ScienceWorld

As the average age of the population goes up with people surviving many years more than their allegorical three score years and ten, the incidence of Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of senile dementia will rise too. Many people can suffer symptoms for many years and yet live independent lives or at least with minimal [...] A design for life is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Carl Zimmer offered some insights at TED-Ed into how dinosaurs got their plumage and evolved into the flying birds, excellent birds, we see today. This is witty animation plucks up the courage to fill in the gaps. On an entirely unrelated note, I wrote a song about flight, which you can hear on my SoundCloud [...] How did feathers evolve? is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

My publisher just added up all the sales of my book Deceived Wisdom including hardback sales since November, Kindle and ePub downloads and the Audible editions. The grand total so far…drum roll please…is 10,000 copies, which ain’t bad for a popular science book (although it was #1 on amazon for a while ahead of Sir [...] Win #DeceivedWisdom in our 10k competition is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Next time you’re sipping on your skinny, frothy mochachocafrappalatteccino with maple syrup and cinnamon at the local Costabucksorthree coffee shop and surfing on their EasyHack(TM) wireless internet spare a thought for the grounds. The burnt out and scalded fragments of beans gone by that in this household are recycled via the compost bins but on [...] We’ve got a lot of grounds to cover is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

The Pale Blue Dot is a photograph of planet Earth taken in 1990 by NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft (launched 1977) when it reached 6 billion kilometres (3.7 billion miles) from Earth in 1990. In the photograph, Earth is shown as a tiny dot (0.12 pixel in size) against the vastness of space. The Voyager 1 [...] Pale Blue Dot is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Pickler Andrew Dalby responded to one of my recent tweets about not cooking asparagus in lemon juice because it discolours it. He had found that his garlic cloves turned blue when he pickled them in spiced malt vinegar. The discolouration doesn’t mean that the pickles are inedible. Now plant material turning blue in acid (vinegar [...] Getting the garlic blues is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

What if Dr Gregory House were on twitter? Hungardian doctor Berci Meskó MD PhD ‏knows his medical communities and uses the internet like a pro in his practice: “We must include digital literacy in the medical curriculum,” he tells TEDxNijmegen ;-) What if Greg House MD were on twitter? is a post from the science [...] What if Greg House MD were on twitter? is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

You can grab a copy of my book Deceived Wisdom, as narrated by actor Kris Dyer (Radio 2, Nice Mum, Edinburgh Fringe etc), for free with the Audible introductory offer. Sign up for a free trial here, download my book and listen on your iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone or any of more than 500 [...] Get Deceived Wisdom audio book free is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Austerity measures – cutbacks in other words – are taking their toll on science. A special issue of The Euroscientist brings together an analysis of the impact of austerity on scientists and their research and the growing brain drain. The magazine is also encouraging other scientists, including those based beyond Southern Europe, to share their [...] Science mob to attack austerity is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Periodically I receive links to stories in the British “tabloid” newspaper, The Daily Mail, from Sciencebase readers. I am yet to see anything in that paper that is worth the ink or electrons. Moreover, I wouldn’t even deem it fit to be torn up into squares and hung from a string in the lavatory for [...] The Daily Fail is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

I met David Spiegelhalter at a conference a while back, a very engaging and charismatic chap with the real stats and the data to tell you all about true risk. His proper title is Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk at the University of Cambridge. He is in two minds literally about playing it [...] Let me introduce Professor Risk and Professor Risk is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Is another bird flu on the rise? Report from Nature on H7N9 type A influenza virus and reported outbreak in China. Scientists and public health officials worldwide are on alert after China announced on 31 March that two people had died and a third had been seriously sickened from infections with a new avian flu [...] H7N9 bird flu is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

NHS Choices critiques tabloid claims for recent research on fishy life extension. “…study has found that higher levels of omega-3 in blood at the start of the study were associated with a 27% reduction in risk of death from any cause, and a 35% reduction in risk of death from heart disease in healthy older [...] Does eating fish really extend your life? is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Science is often portrayed as a fixed set of rules, impersonal, and devoid of emotions. It is not, as can be seen from the discovery of fullerenes, or more specifically buckminsterfullerene, the molecule that became known as the buckyball and on which I must have written a hundred articles over the years. I was working [...] Buckyball discovery is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Nineteenth century British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli supposedly remarked that there are “lies, damned lies and statistics” but although the phrase was repeated often, it is more likely that it was coined by American author Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known as Mark Twain. Regardless of its heritage, the phrase implies that the manipulation of statistics [...] Whose line is it, anyway? is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) is a growing problem, there are mountains of obsolete computers, mobile phones, refrigerators, televisions etc piling up on dumps around the world. Regulations implemented at the National and European levels seek to force those disposing of WEEE to recycle and reclaim the countless, often toxic, materials present in wiring, [...] Greening end of life gadgets is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

#18 It may seem obvious, but art does not always capture the true appearance of the Moon: where it is in the sky always tells you where the Sun is. You will never see a crescent Moon looking like an open parachute: if the crescent is on its side, the "horns" will point upwards, indicating [...] 38 things you might not know about the Moon is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom Subscribe to our Email Newsletter

Probably not. A recent study from Japan was much hyped in the media earlier this week but as NHS Choices points out, the researchers themselves offered a number of limitations to their study: The information on illness, green tea and coffee consumption was all self-reported, which introduces the possibility of error. For example, although food [...] Can drinking green tea or coffee cut stroke risk? is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

There’s a cute video montage currently doing the rounds in which a re-working of the Billy Joel song “We didn’t start the fire” reminisces about growing up in the 1970s and the 1980s and cites the countless games, toys, TV shows and other cultural references we had during that time years before anyone had an [...] Whatever happened to acid rain? is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

Philip Ball, writing on the BBC Future site discusses the carcinogens and poisons pumped into the Roman air every time the cardinals vote on a new Pope… But, he also reckons the The Vatican is missing a trick by being unimaginatively monochrome. “Why stop at a mere two-colour signalling system? The lurid rainbow smokes used [...] Ante-papal smoke signals is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

Some of the world’s oldest engravings of the human form – prehistoric rock art from the Italian Alps – have been brought to life. PITOTI is an innovative research project that applies insights from the new technologies of computer graphics to prehistoric pictures, specifically the rock art of Valcamonica, Italy, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. [...] Animated rock art is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

It hadn’t occurred to me that there might be more than one World Book Day. Apparently (thanks Bob O’Hara) we Brits celebrate and promote literacy on 7th March to get around school holidays, which is why yesterday all the kids trotting up to school were dressed as characters from their favourite books. Apparently, the UNESCO [...] World Book Day Confusion is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

I first wrote about the pioneering work of Prasanna de Silva – AP to his friends and colleagues – back in the early 1990s in publications such as New Scientist, Science and others. It really was pioneering, he and his team at Queen’s University Belfast were starