/tachilab). This ‘optical camouflage’ technology produces a similar effect to the armour worn in the film Predator, and gives a very convincing illusion of invisibility.

The bulky cameras and projectors used to achieve this effect aren’t practical, but switch to wearable cameras and flexible LCD displays woven into the cloak’s fabric (technology that DARPA, the US

The F-117 is virtually invisible to radar but next-generation military planes could even be invisible to the human eye

military R&D organisation, is believed to be investigating) and this technique starts to look quite promising.

Prof Sidney Perkowitz, a physicist at Emory University in Georgia, suggests nanotechnology could one day make this seamless. “It might be possible to make a cloak covered with thousands of nano-scale light detectors and light sources, to give observers the illusion they’re seeing right through the cloak.

If the system were fast enough, this could be done in real-time.”

A team in Japan can make you ‘invisible’ using cameras and projectors

AIRCRAFT

Even stealthier military vehicles Every B-2 stealth bomber is worth more than its weight (that’s 72,000kg) in gold, such is the cost of making them invisible to radar. Now aircraft engineers are moving on from radar, designing planes that are invisible to the naked eye.

According to aviation consultant David Windle, it’s because western nations are increasingly waging wars against technologically inferior adversaries. “If you’re fighting the Taliban, they haven’t got radar – what they have got is rocketpropelled grenades. Fire an approx $200 RPG and it’s goodbye to a $20 million helicopter – not to mention the people inside it.” Lockheed, the company behind the F-117 ‘Nighthawk’ stealth fighter, has patents on using fibre-optic technology to control the light reflected from an aircraft’s surfaces, enabling it to blend in with the colour and brightness of the background sky. In September 2011, BAE Systems announced similar technology for tanks, using heat-changing panels so the tank’s infrared signature matches its surroundings.

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Invisibility science

PEOPLE

The psychology of overlooking the obvious

There’s an easy way to turn yourself invisible: just make sure everyone’s looking the other way. Magicians do this all the time through a technique called ‘misdirection’ – distracting their audience’s attention through clever use of props or comedy.

But sometimes we can inadvertently misdirect ourselves, overlooking glaringly obvious information or events because we’re too engrossed in other things. Psychologists call this ‘inattentional blindness’, as demonstrated in an experiment by Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris at Harvard in 1999.

Test subjects watched a video of six students – three dressed in black, three in white – passing a basketball. The test subjects had to count the number of passes made by the players in white. But they weren’t told that halfway through the video, someone in a gorilla suit would walk through the scene. Incredibly, half the people who took the test were so focused on the players that they completely failed to spot the gorilla, right before their eyes.

Cuttlefish are being studied in the hope that their camouflaging abilities can be adapted for use by naval vessels

Blending into the background Man-made technology still has some catching up to do before it can match the disappearing acts in the natural world. Some animals, including chameleons and some flatfish, are able to change the colour and brightness of their skin in response to their mood or their surroundings.

The US Office of Naval Research recently awarded a $6 million contract to scientists led

by Roger Hanlon at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Massachusetts, to figure out how the camouflage mechanisms employed by sea creatures like the octopus and cuttlefish might be adapted for technological applications.

Animals alter their appearance via special pigment-laden cells in their skin called chromatophores. Colour changes are produced by shifting pigment around inside the chromatophore cells in response to nerve impulses or chemical signals, such as adrenaline.

The creatures also have light-sensitive proteins in their skin, called opsins, which combine with the chromatophores to create a highly effective invisibility cloak.

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keio University Professor Daniel J Simons x4, getty, Lockheed martin

Submarines

Invisibility science

Cloaking

e see physical things because the light from a source – such as a lamp or the Sun – bounces off an object before reaching our eyes. So if anything deflects the path of the light before it reaches us, we see the object differently, like the way water in a glass seems to make a straw bend. Physicists

W

OBJECTS

dr david r smith, press association, thinkstock, richardpalmergraphics.com

Bend light around any object with metamaterials Harry Potter’s cloak of invisibility renders the boy wizard undetectable to the naked eye. Could such a garment exist in the real world? In 2006, a team of physicists led by Prof Sir John Pendry of Imperial College London and David Smith of Duke University, North Carolina, created an invisibility cloak that guided electromagnetic radiation (microwaves) around an object. The cloak was made of a ‘metamaterial’ – an exotic man-made substance with physical properties beyond anything found in nature.

“We constructed a metamaterial cloak that steers radiation away from the hidden object. Then, having passed by the object, the radiation returns to its original direction,” says Pendry.

Metamaterials have a negative ‘refractive index’, a measure of how light rays are bent as they pass through an optical medium. Glass lenses have an index greater than that of air so they bend light inwards and focus them, whereas a negative index has the opposite effect, bending rays outwards and around an object.

Building metamaterials means engineering matter on scales smaller than the wavelength of the radiation involved. Smith has so far managed this for microwaves, but a cloak that works for visible light (with wavelengths 100,000 times smaller) will require materials that haven’t yet been invented. Once mastered, being able to manipulate light so precisely could have applications in solar power, microscopes and the etching of ever-smaller computer chips.

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10-50 YEARS are currently working on ways to cloak an object in special ‘metamaterials’ that bend light around the object and then guide it back along its original path, similar to how water flows around a rock in a stream. With researchers already able to bend microwaves, cloaking objects from light may only be a few decades away.

A 12cm-wide cloak made of concentric cylinders of metamaterial will steer light around an object placed inside it, rendering the object invisible

Meta physics

How metamaterials cloak objects by bending microwaves 1. In the absence of a cloak around an object, microwaves beamed at the object will bounce back. It can be detected by anyone watching – revealing the object’s presence. This is how radar works.

NORMAL

Microwave source

2. A circular cloak made of a special ‘metamaterial’ parts the microwave beam, bending it around the object and then reforming it on the other side to look just as it would were the object not there at all.

CLOAKED

Solid object

3. The cloak is made of concentric cylinders with pits and cavities machined into them, giving the metamaterial the exact electrical and magnetic properties needed to deflect the microwaves.

ENLARGED

Invisibility science

LUGGAGE

Fool the security scanners at airports

We rely on security to keep us safe from terrorists, and that means airports must stay one step ahead in the technology stakes. The latest technology is ‘T-ray’ scanners, which deliver the equivalent of an X-ray but without the harmful ionising radiation. The scanners work in the terahertz frequency band, between the microwave and infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.

However, researchers led by Cheng Sun at Northwestern University in Illinois have created a metamaterial cloak that renders objects invisible at terahertz frequencies. Raising concerns about the reliability of T-ray scans, Sun’s team used light beams to etch out solid layers of metamaterial from a liquid polymer solution, and the layers were then stacked up to form a concave prism. Objects placed under the prism became invisible to T-rays.

Airports use T-ray scans to detect hidden threats but cloaking devices could be used to smuggle objects through

BUILDINGS

Hide unsightly structures from scenic views Want to hide a large structure, like a wind farm? One way that buildings might be hidden is through a clever arrangement of mirrors or prisms. For instance, a submarine’s periscope works using two 45° tilted mirrors, one placed vertically above the other. Two periscopes placed end-to-end would then create an arrangement of four mirrors that’s able to divert light around intervening objects.

In 2010, similar results were reported (albeit on scales of a few centimetres) using calcite crystals. Dr Baile Zhang of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and colleagues realised that calcite, a naturally occurring mineral with unusual optical properties, could deflect light around an object as if the object were not there. Unlike existing metamaterials, this also works for visible light – and does so at a fraction of the cost. The

drawback is that a building would have to be completely encased in the crystal.

That might not be an issue for, say, covert military installations – where staying hidden is the priority, whatever the cost.

There could still be a place for metamaterials when it comes to hiding buildings, though. Physicist Dr Sebastien Guenneau of the University of Liverpool has developed a kind of metamaterial cloak that works not for electromagnetic waves but for mechanical vibrations – such as earthquakes or even tsunami waves. His earthquake cloak consists of concentric rings of solid pillars which, when placed around a building, make it ‘invisible’ to the energy of the quake.

According to Guenneau, “70 to 80 per cent of the elastic energy of the earthquake is smoothly detoured by the cloak.”

Could metamaterials make unsightly wind farms disappear?

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Invisibility science

Science fiction

ven unbelievable approaches to achieving invisibility may one day become reality. An invisibility potion that would make you as transparent as HG Wells’s The Invisible Man is already being used to see through biological cells, while the technology that could cloak an entire spaceship, as seen on Star

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50 years or more

Trek, is theoretically possible. In future, invisibility science may allow light to be manipulated to such an extent that time would seem to stop, allowing things to disappear in an instant. Precisely when these things will become possible isn’t yet known. But it will happen... it’s just a matter of time.

SPACESHIPS

Engage the cloaking device from Star Trek

alamy, riken

In Star Trek, the Romulan race develop a cloaking device – 23rd-century technology that renders an entire spaceship invisible to the Enterprise’s scanners. The show’s creators invoked the laws of gravity to explain how it works, suggesting the device could deflect light rays around an object, creating the illusion it isn’t there.

We already know that gravity can bend light in this way. Our best explanation for gravity is the general theory of relativity

by Einstein, which states that massive

objects bend space. When other objects – including light rays – move through this distorted space, their paths are made to curve. Indeed, some of the first evidence for general relativity was the observation, in 1919, of light from distant stars being bent by the gravity of our own Sun. But this degree of bending is tiny, with the Sun’s gravity deflecting trajectories by less than 1/1,800th of a degree. “To pull light rays around a spacecraft so as to hide it would take an inconceivably huge mass,

or one approaching the density of a black hole – far beyond what a spacecraft could hold,” notes Prof Sidney Perkowitz, author of Slow Light: Invisibility, Teleportation And Other Mysteries Of Light.

Quantum theory could hold the solution.

For decades, physicists have grappled with a quantum theory of gravity – a framework in which the gravitational force is carried by subatomic particles called gravitons.

Perhaps the Romulans figured out how to generate such particles artificially.

The sort of cloaking technology the Romulans used to hide their ships from the Enterprise’s scanners involved gravity bending light

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Invisibility science

TIME

You

Make events disappear

Turn the human body transparent Could science ever be able to make a foetus transparent?

In the 1897 science-fiction classic The Invisible Man by HG Wells, a renegade scientist identified only as ‘Griffin’ perfects a substance that makes the refractive index of the human body equal to that of ordinary air, rendering the user invisible. Wells’s science is bang-on: if you could alter the body’s optical properties to make them the same as air, it really would disappear.

Will we ever be able to do it?

Optical properties of materials are determined by the structure of their atoms and molecules. A molecule of water is very different from an atom of lead, and it’s these differences that account for the fact that water is seethrough while lead is opaque.

Nevertheless, scientists at Japan’s RIKEN Brain Science Institute have concocted a substance called ‘Scale’

that turns brain tissue transparent.

Mouse brains soaked in Scale for two weeks became totally see-through, enabling researchers to see inside tissue specimens.

For now, Scale is too toxic for use on living creatures, but team leader Prof Atushi Miyawaki believes this may change. “We are investigating another, milder reagent that would allow us to study live tissue in the same way, at somewhat lower levels of transparency,” he says. “This would open the door to experiments that have simply never been possible before.”

What do you think?

What would you like to make invisible – and why?

Email: edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

For politicians and criminals, it’s a dream come true – a gadget that can cloak intervals of time and space, enabling events to be edited out of history. The first working example of such a device, an ‘event cloak’, has been built by physicists at Cornell University in the state of New York.

“Event cloaks do not divert some of the light around things as ordinary ‘spatial’ cloaks do. Instead, they slow some of the illuminating light down, then speed it up again, creating a temporary dark spot ahead of the slowed light, in which events occur unseen,” explains Dr Paul Kinsler of Imperial College, London.

With two other colleagues, Kinsler devised the theory of event cloaks in 2010, drawing an analogy between a light beam and a stream of traffic moving along a road. If all the traffic ahead of a certain car speeds up, while the two slow down, a gap is created in which there is no traffic or, similarly, no light.

In July 2011, Moti Fridman and his team at Cornell put this theoretical scheme into practice by building an event cloak from optical fibres. The speed of light within these filaments of silica is dependent on the intensity of the background light. This enabled Fridman’s team to speed up or slow down the light passing along the fibres by varying the ambient light level. In this way, they were to create an event cloak lasting for 12 picoseconds – 12 millionmillionths of a second.

Could we ever cloak events lasting minutes, or even seconds? Kinsler says it would be very tricky. “It takes eight minutes for light to get from the Sun to Earth. So to cloak eight minutes would require a device that size. Even a light-second is 300,000km! Perhaps with advanced technology we might reduce that by a factor of 100 or even 1,000 – but that’s still a big device.”

Paul Parsons is the author of Science 1001: Absolutely Everything That Matters In Science and 30-Second Theories-The 50 Most ThoughtProvoking Theories. in Science.

find out more E Science 1001: Absolutely Everything That Matters in Science

By Dr Paul Parsons, Penguin E www.howstuffworks/invisibility-cloak.htm The science behind the invisibility cloak June 2012

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illustration by pablo bernasconi. Note that This article provides general information and is not a substitute for legal advice

How to live Online

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June 2012

HOW TO LIVE ONLINE

Should you google before a date, befriend your boss on Facebook, or use your neighbour’s Wi-Fi? JV Chamary helps solve your digital dilemmas with a handy guide to living in the Information Age ow that we can access the internet wherever we go, the boundary between our online and offline lives is becoming more and more blurred. Comments that you leave on Facebook become conversation starters down the pub, while things that you find out through Google can help form first impressions about someone long before you meet them in person.

The net has undoubtedly made life easier, but it’s produced its fair share of problems, too. Take Facebook.

Social networks have helped us stay connected with friends and family.

But will accepting your boss’s Facebook friendship help or hinder your career? And will your new lover get angry if you don’t declare that you’re ‘in a relationship’?

Sites such as Facebook have also allowed personal details to appear online. This spread of information is almost impossible to stop, so how do you prevent private data becoming public? Read on to find out…

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HOW TO LIVE ONLINE

Home

43%

of single people google their potential love interest before a first date, a poll of 1167 people by a US dating service showed

60%

Those who piggyback on their neighbours’ Wi-Fi could end up in court

Love stats

Can I use my neighbour’s Wi-Fi? Borrow, steal or piggyback; whatever you call it, using another person’s wireless internet without their permission could be considered a crime.

The 1990 Computer Misuse Act bans unauthorised access to a computer, while the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 prohibits ‘unlawful interception [of] transmission by means of a private telecommunication system’. Other laws might treat piggybacking as theft. According to the 2003 Communications Act [Section 125], a person who ‘dishonestly obtains an electronic communications service with intent to avoid payment of a charge applicable to the provision of that service’ is guilty of an offence. And under the Fraud Act 2006, ‘obtaining services dishonestly’ carries a maximum prison term of 12 months and a fine up to `40 lakhs (approx).

Your neighbour could get in trouble, too, as their internet service provider (ISp) will hold them responsible for anything you do using their connection – including illegal downloading. most ISps include a clause in the contract telling you to secure your Wi-Fi with a password, but some consumer groups argue that those who don’t add a password are inviting others to use their Wi-Fi: “people do that deliberately because they want to share,” says Jim killock from the Open Rights Group.

Should I reveal my location?

Alamy, bbc, illustration by pablo bernasconi

Some web services now ask us to tell them where we are. One of the most popular of these location-sharing services is Foursquare, a social networking game that helps users discover new places. Players earn points and real-world rewards such as free drinks when they ‘check in’ at a particular place using the GPS coordinates sent from their smartphones.

But location sharing isn’t all fun and games. Three Dutch students recently created the website ‘Please Rob Me’ to draw attention to the side effects of sharing your current position.

The danger of publicly revealing where you are is it leaves one place that you’re definitely not: at home. The site (now closed) simply collected and reprinted updates from Foursquare and Twitter that revealed where people were, and posted them under thief-friendly language like ‘new opportunities’.

And it’s not just your current location you shouldn’t share. According to The Digital Criminal, a report written by reformed burglar Michael Fraser, thieves now use social networks to develop relationships with people and identify likely targets (Fraser calls it “internet shopping for burglars”). So you might want to think twice before posting details of your holiday plans on Facebook – it could lead to higher home insurance.

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of Facebook users reveal their current relationship status online

9%

of women make a ‘flirty face’ in profile pictures on dating site OKCupid (56 per cent smile and 35 per cent look serious)

4.7

MILLION people in the UK visited an online dating site during 2008

Is it okay to download TV programmes?

Legally, it depends on who’s offering the programme. “Both downloading and streaming involve making a copy,” says Victoria McEvedy, a solicitor specialising in new media and communications law.

So downloading falls under copyright law. According to the 1988 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act [Sections 16 and 17], making any kind of copy – even transient digital copies – is copyright infringement. “It’s an exclusive right reserved to the owner, and you need either a licence or a defence.”

That licence to copy (permission to download) must come from the copyright owner, who also has an exclusive right to make their work available to the public – which means you can’t do anything else with a download, such as saving the file in a folder available for sharing. The copyright owner can issue licences to others though, which is why the BBC is licenced to make non-BBC programmes available through iPlayer.

If you had a legal right to watch the programme when it was broadcast, you can probably rely on Section 70 of the Copyright Act. This states that you can record for ‘time-shifting’ purposes – viewing or listening to programmes at a more convenient time, which may be what lets us save shows on the set-top boxes.

Few UK court cases have been brought against illegal downloaders, and these weren’t defended – they were default decisions, with damages awarded to the copyright owner. “There’s very little law and none of it’s really been tested,” says McEvedy. “Some people think downloading is okay, but it’s not.”

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members of online dating website eHarmony marry every day in the US according to a survey by research firm Harris Interactive

The BBC is licenced to make non-BBC programmes available through iPlayer

HOW TO LIVE ONLINE

Save your Life

personal Can I prevent photos of me appearing online?

Facebook users will be familiar with the alert that appears in their profile when a friend ‘tags’ a picture with their name. The site’s preference settings won’t let you prevent this automatically, so if you don’t want to be tagged, you’ll have to remove each tag from every picture and tell friends not to tag you in future.

When you sign up to sites like Facebook, you accept terms and conditions that gives them permission to publish what you post online, but not what’s posted by others (under 18s can’t consent to such terms). To force a site to actually remove pictures, the activities in the photos have to be truly private and personal. “If that photo was of you having sex, that would be intrusion and a misuse of your private information,” says solicitor Victoria McEvedy. “You could sue both the site and the person who posted it, and claim damages up to the date of removal. Remember, your rights are only good if you can enforce them.”

The ‘right to respect for private and family life’ is provided by Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, and covers things like our sex life, religious and political beliefs, plus sensitive data such as health and financial information. “This is a highly controversial area of law because it’s all new,” says McEvedy. She adds that if Article 8 were strictly enforced, “many tabloids would have to go out of business tomorrow.”

How many friends should I have?

Some people have hundreds of friends on Facebook, but according to Professor Robin Dunbar – an evolutionary anthropologist and author of How Many Friends Does One Person Need? – you should only have about 150.

Dunbar’s Number, as it’s called, is the 150 people you know well enough to have a ‘reciprocative relationship’ with. As Dunbar explains, these are friendships built on history: “You wouldn’t feel embarrassed going up to them in the bar of Hong Kong airport at 3am, because they’d know where you sit in their social world. You could have a chat and you wouldn’t have to introduce yourself.”

So why 150? “It goes back to the constraints on primate social evolution, what was limiting group sizes then,” says Dunbar. By comparing primate species, he discovered a correlation between the size of natural social groups and the size of the neocortex region of the brain. When this result was extrapolated to humans, it pointed to 150 friends. And when Dunbar examined actual relationships – such as people’s Christmas card lists – the same number appeared.

Dunbar says that we can’t cope with over 150 close friends because of the brain power needed to remember details about each relationship. Unless regularly reinforced through constant contact, these connections – both neural and social – will weaken. “Eventually, you drift apart,” says Dunbar.

Is there digital life after death?

From photos to emails, our personal data is increasingly stored online. So what happens to it all when you die? “It’s very hard to find this out,” says Lilian Edwards, professor of internet law at the University of Sheffield.

“It’s a matter of what you’ve signed up to in your contract with the social network or email site.” The terms of contracts vary between services, and there’s no consistency on how dealing with a user’s data upon death, so make provisions for your passing (see ‘Save your Life’, right).

Facebook is probably the most sensitive site. Family with proof of death can fill out a form that offers options on what to do with the expired account, including getting it deleted.

Some loved ones have the deceased’s profile page ‘memorialised’: Facebook removes contact info and status updates, and only lets existing friends find the memorial and post messages.

Yahoo! treats online activity as confidential, even after death, to stop people reading private information that the deceased might have wanted to keep secret. In 2005, the relatives of a US marine had to take Yahoo! to court to access his emails (in the end, they copied the marine’s messages to CD but didn’t provide the password).

Leaving behind digital assets like passwords is especially important for people with an online business, such as eBay sellers, because a company’s reputation could be damaged by incomplete transactions, while partners may be unable to access money in virtual banks.

June 2012

Backup your data Webmail services save messages on hard drives in ‘the cloud’, so get email software like Mozilla Thunderbird to keep copies of messages on your computer too. Backupify. com can regularly copy your data from popular sites onto Amazon’s cloud storage, from where you can download it. Flickr and Facebook only let you download one image at a time, so use FlickrEdit or FaceDown for backing up a load of pictures in one go.

Leave it all behind Legacy Locker is a secure repository for digital assets like passwords, which you leave to beneficiaries upon your death. Dead Man’s Switch sends you an email every so often to check you’re alive, and if you don’t reply sends out personal messages you’ve prepared. But the easiest solution is to just write down your login details and passwords, then leave them with your will.

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HOW TO LIVE ONLINE Your boss might notice the amount of time you’re spending on a social networking site during office hours

work

Should I befriend my boss on Facebook?

Originally designed as a social networking site for students, Facebook now boasts over 400 million active users – just under six per cent of the world’s population. The site aims to help you connect with the people in your life. But should that also include your boss?

“The second you ‘friend’ your boss, you have to change the way you use Facebook,” says personal branding expert Dan Schawbel. “If you forget and say something bad about the company, it can be very dangerous.”

This is because snooping on employees is becoming more common. Last year, 16-year-old Kimberley Swann was sacked after the teenager described her new job as “boring” – a comment that co-workers relayed to her manager. One way to avoid this would be to alter your privacy settings and add your boss and colleagues to a list of ‘workplace friends’ who can only see limited information.

If you decide to accept the friend request from your boss, always watch what you say because they’ll be able to see what you write. Remember that Facebook also puts a time stamp next to your online activity.

If your boss notices that you’re spending too much time online, they may think they haven’t given you enough work to do, and you don’t want that.

Can social networking harm my career?

According to a recent survey of 2667 human resource managers, 45 per cent of US employers use social networks like Twitter and Facebook to screen job applicants. Of these socially savvy companies, 35 per cent had rejected a potential recruit after finding questionable content – such as provocative photos or inappropriate information – on their social profiles.

Job seekers should therefore be aware that a prospective employer may judge them based on the first things they discover What you say online could haunt you in the office later

through Google. “Most first impressions now are conducted online before you can even establish the relationship offline,” warns Dan Schawbel, author of Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success. “The online world is a public environment. How you live online is a representation of how people perceive you both online and offline. Everything that’s posted online can hurt you both professionally and personally.”

Schawbel says the solution is to create a personal brand and have a strong online presence (see ‘Get a Job’, right). You should also adjust your social network’s privacy settings to restrict the content that appears in search engine results. But this won’t necessarily stop online acquaintances talking about you or tagging you in their photos. And because the web is built on links between sites, what they say can be broadcast right across the internet.

If you already have a job, never badmouth your business or reveal sensitive information. Don’t ‘over share’, keep politics and personal opinions to yourself, or you could end up like the 13 British Airways cabin crew who were sacked over offensive comments about passengers on Facebook.

JV Chamary is the Features Editor of BBC Focus Magazine and writes about science and technology. He has a PhD in evolutionary biology.

find out more Alamy x2

E Living on Cybermind: categories, communication and control

By Jonathan Paul Marshall (Peter Lang, 2007)

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Get a Job Become a brand Employers need be able to find you through an internet search, so get a unique user ID based on your full name, and reserve it on the top three social networks – Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn – as these appear high in Google results. If you can, register a website using your full name for its address.

Social network Build professional relationships with people before you need their help.

That way, it won’t seem like begging when you need a new job. To do this, join LinkedIn, a businessorientated site that helps build a network of trusted contacts who will be familiar with your skills.

Spread the word Announce to the world what work you’re after; contacts will then relay your request through their networks. And the fact they’re broadcasting on your behalf acts as an invaluable third-party endorsement.

Grunts to grammar

obody knows when language emerged – no recordings exist of conversations among earlier hominids; we have a few handaxes and some dry bones but these say little about the origins of the spoken word. Yet remarkably, science is now shedding light on how language evolved.

Most scientists assume that language, roughly as we know it, has

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been around for at least 50,000 years, and probably more than 100,000 years. In other words, for as long as there’s archaeological evidence for ‘modern human behaviour’, which includes the use of symbolic artefacts and art. It’s also assumed that all the languages spoken today are descended from one common ancestor, which may have been spoken somewhere in East Africa some 50,000-100,000

years ago.

But can this common ancestry explain the similarities between languages around the world? And how similar are they really? Would a Martian scientist conclude, as Noam Chomsky famously did, that “there is a single human language, with differences only at the margins” and that all Earthlings speak dialects of one language? Alternatively, do E June 2012

illustration by pablo bernasconi

Thousands of languages are spoken around the world. Where do they come from, and how do they develop? Linguist Guy Deutscher describes how biology and culture have influenced grammar…

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Grunts to grammAr

The need for effective communication exists across all cultures

Getty images, Corbis x3

E human languages vary considerably and in fundamental aspects?

Linguists from different schools of thought have been trying to answer these questions for decades. Chomsky and others from the ‘nativist’ school claim that grammar is rooted in our biology, and that the features common to the structure of all languages point to a ‘Universal Grammar’ that is coded in our genes. Other linguists insist that the similarities can be explained as a result of the common driving function of all languages: efficient communication.

The way teens spoke in the 1930s is very different to today’s lingo

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Change over a short time Compared to the snail’s pace of biological evolution, the metamorphosis of language is an extremely rapid affair. In every living language, the vocabulary, the sounds and even the basic rules of grammar are always on the move. Compare the way teenagers talk today to recordings from the 1930s to hear how much English has changed in just three generations. Within 30 generations, English has altered so much that the language of a millennium ago would be no more comprehensible to a modern English speaker than Swedish or Dutch.

Within 200 generations, the changes are even more radical. English, Albanian, Persian and Hindi, for example, are all descended from one common ancestor spoken some 6,000 years ago. And yet, within this period, the languages have drifted so far apart that a considerable amount of scientific ingenuity was required to recognise their common ancestry. If biological evolution had proceeded at such a rate, then frogs and kangaroos would have shared a common ancestor just 50,000 years ago.

Since words change so quickly, no reputable linguist thinks that any similarity between the sounds of words in remote languages today can be traced back to a direct inheritance from the common EastAfrican ancestor. But if we scratch beneath the surface of vocabulary, we discover that there are distinct similarities in the way languages are built.

If we scratch the surface we discover that there are distinct similarities in the way languages are built Perhaps the most intriguing of these similarities concerns the way languages arrange the words in the sentence. At first sight, there seems to be a great variety in how languages order their words. Take the verb and the object, for instance. In English, we ‘eat (verb) butter (object)’ – that is, we place the verb before the object.

But speakers of Turkish or Japanese ‘butter eat’ instead.

The placement of prepositions is

Grunts to grammar

WORLD VIEW

Different languages cause their speakers to see the world in different ways

Is our mother tongue a lens through which we see the world?

In the mid-20th century, the ‘linguistic relativity’ hypothesis rose to prominence, and it became popular to claim that our mother tongue determines what we’re able to think.

A famous example of this argument is George Orwell’s idea of Newspeak in the novel 1984.

In the story, the political rulers have such faith in the power of language that they assume that political dissent would be entirely eliminated if only all offending words were expunged from the vocabulary.

But the theory of linguistic relativity fell from grace when it emerged that there’s simply no evidence that our mother tongue constrains what we’re able to understand. If we could only understand ideas for which our language has a ready-made label, how would we ever learn something new?

In the last few years, however, researchers have gathered evidence that suggests our mother tongue can affect our thoughts after all, albeit in a different way from what was once believed. The real impact of the mother tongue isn’t in what it allows us to think but rather in what our mother tongue obliges us to think about.

The habits of speech that our mother tongue instils in us – the concepts we’re trained to treat as distinct; the information our mother tongue continuously forces us to specify; the details it requires us to be attentive to – can all form habits of mind that affect more than merely the knowledge of language itself.

Recent research has shown, for example, that the colours that our language trains us to treat as distinct can alter our purely visual perception of colour. For instance, if our language treats blue and green as separate colours (many languages, including traditional Japanese, don’t) it trains our brain to exaggerate the difference between them, especially for shades near the border between the colours, such as turquoise.

Another area where the quirks of a language may affect thought is the gender system. It’s been shown that languages such as French, German and Russian, which routinely treat inanimate objects as ‘he’ or ‘she’, clad the associations that speakers have towards a whole range of inanimate objects in masculine and feminine traits.

Perhaps the most striking example uncovered so far concerns the way languages describe the arrangement of objects in space. Languages that train their speakers to use only geographical directions (see ‘Endangered Speech’, p60) have a profound effect on the way their speakers visualise and remember space, and on their orientation skills.

Noam Chomsky’s work led him to believe that all humans share an innate set of linguistic principles

another example of variation. In English, we generally put prepositions before the relevant noun, and eat butter ‘on toast’.

But speakers of many languages have their butter ‘toast on’ instead.

So can each language choose the order of each element entirely at random? Not entirely. Ever since the pioneering work of the linguist Joseph Greenberg in the 1950s, linguists have known that there is some method behind the apparent madness.

Greenberg noticed that languages from all over the world fall into two main camps with regard to word order: ‘eat butter’ languages like English also tend to have their butter ‘on toast’, whereas ‘butter eat’ languages like Japanese tend to have their butter ‘toast on’. And there are a few other such surprising correlations between seemingly unrelated elements. So how can they be explained?

Nature vs Culture The correlations that Greenberg discovered pose a challenge to the nativist notion of a Universal Grammar genetically coded into our biology. If the rules of word order really are hard-wired into the brain, then one would expect all languages to have exactly the same word order. Or, to put it another way, you wouldn’t expect to find any variety at all.

One influential response from the nativist linguists to this challenge was the idea that innate grammar is not entirely E June 2012

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E fixed but contains a few ‘parameters’: a small set of pre-programmed options that can be thought of as ‘on/off ’ switches.

Setting a certain switch one way would give you English-style ‘eat butter on toast’ languages, setting it the other way would give you Japanese-style ‘butter toast on eat’ languages.

But linguists of the functionalist school, who aren’t convinced by the idea of genetically coded grammar, argue against the theory of innate parameters. The functionalists have a more down-to-earth explanation for the correlations in word order. According to their view, languages tend to choose ‘consistent orders’ (‘eat butter on toast’ or ‘butter toast on eat’) because such orders are more effective for efficient communication. Inconsistent orders (like ‘eat butter toast on’ or ‘butter on toast eat’) can lead to more ambiguities and potential misunderstandings, and may also be more taxing for the brain to process.

So the argument is that such inconsistent orders tend to be avoided. In normal circumstances, each generation of speakers simply use the same word order patterns of previous generations.

ENDANGERED SPEECH Penny Tweedie/Corbis, Thinkstock, Chuck Painter/ Stanford News Service

Exotic languages that work in weird ways are more likely to become extinct On various occasions over the last few decades, linguists have discovered languages – usually of remote tribal societies – that work in ways that are radically different from what we had previously assumed was natural and universal between cultures.

One notable example is Guugu Yimithirr, an Australian aboriginal language from North Queensland. It uses only geographical directions (north, south, east and west) to describe the location of objects, never concepts such as left, right, in front of or behind. In Guugu Yimithirr, you’d say, for instance, “There’s a crumb on your northern cheek.”

Such discoveries force us to revise our idea of the way a human language can be constructed. The trouble is it’s precisely the languages that do things in the most exotic ways that are disappearing at an alarming rate. The conventional predictions are that within the century, at least half the world’s 6,000 or so languages will have become extinct. This destruction will primarily affect those remote tribal tongues that offer us the widest perspective on the possible variety of human languages.

With every year that passes, the notion that all languages are constructed essentially like English or Spanish is becoming closer to reality. Soon enough, it may be factually correct to argue that our familiar linguistic ways are the only possible model for any language, because there are no languages that substantially diverge from it. But this will be a hollow truth.

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Remote tribal languages are rapidly becoming extinct as English and Spanish spread

Grunts to grammAr

But if a language is landed with an inconsistent order (for instance, if the verb migrates to a different position due to contact with another language) then the need for efficient communication will encourage subsequent generations to move the other elements as well, to regain consistency.

Putting words to new uses A third, and even more downto-earth, explanation for the correlations in word order has come from insights into how

It’s thought that within the century at least half the world’s 6,000 or so languages will have become extinct languages evolve. Over the last few decades, linguists have conducted extensive research into the origin of grammatical elements such as prepositions, the words used to locate a noun in space or time.

We now know that verbs are one major source of prepositions.

Take the preposition ‘past’ for example, whose origin is the verbal form ‘passed’. The path of change from verb to preposition is fairly transparent in sentences such as ‘The day is short, and it is passed pryme’ (Chaucer, 14th century). So according to this third explanation, prepositions and verbs tend to appear on the same side of the noun simply because prepositions were

WEIRD WORDS Modern English words with odd origins

Alcohol

From the Arabic word al-kuhul – ‘al’ is ‘the’ and ‘kuhul’ is the refined antimony powder used to paint the eyelids. In ancient Mesopotamia, this powder was known as guhlu.

Europeans later started using ‘alcohol’ for other powders and liquids that were also obtained through refinement or distillation. People thus talked about the ‘alcohol of wine’ – its distilled essence – and eventually this sense took over.

Partridge

A borrowed word that comes from Greek (via Latin and French). If you replace the P in the first part of the word with an F, you get a fourletter native English word that is etymologically related. The Greeks presumably gave the bird this name because of the loud whirring sound it makes when suddenly flushed out.

Resent

In the 17th century, this verb had a meaning directly opposite to the way we understand it today, and could be used in the sense of ‘appreciate’ or ‘feel grateful for’. In 1677, for instance, mathematician and theologian Isaac Barrow (Newton’s teacher in Cambridge), wrote in a sermon: “Should we not be monstrously ingratefull if we did not deeply resent such kindness?”

The building blocks of language seem to be similar across cultures but are assembled in various ways

once verbs, and have thus inherited their position directly from their ancestors.

A recent paper in the journal Nature has joined the argument with a new statistical method for evaluating the plausibility of such explanations. The authors of the paper argue that their statistical analysis casts doubt on the validity of the first two explanations, and that neither genetically coded parameters nor the pressures of effective communication explain the patterns in word order. The implications of their argument is that the only real basis for the correlations must be the third explanation, the idea that prepositions inherit their position directly from their verbal forebears.

As with many arguments based on statistics, the results are open to different interpretations. But whatever your take, the new statistical method should help focus the search on the simplest explanations for the patterns Joseph Greenberg discovered half a century ago. For ultimately, simpler explanations aren’t just more satisfying but, statistically speaking, they’re also more likely to be true.

Dr Guy Deutscher is an Israeli linguist and has earned a Ph.D. in linguistics from the University of Leiden in Holland. He has authored several books including Through the Language Glass.

find out more The Unfolding Of Language Dr Guy Deutscher (Arrow, 2006) Joseph Greenberg found that all languages broadly fall into one of two camps

www.ethnologue.com An encyclopaedia of living languages www.hrelp.org/languages The Endangered Languages Project June 2012

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Finger facts

What do your

HANDS say about you?

From personality traits to medical complaints, your digits can reveal a lot about your physical and mental well-being. Kieron Allen gets hands-on 4D

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June 2012

High 2D:4d ratio AVERAGE MALE 2D:4D ratio

When it comes to the human hand, it’s the ratio of index (second) finger to ring (fourth) finger, otherwise known as the 2D:4D ratio, that most excites scientists. Commonly, a man’s ring finger is longer than his index and the average male ratio is around 0.96. The reverse is generally true in women and a female ratio is usually greater than one.

Earlier this year, biologists at the University of Florida discovered that these differences were a result of prenatal exposure to sex hormones, with testosterone stimulating growth in the ring finger and estrogen in the index. But what does the 2D:4D ratio say about you?

In a 2010 study at the University of Bath, researchers discovered a link between high-performing rugby players and a low 2D:4D ratio. In this case, a low ratio was directly linked to players who scored more tries. Another ongoing study at Teeside University echoes these results. By asking participants to complete a series of personality tests and questionnaires, the team at Teeside found that people with a low 2D:4D ratio are far more likely to show mental toughness, optimism and aggression, traits often associated with sporting success.

It seems that finger length is also related to other traits such as empathy and addiction. Earlier this year, researchers at the universities of Utrecht, Holland and Cambridge asked 16 women to gauge emotion by analysing photos of people’s facial expressions.

They found that women with a more masculine, low 2D:4D ratio were less able to guess the mood of the people in the photos. Another study, carried out in April by researchers from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany, found that the alcohol-dependent participants had a lower 2D:4D ratio than that of the ‘healthy’ volunteers.

Low 2D:4d ratio

illustration by cath riley

2D:4D ratio

4D

2D

Finger Facts

Ring finger In 2009, researchers from Cambridge University compared the profits of city traders over two years and found those with long ring fingers made up to 11 times the amount of their colleagues. The study, published in Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences, was led by Dr John Coates – a former Wall Street broker himself.

Fingerprints As fingerprints are genetically unique, they can’t be used to attribute common traits. But they can still speak volumes about you. In 2010, researchers from the University of East Anglia developed a new technique that can detect medical conditions like cancer or heart disease. Instead of using traditional iron oxide powder to dust for prints, the team added antibodies and suspended the particles in liquid. If a specific chemical targeted by the solution is present, the molecules attach themselves to the fingerprint and glow. The technique was developed primarily to detect drugs like THC found in cannabis, cocaine and heroin, as well as explosive materials and gunpowder residue.

2D

Fingernails The fingernail is remarkably effective at revealing how healthy you are.

If you have brittle nails it might signify a general vitamin deficiency or a specific condition like anaemia. In other cases, brittle nails might be an indication of something more serious, like an overactive thyroid or liver disease.

A discoloured fingernail can reveal a lot about you. If you have a white nail and it is still attached to the nail bed, it may be an indicator of diabetes, liver cirrhosis or even malnutrition. In an estimated 40 per cent of cases, chronic kidney failure can manifest itself in a half brown, half white nail. And black spots on the nail bed can be a form of skin cancer.

Knuckles If your knuckles are stiff or show abnormal growth, you should contact your GP as this can be an early sign of osteoarthritis. But contrary to popular belief, you can’t develop the condition by cracking your knuckles too much. A study published in The Journal Of The American Board Of Family Medicine in March concluded that there was no connection.

As with other joints, the knuckles are surrounded by synovial fluid.

Bend your finger and the bones of the joint pull apart. This stretches the connective tissue, reducing the pressure and producing gas bubbles in the fluid. If the stretching continues, the bubbles burst. The sound you hear when you crack your knuckles isn’t bone crunching but gas bubbles popping.

Palm lines

riradius a xia L t

In 2003, geneticists from Kemerovo State University, Russia, discovered a link between palm lines and predisposition to fluorosis (chronic fluorine poisoning). After examining over 1,000 people from an aluminium works, an environment likely to put them at risk of flurosis, they found genetic similarities between people with the disease and those who shared the same palm lines. The direction of the main palm lines (axial triradius) ran in a different direction to those who weren’t prone.

Kieron Allen writes for BBC Focus Magazine. While his term at Cardiff University, he was awarded the BBC Magazine Diversity Scholarship 2010.

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bug Lives of invertebrates

the weird world of the

Imagebroker/FLPA, Niall Benvie X5, Shutterstock, M Schaap/Minden/FLPA

There’s more to ‘bugs’, or invertebrates, than just natural history. For centuries they have entered our lives and thoughts in countless ways. They please and annoy us in equal measure. We have given them nicknames, found parallels in their existence and

ours, harnessed them for our own use, and invested them with symbolism and magic. Here we explore the always fascinating, often amusing and occasionally revolting meeting ground between people and bugs.

By Peter Marren

The phlegmatic snail

The insatiable leech

The terrifying spider

PG Wodehouse thought that snails were rather dull animals “lacking in sustained dramatic interest”. Others admire them. Snails carry their ‘houses’ on their backs – a brilliant idea – and their shells suggest that they are prudent, too. In old manuscripts, knights can be seen praying in front of snails, or fighting them.

Their coiled shells might have been emblematic of the tomb of Christ, but they were also a symbol of sloth.

Today’s snail fans can attend the World Snail-Racing Championships at Congham in Norfolk (the appropriately named Snailwell in Cambridgeshire hosts a rival contest).

Up to 200 molluscs slug it out over a 35cm course. The prize? A tankard full of lettuce.

In ancient myth, the leech was the most gluttonous of all creatures. It would drink blood, and go on drinking until it burst. It was said to hatch spontaneously from the dung left by drinking animals, which meant that the next blood meal was never far away. The Roman naturalist Pliny was struck by how this humble ‘worm’ could turn the tables on the mightiest of animals, even the elephant.

The leech also lent its name to leechcraft, the art of lowering blood pressure as a cure. Leeches were gathered from ponds, mainly by poor countrywomen using their feet as bait, and kept in marble jars. They are still bred for medicine; the slogan of Britain’s top leech farm is “the biting edge of science”.

What causes arachnophobia? Children are naturally inquisitive and tolerant of creepycrawlies, but they will always be guided by the reactions of their parents. Some people have been turned off for life by a leggy house spider dropped down their blouse. Others associate spiders with dirt, though they are, in fact, clean and pernickety. Most of all, perhaps, we think they have too many legs.

We are so afraid of spiders that we invent tales to make them even more fearful. They were said to be living bottles of poison, hence their old folk name of attercop or ‘poison-head’, and they supposedly lick spittle from our lips as we sleep.

All nonsense, but based on their alien appearance and sinister lives.

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The iconic stag beetle Around London in the 1940s, the baritone drone of flying stag beetles sounded a bit like incoming V1 buzz-bombs, earning them the nickname of ‘doodlebugs’. The British capital remains a magnet for these splendid beetles, with three-quarters of all UK records coming from the city’s suburban gardens and hospital grounds.

Stag beetles are named for their outsize jaws, similar to the horns of a roe deer buck. Males use them to wrestle, sumo-style, with rivals (the loser is tossed out of the tree). Boys used to keep the pugilistic insects in matchboxes to stage tiny gladiatorial battles.

After up to five years as a grub, a male stag beetle, or doodlebug, emerges to do battle

The resplendent butterfly

The inscrutable woodlouse

The bewitching moth

Why are they called butterflies? Maybe the original butterfly was the butter-yellow male brimstone, often the first species to appear in early spring. Some say that butterfly is only ‘flutterby’ backwards, or speculate that it was originally ‘beauty-fly’.

But there is no doubt that ‘butter’ means butter. The word goes back more than 1,000 years, and is the same in Dutch and German. A clue lies in the alternative German name schmetterling, meaning milk or cream, and the folk name milchdieb, or milk-thief. Butterflies, it turns out, really are attracted to milk churns, perhaps by a pheromone. However, in modern enclosed dairies they rarely get the chance.

Bibble bug, monkeypede, tiddy-hog, grammarzow, coffin-cutter, slater: there are more than 80 country names for the woodlouse. Some recall the way in which it curls up tight when disturbed, resembling a round cheese (‘cheesy-bob’), pill (‘pill-pig’), pea (‘pea-bug’) or old-fashioned silk button (‘Billy button’). But most of all, we see the creature as a little pig, as in choogy-pig, an affectionate West Country name for a piglet.

We also invent private monikers for the woodlouse. Research for Bugs Britannica (see p68) uncovered such delightful epithets as ‘Johnny Crump’ and ‘Dougal spider’, the latter based on its resemblance to the dog in the animated series The Magic Roundabout.

What do moths and dreams have in common? As winged creatures of the dark, these insects have long haunted the human imagination. Most of us are asleep when they are active, though we may glimpse them at a lighted window or bright light.

Some believe that pale moths are the souls of the dead, while large, dark ones are known in Caribbean folk culture as ‘witches’.

In ancient times, the personification of the soul was the goddess Psyche, often represented by artists and romantic poets with moth wings, or even as a moth. Her name survives to this day in the word ‘psychology’, and of course ‘psychiatry’ – Sigmund Freud’s science of dreams.

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insects and advertising Insects have starred in all kinds of promotional campaigns.

Painted ladies feeding on hemp agrimony: a quintessential July scene.

But are they butterflies, flutterbys or beauty-flies? Take your pick

The humble earthworm

The ambivalent wasp

Unfortunately, the English language is hard on worms. To call someone a worm is to insinuate that they are the lowest form of life; wormy means grovelling abjectly.

A worm’s-eye view is to see things from the very bottom. Think ‘worm’ and we picture something wriggling on an angler’s hook.

Yet we wouldn’t last long without worms to aerate the ground and fertilise it with their droppings. Worms, said Aristotle, are the intestines of the soil. Gilbert White thought that their loss would result in a “lamentable chasm”; the earth would be left “hardbound and sterile”. After getting On the Origin of Species off his chest, Darwin spent countless hours studying “the politic worm”.

Despite their bright warning colouration and interesting lives, social wasps have never been popular. They are seen as the Devil’s bees, all sting and no honey. Naturalists are often asked “What are wasps for?”, while words and sayings based on wasps tend to concern feelings of anger and aggression. ‘Waspish’, for instance, means bad-tempered.

Wasps have also been linked with bravery, however: Homer compared them with the single-mindedness of the best Greek soldiers.

Early Christians used the image of a wasp killing a grasshopper as a representation of the triumph of good over evil. Meanwhile, dead wasps worn in an amulet around the neck were said to ward off illnesses.

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One of the most famous instances of insects being used to sell things is the friendly logo on the cover of Ladybird Books (right), a reminder that children love ladybirds and even play fortune-telling games with them. The garden spider and its fine, soft webs made an equally satisfying emblem for Lenor fabric conditioner.

Advertisers have found a whole range of qualities in butterflies, including grace, airiness, fragility and a sense of freedom. Applied to cars, they imply lightness and speed; to herbal shampoos, a quality of naturalness. One marketing company takes its name from the supposed ‘butterfly effect’ of an insect producing atmospheric ripples that result in a tropical storm. In the same way, it implies, even small changes to your business can be hugely rewarding.

Mayflies are marketed as symbols of brevity.

Their chief attraction is that, as we see them, these insects are highly focused creatures: they cram all of their adult experience into a single day.

The American artist Emily Berezin takes a different approach by painting tiny corporate logos directly onto insects. Among her ‘sponsorship bugs’ are pond skaters carrying the Nike symbol and cockchafers wearing the iconic Volkswagen badge (right). Berezin releases her insects unharmed afterwards.

bugged out

PETER MARREN reveals his shortlist of the top invertebrate spectacles in and around the UK. mass hatches of mayflies, in which myriad points of light dance above a rippling stream, have delighted many a fisherman – and bug enthusiast. Billions of the insects emerge from the water to float on air currents. Having mated in mid-air and laid their eggs, the ‘spinners’ fall dead.

The jewel anemone-clad rocks at Sark in the English Channel are one of Britannia’s most memorable ‘bug’ spectacles

migrant butterflies arriving on the coast after a risky sea crossing, feasting on every thistle, make an unforgettable sight. Look out for painted ladies and clouded yellows.

Slug Sex really has to be seen to be believed. A mating pair of leopard slugs spiralling like animated DNA on their rope of slime makes one gasp with wonder, and, perhaps, envy.

Wood ants are the insects that most resemble us. They make large nests with complex interiors that evoke human cities, their radiating trails recall roads and their co-operation puts human institutions to shame.

The mystical scallop

The nearly-fish

The flaring shape of the scallop shell has been much used in heraldry and statuary, and, in our own time, as a logo for Shell.

But the mollusc has a deeper significance as an emblem of birth and immortality. In Botticelli’s famous painting The Birth of Venus, the goddess rides a giant scallop like a surfboard from her birthplace in the ocean foam, and it was also a popular badge worn on Christian pilgrimages.

Legend has it that the ship bearing the remains of St James to his shrine in Spain saw a vision of a rider emerging from the sea covered in scallop shells, a symbol of baptism and rebirth. St James is traditionally shown with a scallop badge in his hat, and churches dedicated to him are often near the coast.

Bugs Britannica covers invertebrate life in rough progression from simple life (it opens with Amoeba, the ‘original blob’) to highly sophisticated, co-operative bees and ants, and intelligent cuttlefish and squid. The book ends with the lancelet or amphioxus, a fish-like ‘bug’ that seems to represent the meeting point between invertebrate and backboned life. “It’s a long, long way from amphioxus,” sang the evolutionary biologists of the 1920s in a light-hearted spoof, “but we all came from there.”

Recent investigation of the creature’s genome indicates that it is even further than we thought.

So why not raise your hat to our ultimate ancestor, a true survivor that’s hardly changed in 520 million years.

a tidal grotto on the island of Sark is my choice for the most eye-catching invertebrate spectacle in Britain.

Like the Victorian shorelife hunter Philip Gosse, “when I saw its sea anemone-bejewelled walls I felt like one who had stumbled on a submerged garden and emerged ‘dazzled’”.

Peter Marren is a well-known naturalist and the co-author of Bugs Britannica, a celebration of bugs in our culture and daily lives.

find out more E Bugs Britannica

By Peter Marren & Richard Mabey (Chatto & Windus, 2010) June 2012

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Gary K Smith/NaturePL.com, Sue Daly/naturepl.com; Philippe Clement/naturepl.com; Christian Koeing/BIOS/SpecialistStock; Kim Taylor/naturepl.com X2, ladybird.co.uk, Emily Berezin, Niall Benvie

Lives of invertebrates

A history of science in

10 objects

Patricia Fara introduces some of the objects that have transformed human understanding of our world and our Universe over the past 500 years

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Tycho Brahe’s mural quadrant E

Getty x3, Science & Society picture Library x3, Oxford Museum of Natural History, Luigi Chiesa, corbis, Alamy x2

The brass quarter-arc that helped compile the world’s most accurate set of star data

The harmonious musical cosmos as imagined by the astronomer

Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe (1546-1601) wore an artificial nose following a duel, and is said to have died from a burst bladder at a feast. More importantly, he compiled the most accurate and comprehensive set of star data of his time.

Most of this picture is itself a picture.

Brahe and his dog belong to a mural painted within the quadrant, which is fixed to the wall and used to measure the position of a star as it passes the small sight at the top left.

Behind the virtual Brahe’s outstretched arm is his observatory. The ‘real’ Brahe is just visible on the right, calling out to his assistants, who coordinate their measurements of a moving star’s time and position.

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John Napier’s bones H

The early calculator that made sums quick and easy

How did the Romans do multiplication? Even the twotimes table expands into nightmarish proportions if you try to work it out in Latin numerals. Hardly surprising that when Hindu-Arabic numbers were imported into Europe at the beginning of the 13th century, merchants and mathematicians alike enthusiastically adopted the new system of nine digits plus zero. Even so, it was still easy to make mistakes.

Four centuries later, Scottish mathematician John Napier (1550-1617) invented a special type of abacus consisting of a set of rotating rods, each inscribed with the 10 basic digits. Known as Napier’s bones, the device made it possible to carry out long calculations quickly and accurately: simply line up the rods and read off the answer.

Johannes Kepler’s model Universe H

The three laws formulated by German mathematician and astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) to describe how the planets move still lie at the heart of Newtonian astronomy.

Yet Kepler himself believed in a magnetic, musical Universe structured to mirror God’s perfect geometrical forms.

In Kepler’s harmonious vision, God had spaced out the planetary spheres so that symmetrical shapes could be nested between them. The outermost orbit of Saturn is separated from its neighbour, Jupiter‚ by a cube. Moving inwards, a pyramid lies between Jupiter and Mars. Other solids similarly frame the paths of Earth, Venus and Mercury around the Sun.

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Isaac Newton’s apple H

The fruit that may, or may not, have fallen from a tree and inspired Newton’s theory of gravitation

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Robert Boyle’s air pump H

The device that produced a completely artificial state: a vacuum Developed in 1660 by Robert Boyle (1627-1691) and Robert Hooke (16351703), the air pump was a completely new type of instrument, because it produced an artificial state: a vacuum.

By turning a crank at the bottom, most of the air could be mechanically sucked out of a glass globe.

Critics denied that anything could be learnt about reality from a situation that was non-existent in nature, but the experiments were intriguing. Moving bells could be seen but not heard, flames were extinguished and rabbits died.

Newton’s apple has become an iconic attribute of scientific genius. The story originated with Isaac Newton (1642-1727) himself, who as an elderly man reminisced about a day nearly 60 years earlier when “he sat in a contemplative mood. Why should that apple always descend perpendicularly to the ground, thought he to himself. Why should it not go sideways or upwards, but constantly to the Earth’s centre?

Assuredly, the reason is, that the Earth draws it...”

We can never know whether that apple really did fall, but its impact has been enormous nonetheless.

History of science

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Volta’s battery F

The prototype battery that its inventor perfected by shocking himself In 1800, Italian physicist Alessandro Volta (1745-1827) made the first prototype cell battery. He piled up discs on vertical glass rods, alternating two different metals and separating them with cardboard soaked in salty water. Incorporating himself as an experimental subject, Volta placed one hand in the basin of water at the bottom, and the other on the metal plate at the top. Sometimes he even used his tongue as a detector. The shocks he received were, he claimed, proof that animal electricity – the kind already observed in electric eels or frogs’ legs – was identical to artificial electricity produced in a laboratory.

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Crookes’ tube H

The mysterious glowing apparatus in which electrons were discovered William Crookes (1832-1919) was an ingenious British physicist who created movement and shadows to back up his claims that a strange substance – mysterious rays? – was being emitted by one of the electric plates in his glowing electrical tube. Crookes suggested that spiritualism may be behind the phenomenon. Some eminent scientists even believed that it really was possible to contact the dead.

Sceptics accused them of being duped by charlatans, but Crookes’s evidence was persuasive, and he was partially vindicated when his rays were shown to be electrons. His seance experiences have never been fully explained.

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Rosalind Franklin’s X-ray photograph E

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Mrs Roentgen’s ringG

The jewel in the crown of the world’s first X-ray photograph While checking his apparatus to make sure it was lightproof, German physicist Wilhelm Roentgen (1845-1923) noticed a strange shimmering some distance away. He set about a systematic investigation, eating and sleeping in his laboratory for several weeks. A fortnight after his initial discovery, he asked his wife, Anna Bertha, to hold her hand in the path of the rays that he labelled X to indicate his bafflement. “I have seen my death,” she exclaimed prophetically when she was shown her bones with their ghostly coating of flesh.

The image that unlocked the secrets of DNA – and sparked a row over who should take the credit

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Edwin Hubble’s telescope G

The instrument that helped a World War I veteran establish that the Universe is expanding Not many people could make Albert Einstein admit he had made a mistake, but the American astronomer Edwin Hubble (1889-1953) was one of them. Hubble proved that the further away a galaxy is, the faster it is racing away from the Earth. This diagram confirmed a consequence of relativity theory that Einstein had previously refused to accept: that the Universe started out as a small dense cluster and has been expanding ever since. Although Einstein was converted, other scientists disagreed – ironically, the expression ‘Big Bang’ was coined by one of the theory’s most outspoken opponents.

When the British crystallographer Rosalind Franklin produced this X-ray image in London in the early 1950s, she filed it away for future analysis. She was determined to complete her current set of experiments before exploring further possibilities.

American PhD student James Watson was ambitious and firmly focused on his goal of deciphering the structure of DNA. He spent hours in clandestine meetings with Francis Crick, struggling to solve science’s biggest puzzle. When Watson was shown Franklin’s picture without her knowledge, he immediately recognised its significance. He knew that the prominent X shape revealed a spiral, and he realised later that two molecular strands must be intertwined. Both Watson and Crick rushed into print, claiming that they had discovered the secrets of inheritance. Franklin died young in 1958.

Patricia Fara is the senior tutor of Clare College, University of Cambridge.

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Electric Tesladownunder.com

Nikola Tesla’s ideas of transferring power without wires died 100 years ago. But as Paul Parsons discovers, new technology could finally create a truly wireless home

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Wireless electricity

D `reams ot so long ago, our offices were choked by a tangle of cables and leads that looked like a bad case of bindweed. Then along came wireless technology: keyboards, mice and other peripherals that didn’t need plugging in. Suddenly we could see our desks again. Wouldn’t it be great if we could do the same with power cables, and access mains electricity without the need to actually plug anything in?

This was the dream of Nikola Tesla, whose pioneering work is being investigated by Professor Jim Al-Khalili, the British scientist, author and

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professor of Physics at University of Surrey. Over 100 years ago, Tesla – a Serbian-American electrical engineer – wanted to beam electricity across continents. He believed (wrongly, as it turned out) that nobody would want to lay the vast infrastructure needed to distribute electricity with metal wires.

Thus the Tesla coil was conceived. At the time, the public understandably perceived these devices as dangerous.

So Tesla, to prove otherwise, would stand next to his invention without any shielding while it powered a fluorescent lightbulb. It’s a feat that Prof Al-Khalili recreates, albeit in a protective chain

mail suit. Still,Tesla’s financial backers lost faith and withdrew their money.

The project was abandoned, along with Tesla’s vision of wireless electricity.

Today there’s renewed interest in wireless electricity transfer. Not to beam power around the planet, as Tesla had hoped, but to beam it around people’s homes to power all our technology.

At first sight, that might not sound terribly clever. After all, there’s a name for large electric currents that travel through the air – lightning. And it’s definitely not something you’d want in your front room.

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Wireless electricity

Professor Jim Al-Khalili dons a chain mail suit to interact with a Tesla coil without getting shocked

But there is a way to transfer electricity through the air that’s slightly less hair-raising. It’s called magnetic induction, and you may well be using it already if you own an electric toothbrush. To get round the problems associated with metal contacts corroding in the damp environment of your bathroom, electric toothbrushes have no metal connectors to send a charging current directly to the brush.

Instead, a current is passed through a coil in the base unit. This generates a magnetic field because of an effect called ‘electromagnetic induction’, first discovered by English physicist Michael Faraday in 1831. The magnetic field then induces a similar current in a coil inside the brush, and this flow of electricity charges it up.

Magnetic induction charging has already been used to build mats that can wirelessly charge gadgets like phones and MP3 players. Come in from work, drop your phone on the mat with a special adaptor on the back,

BBC/Emilie sandy x2, Science Photo Library, Nasa, illustration by Paul wootton

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and it’ll be topped up when you pick it up later.

But magnetic induction is very inefficient – lots of the energy you put in is wasted, and so doesn’t make it into the battery in your gadget. And for mass-market consumer electronics, with the increasing need for devices that conserve energy, this is unacceptable. Nobody, for example, is going to buy an energy-saving electric car if all their savings will be lost to an inefficient charging station.

In 2007, this problem led a team of physicists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to come up with a new method. Their system is similar to induction charging, in that it makes use of magnetic fields to transfer electricity. But it also exploits a principle in physics known as ‘resonance’, whereby large amounts of energy can be transferred between objects that are vibrating at similar frequencies.

A simple example of resonance is a child on a swing. If the child swings

“The next generation of consumers won’t even know what a charging port is”

her legs in time with (at the same frequency as) the oscillations of the swing, then she can transfer energy to the swing and the oscillations get bigger – the swing goes higher. If she swings her legs out of time, then the oscillations decrease. The MIT group found that resonating magnetic fields can exchange energy in the same way.

Using this system, called ‘highly

Nikola Tesla never realised his ambition to beam electricity across continents

Wireless electricity

Laser Power

Charging mats that use magnetic induction are already available

coupled magnetic resonance’, researchers have been able to achieve very high efficiencies – with sometimes less than five per cent of the input electricity being wasted.

“We demonstrated transfer of 60Watts over two metres,” says Professor Marin Soljacˇic´, of the MIT team. “That’s comparable to what you’d need to power a laptop, and much more than you’d need for a cellphone.”

The discovery is being commercialised

by MIT spin-off company WiTricity.

“We’ve demonstrated configurations in which we can energise many areas of a room, where the room might be 4m2,” says WiTricity’s David Schatz. They’ve been able to do this by incorporating magnetic relays into household items such as carpets and furniture.

Schatz believes that by 2012, consumers will be able to buy simple kits that can be retrofitted to their homes and enable wireless charging of their mobile devices – with no need to place the devices on a mat. Ultimately, he believes houses will be constructed with the infrastructure needed to power all home electrical devices built-in.

Meanwhile, German engineering firm Siemens is now testing an underfloor contactless system for garages and driveways that could be used to charge electric cars. Because the system works using magnetic fields, which don’t interact with organic matter, safety is guaranteed. Security isn’t an issue either, says Schatz; nobody will be able to sit outside your house charging their gadgets with your electricity. There are two reasons why. Firstly, the magnetic resonance effect is short-ranged, only operating inside the ‘near field’ within a few metres of the transmitting electromagnetic coil. And secondly, all your devices must first be paired with the system to confirm that they’re authorised to receive the electricity.

It could be that over the next few years, wireless mains electricity is going to become as ubiquitous in the home as your wireless internet signal. “The next generation of consumers won’t even know what a charging port is and won’t have to think about recharging their devices,” says Schatz. And when that happens, the wireless revolution will have truly arrived.

Beaming electricity wirelessly around your home offers a convenient way to charge your gadgets – but what about transmitting power further afield?

Research by scientists at Cleveland State University (CSU), in the US, suggests electric current could be transferred across thousands of kilometres of empty space using lasers. The technique could power spacecraft, or be used to beam electricity from satellites down to military units operating in remote locations.

The technique works just like a solar panel. A laser beam is aimed at a lightsensitive device like a solar cell, which converts energy in the beam into electric current.

This method is quite inefficient, but it could reach places that a cable never would. “Fifty years from now, with more efficient lasers, you could do wonders with this technology,” says Professor Taysir Nayfeh, of the CSU team.

Paul Parsons is the author of Science 1001: Absolutely Everything That Matters In Science and 30-Second Theories: The 50 Most Thought-Provoking Theories in Science.

find out more E j.mp/StoryElectricity Preview of The Story Of Electricity E www.witricity.com WiTricity E Wizard: The Life And Times Of Nikola Tesla Marc J Seifer (Citadel Press, 1998) June 2012

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black mamba

BL ACK MAMBA

The snake charmer

getty

Why would anyone go out of their way to handle one of the most venomous snakes on Earth? We head out on patrol with Thea Litschka, whose dangerous work is helping to conserve black mambas and saving countless human lives

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One black mamba has enough venom to kill 14 humans

black mamba

t’s past midnight when the telephone rings. I drag myself out of bed, anticipating a trip to a remote rural homestead to remove yet another unwelcome snake.

The woman on the other end of the phone is hysterical. Her name is Sanele, and she is crying and screaming so much that it’s virtually impossible to make out what she’s saying. Between her sobs, I can hear a young child in the background shouting, “It’s coming in, the snake is coming in!” From Sanele’s frenzied description, I manage to establish that a large, slender snake has reached the doorway, trapping her toddler and baby daughter. It is about 3m (10ft) long,

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– probably a black mamba, I think to myself. Still in pyjamas, I grab my trusty snake tongs – a gadget for handling snakes that resembles a litter-grabber – and rush off into the rainy night.

As I drive to the farm, I feel more certain about the identity of the mystery snake that has invaded Sanele’s home.

Black mambas are highly inquisitive and frequently enter people’s homes, seeking refuge in schoolbags and cupboards and under beds – anywhere they can squeeze into. Like many other reptiles, they look for a cool location when the summer heat becomes unbearable, and a nice warm spot during the winter.

Unfortunately, houses fit the bill perfectly.

Thea Litschka x3

Rule number one: If you are close enough to kill a snake, it is most certainly close enough to kill you

Thea carefully captures a black mamba

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A rescued black mamba measuring 2.9m (9.5ft)

The rain is coming down in bucketloads now. I try to keep my vehicle on the muddy track through the sugarcane fields, steering with one hand and holding my mobile phone to my ear with the other.

Sanele begs me to hurry, blurting that her one and only candle has almost burned out. Tears of relief stream down my own face when, after an hour, I find the homestead at last.

Dicing with death Sanele is standing perilously close to the curled up mamba, holding her broom like a weapon, ready to bash the intruder to a pulp if it dares move another inch. This is a fatal mistake – no mamba I have ever come across will stand idly by while you take a hefty swing at it. Instead, it will strike with deadly accuracy. Rule number one: if you are close enough to kill a snake, it is most certainly close enough to kill you.

Using my tongs, I carefully remove the serpent and pop it in a snake bag. Sanele rushes forwards to hug her children, and I complete the rescue in my customary fashion: by teaching the correct first-aid procedure and explaining the basics of snake safety. As usual, I emphasise the importance of remaining immobile when in close proximity to a venomous snake.

There’s a very good reason for this: snakes sense what’s going on around them in a completely different way to us. Almost all species of snake lack a retinal fovea – the area in the centre of the retina that mammals use to perceive colour and shape.

Instead, they orientate in their home range and locate prey – and potential threats – by detecting vibrations and sampling the air for traces of scents and chemicals.

Since snakes have relatively poor eyesight, sudden, jerky movements that take them by surprise are almost guaranteed to upset them. So if you ever find yourself face to face with a black mamba, it is essential to keep calm. The snake will only strike if it senses threatening movement.

Keep your distance Mambas belong to the family Elapidae, which also contains the cobras, sea snakes, taipans and kraits – species equally feared for their powerful venom. One of four species of mamba, the black is named not for the colour of its brownish, olive or green body, but for the inky black lining E

10

STEps to surviving a snake bite

1. Back away from the snake to prevent it striking again.

2. Don’t panic. Easier said than done, but

freaking out will only cause your heart to pump the venom faster around your body.

3. Call for emergency medical assistance immediately. If you have to travel to a hospital or doctor, phone ahead to pre-warn them so treatment can be ready as soon as you arrive.

4. Don’t attempt to catch or kill the snake.

Identifying it may be helpful, but modern anti-venoms treat numerous venoms.

5. Sit or lie down, removing rings and other restrictive clothing or jewellery.

6. Wash the bite with soap and water.

7. Apply a broad pressure bandage to

the affected area. Do not cut the blood off from the area. You should be able to slip a finger between the bandage and your skin.

8. Make sure that the bitten area is kept lower than your heart.

9. Don’t try to suck venom out with your mouth. Suction devices are found in commercial snake bite kits.

10. If you are bitten while alone in the bush, make your way slowly but steadily to where you can call for help. If you have to drive, do so slowly, because your reactions may be impaired by the effect of the venom.

Thea rescues around 80-120 black mambas every season

black mamba

E to its mouth. If cornered, it flicks its jaws open to reveal this bold colouration as a warning to keep your distance. To make sure the threat is understood, the snake lifts its head well off the ground, flattens its neck into a slight hood and gives a hollowsounding hiss for good measure. It’s an altogether frightening display.

The black mamba has a reputation for being extremely aggressive – striking and killing indiscriminately. It is said to be able to outrun a person on a horse and to ‘stare’ at its victims as if to spook them.

Some local people even believe that black mambas hunt humans. All of these claims

are totally unfounded. In my experience, black mambas will do their best to get away as quickly as possible, slithering towards the nearest hollow tree, termite mound, burrow or dark corner. They become aggressive only when there is no escape route. If more people were to realise this, mambas would suffer less persecution through ignorance and dangerous confrontations would be much rarer.

In the meantime, the snake-rescuer’s life is a busy one. Every season my partner, Clifton Koen, and I rescue about 600 snakes, of which 100 are black mambas.

The rescued snakes are then released in

As farming encroaches on the black mamba’s habitat, snakebite in Africa is reaching epidemic proportions

carefully selected areas far from humans where they can exist without posing any threat to human life. Together Clifton and I run Antivenom Swazi, a charity whose mission is to raise enough funds to create a ‘bank’ of anti-venom for treating snakebite victims in Swaziland, a small, landlocked country bordered by South Africa and Mozambique. Our plan is to store the anti-venom in two different locations, so that it is easily accessible to everyone within a couple of hours.

The need for speed Speed is of the essence. Mamba venom is a fast-acting neurotoxin, a substance that destoys, damages or impairs the functioning of the nervous system.

The bite itself is usually relatively painless, with little or no swelling, but the first symptoms are felt within 15 minutes – much sooner if the victim is a small child. Breathing difficulties develop rapidly, leading to respiratory paralysis

Where worlds collide Conflicts between man and beast around the world

dreamstime x4, Thea Litschka x2, alamy x2

G Grin and bear it

Every October, Churchill, Canada, is invaded by around 1000 polar bears en route to Hudson Bay. After years of practice the townsfolk are adept at dealing with the lumbering interlopers. Households stock noisy cracker-shells to warn off infringing bears, and those who cannot be scared away are tranquilised and transferred to a special polar bear jail that can hold 30 of the creatures. Here they wait to be transported by helicopter back to the ice.

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G Boar war

The fall of the Berlin Wall unexpectedly allowed wild boar to return to their former stomping ground, now covered by suburbia.

Today 7000 to 8000 urban boars thrive in the city’s parks and gardens, causing road accidents, goring pet dogs and on one occasion even ravaging the grounds of Berlin’s soccer team.

Scientists are working on a porcine contraception while the city employs Stadtjäger (urban hunters) to cull the booming population.

G Do not feed the birds Would you attempt to hand-feed the world’s most dangerous bird?

Unbelievably, this is exactly what is happening in Queensland, Australia.

Extensive destruction of the rainforest has already displaced the endangered cassawary and birds have begun to associate humans with food. The misplaced kindness is leading to increasingly aggressive behaviour and the unfortunate habit of wandering onto busy roads.

G Tusker trauma

Problems with pachyderms began as soon as farmers settled in Mount Kenya National Park. Every year elephants move along migration routes, flattening everything in their path.

Smallholders often wake to find they’ve lost everything overnight. To help elephants pass safely between Mount Kenya and the Nagre Ndare Forest reserve a $1million corridor is being created, wide enough for three elephants walking side by side.

G Wiley coyotes

Inhabitants of Chicago may be living near to a pack of coyotes without even realising. Latest research from Ohio State University suggests that as many as 2000 coyotes are living in the Windy City. The rural live longer than their country cousins and, despite worries over pet attacks, keep the flourishing Canada geese and rodent populations down. The creatures pose no threat to their human neighbours, unless they are fed.

FACTSHEET

www

The black mamba’s fixed front fangs are hollow

Dendroaspis polylepis Common name: Black Mamba. Mamba is a Zulu word meaning ‘big snake’

Early in the morning the mamba basks in sugarcane or maize

Type Of REPTILE: Carnivorous snake. A member of the Elapidae family of venomous snakes found in tropical and sub-tropical areas

time that we have received a call for assistance from this particular homestead, which is situated in the middle of dense bush. It is a long drive on a bad dirt road.

When Clifton and I finally arrive, we are met by a frantic father and his family, who almost physically drag us out of our vehicle. We are urged into the house and ushered into the bedroom where we find a terrified young boy lying in bed. On top of the sheet is a huge mamba.

We all freeze. If we make a mistake or the traumatised child moves, there’s a very good chance he will be bitten. I gently try to calm the boy down, while Clifton edges towards the snake and lifts it off the child in one smooth motion. Luckily, the previous snake-safety course we gave at this homestead has saved the youngster from a fatal bite.

It’s a happy ending – one we could do with more of. Black mambas are part of our lives, whether we like it or not, and we must learn to co-exist with them.

In the nick of time The phone rings again. It is the second

E Venomous Snakes of the World

by Mark O’Shea (New Holland, 2008)

Known affectionately as the ‘White Witch’, Thea Litschka is a fearless herpetologist in Swaziland, southern Africa. She works to help the victims of snakebite

find out more E www.antivenomswazi.org Discover more about the work of the Antivenom Swazi Trust Foundation E Bitten: true medical stories of bites and stings

by Pamela Nagami (Macmillin, 2005)

Closest relatives: Western green mamba (Dendroaspis viridis) and Eastern green or common mamba (Dendroaspis angusticeps) Size: Fully grown they are on average 2.5 to 3m (8-10ft) long although can occasionally grow up to 4.3m (14ft) Diet: Mambas feed on small mammals and birds, largely taken on the ground or from burrows Breeding: Mating takes place in spring and summer. Females lay 10-25 eggs in burrows.

These hatch after 90 days and are immediately independent, able to catch small rodents Average life expectancy: Up to 11 years in captivity. Lifespan in the wild unknown SPEED: Black mambas can reach speeds of 20km/h (12.5mph) although this is usually to escape threats, not hunt prey Habitat: Dry savannah, rocky hills, open woodland and farmland. Found in Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Somalia, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe Conservation status: Not endangered, but persecution and the encroachment of agriculture are causing local population declines

Where they are found: MOZAMBIQUE Indian Ocean

SOUTH AFRICA Mbabane

Antivenom Swazi Foundation

SWAZILAND xxx

and death within a few hours. Just two drops of venom are fatal, and a mamba may deliver as much as 10 times that amount in a single bite. Each individual has enough venom to kill up to 14 adult humans.

Farmers, who account for almost every homestead in Swaziland, are particularly at risk, because farms are ideal mamba habitat. The dense fields of sugarcane and maize support an abundance of prey – rats, mice, gerbils, shrews, small birds and, on occasion, chicken hatchlings are all taken. The mambas emerge just after sunrise, climbing up the cane or maize to about chest height, then bask in the sun for an hour or two before moving away to forage. In the late afternoon, they slink off to their lairs for the night.

As agriculture encroaches on the dry, open bush that is the black mamba’s preferred natural habitat, snakebite in Africa is reaching epidemic proportions.

Since it is impossible to prevent all interaction between snakes and humans, education in snake avoidance and simple first-aid is urgently needed to help stem the ever-increasing number of tragedies.

Anti-venom – the only specific cure – is not readily available in Swaziland, and in any case is so expensive that locals can’t afford it. Eighty per cent of the country’s population rely on traditional healers, who prescribe a herbal medicine known as mooty to treat snakebite. But while such remedies can be effective for some ailments, they are useless against the potent venom of a mamba.

Janaki Lenin

“People are afraid of things they don’t know about or aren’t able to understand and reptiles fit the bill”

call of the wild

Romulus whitaker

One of the world’s foremost herpetologist and conservationist talks about India’s two most feared species, the King Cobra and the Gharial R

omulus Whitaker was born in the United States in 1943 but has been living in India for 60 years championing the cause for the study and conservation of reptiles. In 1972, he founded India’s first reptile park, the Chennai Snake Park. He also conceived and founded The Madras Crocodile Bank Trust in 1976, to protect the country’s dwindling crocodile population and to preserve the art of snake catching. Today it is India’s leading institution for herpeto faunal conservation, research and education and is also Asia’s first crocodile breeding centre. In 2005, he won the Whitley Award for outstanding leadership in nature conservation. He used this award to found the Agumbe Rainforest Research Station in Karnataka, for the study of King Cobras and their habitat. Whitaker was also selected as an Associate Laureate in the 2008 Rolex Awards for Enterprise, for his efforts to create a network of rainforest research stations throughout India.

L What kind of a reception did you get in India as a foreigner talking about saving snakes?

Since I grew up in India I already had the advantage of knowing Hindi and Tamil, so it was just a matter of convincing people that I was not totally insane, handling snakes and crocs and talking about how good they are!

L You have extensively covered the Big Four (the Saw-scaled Viper, the Krait, the Russell’s Viper and the Cobra), but King Cobra has been your focus lately. Why? Well, the Big Four are the species responsible for most fatal snakebites and I’m still concentrating on these, in terms of collecting venom samples and testing the available anti-venom serums to try to help deal with the huge problem of snakebite mortality in India. King Cobras, well, you just can’t

beat them can you? They are huge, magnificent snakes, which cause very little danger to humans simply because they are so smart and fast and know how to stay out of our way.

L What is the biggest misconception people have about reptiles?

People are typically afraid of things they don’t know about or aren’t able to understand and reptiles fit the bill.

There are lots of reasons why reptiles have such bad PR, but most of it is bunkum. Changing attitudes towards reptiles hasn’t been easy but I’ve seen a big change over the years thanks largely to the positive promotion through films, snake parks and the print media.

L When did you first capture a snake?

How many snakes have you caught till date and what happens to them after?

The very first snake I caught was a small harmless fellow called Dekay’s snake in a village called Hoosick in northern New York State where we lived when I was four- to six-years old. It’s pretty difficult to estimate the thousands of snakes caught since then; on a trip to Ratnagiri district in Maharashtra, my tribal colleagues and I caught more than 2000 Saw-scaled Vipers. In those days, I was catching snakes for venom extraction so they were kept in captivity for years sometimes. In recent years, I just catch/photo/release most of the snakes I find, though we are doing a venom research project which means the snakes sometimes stay with us for a week or two before they are released back to the wild.

L You have been bitten multiple times by snakes and now are allergic to the anti-venom serum. That’s demands caution of a different level now.

I’ve always considered myself a cautious snake hunter, but obviously mistakes do happen, (we call them ‘missnakes’) and yes I’ve had several somewhat severe bites. I am certainly

more cautious now (in my old age maybe?) when I’m catching a snake.

The thing is, a snake-catcher must think about the welfare of the snake as well, so there are several things on the mind when indulging in this kind of activity.

L How did the idea for the Agumbe Rainforest Research Centre (ARRS) come about? How did you find this location?

The ARRS started because I fell in love with this rain-drenched place back in the early 1970s when I first went there and saw my first wild King Cobra. Today, ARRS is a local landmark working with the people to come to terms with saving the wonderful rainforest and taking advantage of the local people’s good vibes towards the king of all snakes. ARRS is a mecca for young naturalists and serious scientists and we have a strong link with the premier biological institution, the National Centre for Biological Sciences in Bangalore.

L You have been an advocate for the protection of the Gharial in India. What are the challenges that it still faces today and what further measures need to be taken?

Today the Gharial is facing its biggest challenge to its survival: losing its riverine habitat. It has been wiped out in most of its former range and today the main population is concentrated on the Chambal river, flowing through Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Unfortunately, though it is very well established that this river is the last large repository for the Gharial, the pressures on the river for use of its water and mining its sand for construction in Delhi and Agra may yet see the end of it.

L Most conservation work in India needs the government’s backing.

How has your experience been and is

enough being done?

I could quibble about the government’s lack of action on many conservation fronts. Reptiles in particular get little attention (though the complete closure of the snakeskin industry in the mid 1970s was a really good move). I’ve had mixed results in dealing with state and central authorities and follow the formula that most Indian wildlife biologists use: when we find a good principal chief conservator of forests or chief wildlife warden in charge, someone who is willing to listen and to take appropriate action and give encouragement, that’s where we concentrate our energies because we know it will mean something.

L What is the most unusual behaviour that you have seen among snakes and crocodiles?

Not too long ago we saw a vine snake catch a flying snake and swallow it down. It was a long, agonising process but what amazed us was that the flying snake (being swallowed head first) actually turned around in the vine snake’s tummy and came crawling back out of the snake’s mouth!

Amongst crocs, one of the strangest experiences I had was watching a male mugger croc guarding a nest laid by one of several females he had mated with, chasing the female and any other crocs that happened to come near. This dutiful male, once he heard the babies calling from inside the nest, dug the eggs up and carefully helped to hatch the babies and then carried them to the safety of the water, again keeping other crocs at a distance.

L Probably you have been asked this many times... but why reptiles? What made you dedicate a life time for them?

Somehow I never thought about anything else. Reptiles were simply the most interesting and exciting animals I knew and from age five onwards, I was totally smitten by them.

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The Big Idea exploring life’s great mysteries Robert Matthews investigates

Game Theory

From card games to nuclear deterrence, game theory is the mathematics that can help you work out the strategy that will lead to your best possible outcome n October 1962 the world stood on the brink of nuclear Armageddon. The Soviet Union had set up nuclear missiles in Cuba and America was demanding their immediate removal.

The missiles posed a threat President Kennedy could not ignore, but he also knew that the wrong response could lead to nuclear war and the death of millions. Some of his aides called for a massive airstrike to take out the dozens of missiles on Cuba already pointing at the US. Yet this risked provoking the Soviet Union into launching an attack rather than run the risk losing its nuclear warheads. Others wanted a naval blockade, to prevent more missiles from reaching the island, and demands for withdrawal – but some feared this would not be effective.

For a few fateful days, the two superpowers wrestled with their dilemma, all too aware of the consequences of making the wrong decision. Kennedy opted for a naval blockade, while also preparing for a massive strike against Cuba.

A few days later, after feverish behind-the-scenes negotiations, the Soviet Union withdrew the missiles, and the world breathed again.

The Cuban Missile Crisis is one of the turning points of history. But it is also a

photography by Sheu-Kuie Ho, game shown - risk® by Hasbro

I

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nightmarish example of a problem we all meet countless times in everyday life: how to make optimal decisions when we aren’t certain what the other person is thinking. From employees trying to negotiate pay rises to card players wondering whether to bluff or fold, such dilemmas crop up time and again. Could there be some way of working out the best way to play, the optimal strategy that leads to the best possible outcome? That is the question some far-sighted mathematicians began to ponder around a century ago.

And they found the solution – in the process creating a new discipline called game theory, which has since found applications everywhere from economics to evolution.

Playful start Despite its impressive reach, the origins of game theory lie in nothing more profound than the activity that gives the field its name: game-playing.

As early as 1713, the English aristocrat James Waldegrave found a method for winning at a card game, which contains many of the elements of modern game theory. Yet he failed to spot the potential applications elsewhere, and game theory had to wait another 200 years before finally taking off.

It was another card player,

the French mathematician Emile Borel, who made the connection between games and more serious problems. In 1921, he published the first of a series of papers about playing games where winning requires finding the best strategy when an opponent’s thinking isn’t known. Borel came up with a neat way of dealing with this lack of knowledge: play in such a way as to minimise the loss, regardless of how the opponent plays. Using this strategy, Borel was able to come up with rules of thumb for playing simple games, such as ‘Rock, Paper, Scissors’, showing that, for example, a random mix of all three choices works best.

Unlike Waldegrave, Borel also recognised that the same idea of playing to minimise loss could have more serious applications in other fields, for example in military strategy.

Yet he also warned of the dangers of pushing such ideas too far – not least because he believed there was no way to find the best strategy for complex ‘games’ where players face many options.

But Borel was wrong.

Whenever two opponents battle for supremacy, and one player’s gain is the other player’s loss, there is always a best possible strategy that they should use. This is the so-called ‘minimax’ strategy, and its existence was proved

by a brilliant 25-year-old Hungarian mathematician named John von Neumann.

Not too bad Von Neumann showed that the best strategy to use in such games is to study all the available options, work out their worst possible outcome,

In a nutshell

What is game theory?

Game theory started out as an attempt to find the best ways of playing games such as poker, in which players can’t be certain of the intentions of their opponents.

During the 1920s, mathematicians tried to solve the problem using the rule of choosing the strategy that gives the best payoff in the worst circumstances. In 1928, the Hungarian mathematician John von Neumann proved that every two-player game has such a ‘minimax’ strategy, as long as one player’s gain is exactly matched by the other’s loss. But many real life situations do not have such a clear outcome. Von Neumann’s result was extended to cover such situations by the American mathematician John Nash. Game theory is now being extended to include factors such as emotions, with implications for a host of fields, from world politics to crime prevention.

and then choose the least bad one. If either opponent tries to do better, they risk suffering a higher loss – making this mini-risk, maxi-gain strategy the most rational choice.

The minimax strategy also solves the problem of trying to second-guess opponents: assuming they always act

rationally, they too will pick the minimax strategy.

Von Neumann’s discovery of the Minimax Theorem in 1928 made him the father of game theory. But he saw it as just the beginning. In 1944, together with the Austrian economist Oscar Morgenstern, he published Theory of Games

and Economic Behaviour. It sought to make the Minimax Theorem the basis of a new approach to economics which frequently involves two or more opponents competing to get the best possible outcome for themselves.

Von Neumann and Morgenstern’s book showed

the great potential of applying game theory to more than mere pastimes, and by the early 1950s US military strategists were using it to make sense of Cold War strategy. But they quickly discovered its limitations. The most serious was the assumption that one player’s gain is always exactly E June 2012

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The Big Idea

exploring life’s great mysteries

What’s the best tactic to take in a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors?

dreamstime x2,aquarius collection, getty, spl

E matched by another’s loss. Although many simple games like Noughts and Crosses obey this ‘zero-sum’ rule, many real life situations do not. For example, in a situation like the Cuban Missile Crisis, an attack by one side could prompt a nuclear war – which could result in annihilation for both players.

Von Neumann’s Theorem was silent about these ‘non-zero-sum’ games. Was there a way of finding the optimal strategy for playing them? Come to that, did such a strategy even exist? Once again, a brilliant young mathematician found the answer, and again, it was positive.

In 1950, 21-year-old Princeton student John Nash managed to extend von Neumann’s original Minimax Theorem to cover non-zero-sum games as well.

Nash showed that for any game between any number of players, there is always at least one strategy that guarantees that the players can only do worse by choosing anything else.

Known today as Nash Equilibria, these strategies are at the heart of game theory.

TIMELINE Playing the game

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They are also the source of enormous controversy. One reason is that they don’t always coincide with the obvious best choice for the players. An all too realworld example was the nuclear arms race that was underway when Nash made his discovery. Both the US and the Soviet Union knew the best option was to disarm, but neither trusted the other – so they both ended up spending vast sums on arms they hoped never to use.

Rebel rousers It also became clear that many everyday situations had two or more Nash Equilibria – and it was far from clear which one players should pick. Again, there was a vivid contemporary example, in the 1955 Hollywood film Rebel Without A Cause.

James Dean plays Jim, who takes on school bully Buzz in a game in which they race their cars toward the edge of a cliff, with the first one to ‘chicken out’ losing. Jim and Buzz thus face a choice of either swerving or driving on, giving four possible outcomes – none of which was obviously ideal.

Swerving first means losing, but if both drive on the result is disastrous. Clearly it would be better if both decided to swerve – both lose, but both also get to live another day.

Yet puzzlingly, Nash’s work showed this ‘obvious’ choice isn’t a Nash Equilibrium. There is

1713

1921

British aristocrat James Waldegrave describes the first minimax strategy for winning at the card game ‘Le Her’ (‘The Gentleman’) with two players, but fails to extend it to other situations

H Emile Borel publishes papers on finding the best strategy in games with various choices, including poker. He points out that sometimes a random mix of different strategies works best

no one clear strategy which guarantees that Jim and Buzz can only do worse by choosing anything else, since either can do better by deciding to drive on while the other swerves. The game has two Nash Equilibrium strategies – but how could the other driver be compelled to stick to the strategy?

Game theorists wrestled with this question, only to find more problems.

It seemed something extra was needed.

For example, Jim could pretend to be drunk before setting off, thus giving the impression death held no fear for him, and fooling Buzz into swerving first. In short, Nash’s work revealed that the clarity von Neumann’s original result brought to game theory was illusory.

Since then, game theorists have divided into two broad camps: one focusing on using classic games like Chicken to capture the essence of a problem, others seeking to extend standard game theory and make it more realistic. Both have achieved impressive successes in fields ranging from economics to sociology.

For example, psychologist Andrew Colman and colleagues at the University of Leicester, UK, have modelled E the behaviour of criminals in society as a game of Chicken. Both criminals and society would prefer the other party to ‘chicken out’ first. On the other hand, neither side would benefit if everyone behaved

1928 G The brilliant 25-year-old Hungarian mathematician John von Neumann proves the ‘Minimax Theorem – a key result in game theory that identifies the best way to play certain types of games

1944

1950

H Von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern publish Theory of Games and Economic Behaviour (latest edition: Princeton University Press, 2007)

E John Nash of Princeton University publishes his discovery of the so-called Nash Equilibrium – a strategy that cannot be bettered even if every player knows what the others are planning to do

like criminals. Using game theory, Colman and his colleagues showed that this leads to an essentially stable proportion of criminals in society, who do well enough from their activities without provoking society into draconian crackdowns. Game theory also predicts that reducing crime below this level demands measures tough enough to convince criminals they are better off going straight – a prediction borne out by the success of zero tolerance policies in New York and a number of other big cities around the world.

Animal instinct Following pioneering work carried out by the British evolutionary theorist John Maynard Smith, biologists now use similar game-theoretic ideas to understand why animals adopt certain types of behaviour – such as aggression or co-operation.

Instead of a Nash equilibrium, biologists talk of an ‘evolutionarily stable strategy’, in which the costs and benefits of certain types of behaviour influence the prevalence of organisms – such as the relative numbers of aggressive hawks or passive doves.

Von Neumann’s original Minimax Theorem is even used in computer chess machines, where it helps select the handful of best moves from the huge numbers of possibilities available.

The most intriguing developments in game theory focus on making it ever more realistic. A group led by the British game theorist Nigel Howard, who advised the US government in the famous arms limitation talks in the 1960s, has developed so-called drama theory, which brings the role of emotions into game theory. Players who find themselves trapped in one kind of

game often transform it into another game through their emotional response, and drama theory attempts to predict the likely outcomes of these.

Howard likes to illustrate the idea of drama theory with the real-life tale of two economists taking a taxi to their hotel in Jerusalem after a conference. Worried that they were going to be overcharged, they decided to avoid getting involved in haggling about the price until they’d reached the hotel, when their bargaining position would be much stronger. But their clever game-theoretic strategy didn’t work out too well. Realising he’d been backed into a corner by these two smart alecks, the driver simply locked the taxi doors, drove them back to where they’d started – and dumped them on the street.

If the economists had used drama theory instead of game theory they might have predicted this outcome and better handled the situation.

Drama theorists believe they can provide an extra dimension to game theory that can resolve some of its knottier issues.

For example, wanting to win at the game of Chicken is clearly a rational desire, but to be victorious it’s necessary for one player to convince the other that he won’t swerve under any circumstances – which is clearly not very rational.

Drama theorists call this a ‘credibility paradox’, and resolving it is simple: one driver must simply convince the other that he is drunk or insane before going anywhere near the car, thus violating the standard game theory assumption of rationality on the part of both players. The other player is then much more likely to take the most rational decision when E

1962

1972

1994

2005

The Cuban Missile Crisis becomes a real life example of the game ‘Chicken’, with President Kennedy and Soviet leader Khrushchev and their advisors both trying to secondguess the intention of the other side

British biologist John Maynard Smith introduces ‘evolutionary stable strategy’, a set of behaviours that is maintained among a group of organisms by the natural selection process of evolution

Game theorists devise auctions of new cellphone wavelengths for US regulators using strategies designed to maximise benefit for industry and government alike.

Adopted by other countries, by 2001 the technique raises over $100 billion worldwide

H American game theorists Thomas Schelling (below left) and Robert Aumann win the Economics Nobel Prize for their work on the mathematics of cooperation and conflict, dating back to the Cold War

If you play the game, you have to be prepared to sink by the rules model citizens

Are criminals here to stay?

Game Theory suggests we may always have to put up with a small proportion of criminals in society. According to psychologist Andrew Colman at the University of Leicester, UK, professional criminals have a choice of strategy: they can either do what they like, or conform. At the same time, the rest of us can either put up with criminals, or adopt their practices. The resulting combination of strategies and payoffs is then like the game of Chicken. Criminals and the rest of us would do best if the other party ‘chickened out’ and cooperated. On the other hand, the worst possible outcome would be if everybody behaved like criminals.

Using game-theoretic methods, Colman showed that this leads to a stable state in which criminals taken out of circulation are replaced by formerly law-abiding citizens attracted by the niche left empty by the incarcerated criminals. The result is a permanent, if small, criminal element in society.

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The Big Idea

Question Time

exploring life’s great mysteries

War games: The Israeli war room during the 1973 Yom Kippur war

Steven Brams A professor of politics at New York University, game theorist Brams has developed the Theory of Moves over the last 25 years

Why is the nature vs nurture debate important?

When transformed from a debate into a scientific question – what are the innate mechanisms that allow people to learn in particular ways? – it’s nothing less than the quest for explanatory theories in psychology. the theory of moves

Making games more dynamic The Theory of Moves (ToM) has been developed by political scientist Steven Brams as an extension of game theory that reflects the dynamic aspects of conflicts. Instead of regarding each conflict as an essentially static situation, ToM allows the responses of opponents to be included, producing a more dynamic and arguably more realistic framework in which to analyse conflicts.

Brams and his co-workers have used ToM to re-evaluate many real life conflicts, with results that often contradict the predictions of game theory. For example,

getty, corbis

E faced with a madman – and chicken out first.

A changing game Drama theory highlights how events that unfold before the game even starts can cause it to change dramatically. It can also change once it’s underway, however – an issue tackled by another extension of game theory, known as G the Theory of Moves.

Developed over the last 25 years by political scientist Steven Brams at New York University, the Theory of Moves shows how games evolve as each player responds to the strategies used by others.

Game theory is increasingly being recognised far beyond its original confines, reflected in the award of Nobel Prizes to its pioneers and advocates, including John Nash in 1994.

The behaviour of people faced with tough choices may not be as simple as von 90

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when it became clear that Israel was not going to be defeated in the Yom Kippur War of 1973, the Soviet Union – which was backing Egypt and Syria – offered to broker a settlement. The pro-Israeli Nixon administration responded by putting all US military forces on global nuclear alert. Game theory predicts that this should have turned the war into a confrontation between the superpowers, but ToM shows that it was more likely to lead to peace – which, mercifully, is exactly what transpired.

Neumann originally hoped, but game theory can help cast light on the likely outcome.

Robert Matthews is a science journalist and Visiting Reader in Science at Aston University, UK. www.robertmatthews.org

find out more E Mathematics and Politics: Strategy, Voting, Power and Proof by Alan D Taylor and Allison M Pacelli (Springer, 2008) E Prisoner’s Dilemma: John von Neumann, game theory and the puzzle of the bomb by William Poundstone (Anchor, 1993) E www.dklevine.com/general/whatis.htm Washington University professor’s introductory page on different kinds of game theory

What do you think has kept the debate alive for so long?

There are three things. One is a history of sloppy formulations of the issues, including false dichotomies – is it innate or learned?

– and lazy compromises – everything is a mixture. Next is the politicisation of the scientific issues by activists and ideologues on the right and left. And third is the absence, until recently, of scientific methodologies that clarify the interaction, including large-scale twin and adoption studies and genome association methods.

What’s your take on the debate?

Nature and nurture are not a spectrum in which a scientific theory consists of, say, the number 37 on a scale of 0 to 100. For one thing, there are several conceptually distinct nature-nurture questions whose answers are independent – such as what makes humans different from other species, what makes men different from women, and what makes one individual different from another.

What’s the thesis of your new book?

If human nature comprises several systems, then historical changes in violence reveal how different environments engage a fixed set of mechanisms in different ways. On one side, we have innate motives like rage and vengeance, while on the other we have ‘better angels’, such as self-control and empathy. All of them are sensitive to information from the environment, but without characterising the operation of each it would be impossible to explain why humans have been violent in some eras and peaceable in others.

E www.gametheory.net Good resource for teachers, students and anyone else interested in game theory Jul/Aug April 2009 2012

90

Edu Talk

Grace Pinto, Managing Director of Ryan International Schools and a renowned educationist talks about the Indian education system

“The door has been opened too wide that children are free, along with the teachers” What should be the core function of an educational institution?

We, at Ryan’s, feel that education is not just about learning how to read and write but about gaining knowledge, sharing love, understanding and patience. We want our students to be good human beings and give back to society, the environment and the family.

really want - to earn, enjoy life and retire at the age of 40. If we ask the students from the politicians-run colleges in Maharashtra as to what their desire, goal is, the answer will be to make quick money. These students have joined BPOs after the 12th grade and many of them are miserable today because they couldn’t complete their education.

What does the Ryan Foundation do?

‘Each one teach one’ is our slogan and all our schools and students have adopted a village or a colony as a way of giving back to the society. Today, the Ryan Foundation has adopted 63 villages and colonies.

What do you think about the current education system in India?

They are not preparing children who can be employable, they are preparing children who can’t think for themselves and have no creativity. This is because of the rote system.

Southern India has mathematicians and scientists, but the north doesn’t. Why? Because of this rote system of learning.

Graduates don’t think; they only copy. But the reasons for us lacking behind are workable.

What is the government missing?

The government doesn’t have the right plan for a right future. If you can’t think and plan well, invite the educationists. Sorry to say but today schools and colleges are under the control of the politicians. All the universities and lands, you name it, are under them. They receive funds from their other business and hand it over to two-third of their people who don’t know what education is and ask them to run it. Do you think these people have the intention to impart good education? Do you think there can be a change in education system in this situation?

What would make the Right to Education act a success?

Give the government schools to us - private

people, educationists, who are ready. Today the government schools have students, but no teachers. Why? Villages are waiting with their school doors open. It is sad that teachers are not coming to the schools. Meanwhile, privatisation brings in its share of problems too. The private parties should give it in writing that out of all their schools planned there will be one dedicated towards educating the underserved of the society. Give this in undertaking for 30 years and let the private people run such a programme. But don’t go on giving permission to the wealthy people to build schools for wealthy people.

What challenges do you face as an educationist?

We face a lot of opposition from people with vested interests. We struggle to find commercial land and build schools. We take loans from banks and pay them over decades.

Whenever we try to open a school, there is so much political interest, especially in Maharashtra. Two other very difficult places for us are Bengal and Kerala. I think that is not going to be the scenario if all the educationists come together.

If you ask today’s generation what they

What are your thoughts on the increasing role of technology as a learning tool?

I have both negative and positive feelings from what I have observed. Children who are given an iPad at an early age aren’t interested in writing. They learn to use the colouring system and join the lines, learning alphabets and number system, but they don’t love to write. They only love to watch and visualise.

While they learn faster, they are so absorbed in the technology that they communicate and interact less.

Children have friends only on Facebook.

They have forgotten subjects, theory, project work. This is actively hampering education in schools.

What about the recent changes in the school examination system?

The 10th standard examinations have been ruled out from the examination boards which is not a good development. The government says, ‘pass everyone’. Are you providing mass or quality? The door has been opened so wide that children are free, along with the teachers. The 10th standard examinations were preparatory. Every aspect of life has to have a preparatory level.

Which teacher do you remember the most from your childhood?

Whoever has reprimanded me the most for not winning for the team... That communication, their reprimands, their strictness, their discipline, their challenge is missing today. Today, you are not able to discipline the child; the media, the parents question you.

June 2012

91

Resource Staying alive

A feast for the mind

The bombardier beetle protects itself by ejecting a boiling, noxious chemical spray

Not becoming dinner is the key to survival How Not to be Eaten: the insects fight back

By Gilbert Waldbauer University of California Press, 240 pages, `1,451

K Insects are the most numerous, most diverse and most bizarrely adapted creatures on the planet. So how on Earth do you offer a taster to a subject as vast as insect biodiversity?

The usual approach is to

look at ways that insects live – especially what they eat – and whether they represent a problem for humans. However, in his latest book, entomologist Gilbert Waldbauer turns this around. He offers a tour not through where each species lives and what it eats, but how it manages to remain uneaten so that it survives to live and feed – and mate and lay eggs – another day.

Across its 10 chapters, How Not to be Eaten covers some of the great biological themes that have shaped insect behaviour, ecology and evolution

A matter of facts The story of maths told via 17 equations 17 Equations that Changed the World

thinkstock, Getty x2, NaturePL.com

By Ian Stewart Profile, 288 pages, `1,401

K Ian Stewart is a master of mathematical exposition, and this book gives a broad overview of the way

Einstein’s famous formula is one of 17 equations that have shaped the world 92

June 2012

– camouflage, stings, bodily poisons, warning colours, mimicry, death-feigning, evasive flight patterns, mass emergence (safety in numbers), stealth and furtiveness. All of these are governed by avoiding being eaten rather than the need to feed and grow.

Waldbauer’s prose is clear and entertaining, whether he is describing a bombardier

maths has been applied over the centuries.

Each chapter starts with an equation, but the exposition that follows is remarkably free of any mathematical notation. Having said which, it’s not without sophistication, dealing in detail with subjects like waves, electromagnetism and the famous Second Law of Thermodynamics.

An enormous historical panorama is laid out before the reader.

When dealing with Einstein’s theory of relativity, for example, Stewart makes it clear what the theory is and

beetle’s anal ejection of scalding spray, or a blue jay vomiting up a swallowtail caterpillar. In short, this is an ideal general introduction to the world of insects. Although it is not, perhaps, one to be read at the dinner table.

Richard Jones is a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society and author of Extreme Insects (Collins, 2010)

isn’t about (his irritation at people who think Einstein’s relativity is the same as Newtonian relativity is palpable). He explains how Einstein’s E=mc2 equation comes out of special relativity, before moving on to how gravity is incorporated into general relativity. This then leads on to recent ideas about inflationary universes and dark energy. After relativity comes an excellent discussion of Schrödinger’s cat, followed by a look at the applications of quantum theory.

This book has something for all those interested in the applications of maths, while offering historical perspective on a wide variety of topics.

Mark Ronan is a Honorary Professor of Mathematics at University College London

Get your clicks

Our pick of internet highlights to explore

H WEBSITE

H WEBSITE

H PODCAST

Egyptology excellence

Evolution resources

Science chat and debate

http://bit.ly/ancientegypt

www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/

http://bit.ly/guardianscience

For those keen to get to grips with the differences between Hatshepsut and Rameses, this site is a rich resource to explore Ancient Egyptian history.

Its delights are plentiful – a comprehensive explanation of the hieroglyph alphabet, an animated video explaining the mummification process, pyramids and temples, a complete list of Egyptian dynasties, games and quizzes galore.

This interactive site is perfect for brushing up knowledge of evolution with its easy splitting of resources into seven clear and distinct areas: Darwin, Change, Extinction, Survival, Sex, Humans and Religion.

Explore ‘Darwin’s Diary’, which details the great scientist’s scientific insights. Or dive into the interactive timeline dating back 4550 million years.

British newspaper The Guardian presents a regular podcast that serves a similar purpose for the more scientifically curious kind of listener.

Science Weekly is presented by the paper’s science correspondent Alok Jha and covers all manner of subjects – from Stephen Hawking’s recent 70th birthday to a beginner’s guide to the Higgs boson.

H WEBSITE

H WEBSITE

H BLOG

The Wilderness Society

Great people, great lives

British nature log

http://wilderness.org

www.bbc.co.uk/history

www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/natureuk

This is the online home of The Wilderness Society, the leading American conservation organisation dedicated to protecting the 635 million acres of government-administered US countryside.

A state-wise breakdown of their projects is engaging and informative, giving opportunities to join its campaigns, like the recent successful drive to ban mining in the Grand Canyon.

Didn’t pay enough attention during history lessons? Always getting mixed up between Henry VIII’s wives, Anne Boleyn and Catherine of Aragon?

If these names ring a bell, but you can’t quite explain why, submerge yourself in this wideranging list of historical figures, complete with potted biographies and pictures. Become a history buff in an instant.

The seasonal BBC TV series Springwatch and Autumnwatch are continually fascinating examinations of the ebb and flow of Britain’s wildlife. Keep yourself abreast with the latest happenings with the UK’s very varied animal life, via this website, as well as making your own written and pictorial contributions to this absorbing survey of what’s living out in the wild.

If you have a favourite website, blog or podcast that you’d like to share with other readers, please email edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

June 2012

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Buzz

RVQuizCorp Presents

Under the Peepal Tree

We have always tried to make BBC Knowledge an interactive read. Here’s just a snippet of what we’ve been upto.

BBC Knowledge partnered with the 14th edition of the Under the Peepal Tree quiz festival conducted

by RV QuizCorp was held from March 30 - April 1, 2012 at the RV Teachers College Auditorium, Jayanagar, Bangalore. Ricoh Innovations Private Ltd sponsored this event along with MYRA School of Business that played host to teams from Birla Institute of Technology and Science - Pilani, Vellore Institute of Technology Vellore, Anna University - Chennai, PSG College of Technology –

Coimbatore. The theme of this year’s quiz was paintings.

Six different categories of quizzes were held during the three-day event; The Indi-Genius Quiz, The Science and Technology Quiz, Game Theory Quiz, the Lit –eunEnt (Literature and Entertainment) Quiz, followed by the Major and Magnum Open Quiz. The General Quiz, sponsored by BBC Knowledge, saw 80 teams taking part. The quiz was compiled and conducted by the senior most quizcorper, Sreenivas Ravi.

If your college or club is organising an exciting event that you would like BBC Knowledge to partner with, write in to us at bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

Frozen planet contest winners Congratulations to all the winners!

BBC Knowledge and BBC Entertainment organised the Frozen Planet caption contest which ran from February - April 2012 on our Facebook page, Knowledge Magazine India. One image from the show Frozen Planet was uploaded each week onto the page, and the participants were invited to send in their witty captions.

Caption Contest 1

Caption Contest 2

Caption Contest 3

Jason Goveas and Amarish B Nagori

Gunjan Jaswal and Vivek Shah

Anandita Seksaria and Lorraine Fernandes

Caption Contest 4

Caption Contest 5

Caption Contest 6

Ankith B P and Sahil Wadhwa

Vikrant Sharma and Yatin Puthran

Aditi Gaitonde and Abhishek Jain

School in Focus

Delhi Public School (Amritsar)

Established in 2003, Delhi Public School (DPS) Amritsar, a member of the Delhi Public School Society, prides itself on adopting a holistic approach in preparing students to face the challenges of today and tomorrow. DPS Amritsar combines traditional and modern approach to education and is committed in shaping and grooming personalities who can take the world in their stride. The CBSE-affiliated school is recognised by the Government of India and provides education to students from pre-nursery to Standard 12th.

Students participated in The Gold City Marathon 2012 run for Amritsar city

DPS students interact with farmers for their Campaign Against Stubble Burning

Performance by students on stage to depict Punjab’s culture and heritage

Students competing for the title of Mr. Gabru and Ms. Mutiar

Students portraying the importance of the girl child through its annual show BIBBA

A dance by the students in the annual show BIBBA

Students enacting the sacrifices and contributions of the freedom fighters of Punjab in a play

If you would like us to visit your school and have it featured on this page, write in to us at bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

Gadgets New Tech

The latest gizmos and apps creating buzz in the market  MULTI MEDIA PERSONAL EXPERIENCE The Vuzix iWear Wrap 920 is a pair of light weight glasses with integrated headphones and microphone that allow you to not only watch movies like it is on the big screen, but it comes with an in-built 3D viewing software that enhances the viewing experience. The glasses recreate a viewing environment, which is the equivalent of a large screen display and comes with connectivity to your iPod, iPhone, portable DVD player etc. allowing you to watch movies or shows directly. For gamers, the Vuzix iWear, allows you to almost virtually place yourself in the midst of the action while playing and is compatible with playstation, Xbox, game cube etc.

Price: ` 12,682 • www.vuzix.com

 HEARING OUT

apple x2, nikon, vuzix, sony, quirky, ionaudio, nokia, gadgetian.com

Sony has recently released a new series of walkmans. Weighing about 28 grams, the B170 Walkman series epitomises the adage that good things come in small packages. The dedicated ‘Bass Boost’ promises to enhance your listening experience along with an onboard equalizer, voice recorder and a USB port that enables easy transfer of music. The device promises continuous playback for up to 18 hours and if you are stressed for time, plug-in the device for three minutes and you have a continuous playback for 90 minutes. The devices come with a memory of 2GB and 4GB respectively.

Price: 2GB ` 2,990 and 4GB ` 3,990 • www.sony.co.in

 PICTURE PERFECT If you find it difficult to show or share the images of your latest vacation or party with your friends, the newest camera from Nikon is the one you need to look into. The Nikon Coolpix S1100pj is a digital camera that comes in with an in-built projector, which offers 14 lumens of light. The projector option is simple to navigate through and projects over 6.5 feet, for both images and videos, onto a blank screen or wall. With an image resolution of 14.1 megapixels and a 5x optical zoom, the camera also allows for HD recording.

The camera is easy to use, thanks to its LCD display screen enabling easy-to-navigate touch controls and screen modes.

Price: ` 23,000 approx • www.nikon.co.in 96

June 2012

Free apps to discover, learn and share Angry Space Birds

 Take Note The Scratch n Scroll is a mouse pad with a twist. It doubles up as an impromptu notepad where you can jot down your ideas, information or even reminders with the attached plastic stylus. Once written, the information can be erased by flipping up the semi-transparent top sheet and write anew. With its slim and portable design, it has a smooth rolling surface just like a regular mouse pad and it is compatible with any ball based or optical mouse.

Price: `760 • www.quirky.com

 The PURE VIEW The Finnish mobile giant, Nokia presents the latest smartphone model the Nokia 808 PureView that is guaranteed to amaze with its sleek design and intelligent software. Running on Symbian Belle OS, it is powered by a 1.3GHz single-core processor and a 4-inch display.

The PureView’s starring point involves a camera with a Carl Zeiss lens having a sensor capable of taking 41 megapixels worth of photos and a recording of continuous-focus 1080p which is an impressive feat.

With an in-built 16GB memory, the phone also comes with pre-loaded Nokia maps and Sat Nav directions for over 100 countries.

Price: ` 29,500 approx • www.nokia.com/in-en/

 PAPER-FREE STORAGE Storing photos, magazine or newspaper pages, paper documents etc. just got hassle-free. The DocuScan is a sleek and compact allin-one colour scanner that makes storing easier – without the help of a computer! Just feed in your documents through its open slide and watch and zoom in on them as they are scanned and saved thanks to its 2.4” colour screen. The files are copied, converted and stored directly onto the inbuilt SD card slot. Photos are archived in JPEG format for stunning clarity, and because the DocuScan scans in high res 300 DPI, you’ll be able to read every word of your saved document.

Price: ` 5,073 • www.ionaudio.com

Have suggestions for any gadget/application? Share with other readers, please email edit.bbcknowledge@wwm.co.in

Angry Birds have travelled to space in their mission to retrieve their eggs from the pigs. The rules and the game plan changes with gravity playing a crucial role. Ice bird, a new character, is introduced, which breaks the pigs’ fortresses by freezing it.

The characters have all undergone slight physical changes but still retain their earlier charm or rather the vendetta quality that endeared us from the very first flight we sent them on.

Users: Android, iPod, iPad and iPhone

No drawing skill required Draw Something, as the names suggests, is an app where you draw something, be it a barcode, a bonfire, or a important figure from history; share it online with your friends and watch as they try to guess your drawing. With over 50 vibrant colours to choose from, you can take turns with your friends to guess the drawings as you earn your coins to reach the top of the leader board. If you are stumped by a word, then drop a ‘bomb’ and try to decipher a new image and continue. You can also share your drawings with your friends’ on Facebook.

Users: iPhone and iPad

Click, tweak and share Android users rejoice! The popular Instagram app is now available for Android users. The Instagram app is a free photo enhancement app that allows you to share your pictures on various photo-based social networks. Instagram camera app comes with simple flash control and a camera-switch button to go from front-facing to rear-facing in a single tap.

After you click an image, Instagram gives you the option to use any of its 18 photo filters, to change or enhance the look of the image and then allows you to post and share your work with your followers on your home page.

Users: Android 2.2 or later

The

last word

Dr Dibyendu Nandy explains the science behind the recent solar storms

“Solar storms have energy equivalent of the explosion of a thousand billion atomic bombs” arch 13, 1989 was a cold winter night in the province of Quebec, Canada. People were comfortably ensconced in their homes heated by electricity from the sophisticated North American power grid. Suddenly, the power snapped plunging the whole Quebec province into darkness.

The underground metro railway system in the city of Montreal came to a grinding halt and the city airport was forced to close.

Further down the continent in the United States of America, amazingly beautiful auroras were seen as far south as Texas. Out in the lonely expanse of space, several satellites went silent and remained incommunicado for hours and the space shuttle Discovery, on a mission in space, escaped with only a few sensors misbehaving.

If you think that I have just described a science-fiction movie or a doomsday scenario, you are wrong. Only a few days earlier, on March 10, 1989, a powerful magnetic storm had originated in the Sun. Could these seemingly disparate incidents be connected?

Our nearest star, the Sun, is a giant ball of fire, literally.

Temperatures inside it are as high as 15 million degrees and at such temperatures matter exists in the plasma state; the atoms lose their negatively charged electrons generating positively charged ions. Energy is produced

SDO/NASA

M

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A solar storm is seen erupting out of the Sun at the top-left corner

through nuclear fusion at the Sun’s center from where it flows outwards heating the plasma.

The heated plasma rises to the surface radiating its energy away as sunshine, subsequently cooling and sinking down. This vigorous up and down motion is nothing but convection – a phenomenon that is also observed in a boiling pot of water. In the Sun, this motion of charged particles constitute large-scale electrical currents and also create magnetic fields – famously epitomised in the equations of James Clerk Maxwell – the 19th century Scottish mathematical physicist.

This solar dynamo mechanism produces the Sun’s magnetic field and the 11-year solar cycle.

Magnetic fields are generated deep inside the Sun but rise up producing sunspots, which are relatively dark, strongly magnetised regions on the surface. Galileo Galilei was one

of the first to systematically study sunspots in the early 17th century with the newly invented telescope. Sunspots are magnetic behemoths; they can comfortably engulf a few Earths and their magnetic field strength is ten thousand times stronger than the Earth’s. Sunspots also spawn solar storms.

The magnetic fields within sunspots arch upwards forming loops that are extremely hot and which emit high energy radiation. These loops heat up the solar outer atmosphere creating the million degree solar corona – the ethereal halo around the solar disk visible during a total solar eclipse. The loops, energised by the twisting, turning motion of the solar plasma sustain huge currents. Sometimes, in the course of their frenzied dance, the loops cross each other.

When conditions are appropriate the magnetic loops violently destroy each other in a process known as magnetic reconnection. Their magnetic energy is lost; but energy is indestructible, it can only be converted from one form to another. The magnetic energy is used up in heating the corona further. Charged particles and coronal material are accelerated in this inferno and eventually erupt out of the Sun. The eruption carries material typically weighing a trillion kilograms at speeds of about 1000km/s into

outer space. A solar storm is born.

Solar storms are often referred to as flares or Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) and they carry the energy equivalent of a thousand billion atomic bombs exploding together! When they are Earth-directed they can be very hazardous; their severity depends on their magnetic orientation, speed and amount of plasma. Starting from radiation hazard to astronauts, interference with the electronic circuitry of satellites, communication blackouts, failure of GPS navigational systems to disruption of power grids, oil pipelines and air traffic over polar routes, the impact of solar storms on our modern technologies is farreaching. Studies of the origin and impact of solar storms with a view to develop predictive capabilities has led to the rapid development of a field of research known as space weather.

Yes, there is weather in space and it dictates whether you can operate your cell phone without a hitch, whether you can watch your favourite programme on television and how much you pay for that New Delhi to New York air ticket.

Astrophysicist Dibyendu Nandy has been associated with various NASA projects and is an Assistant Professor at IISER-Kolkata. He holds the Ramanujan Fellowship and recently received the Karen Harvey prize of the American Astronomical Society.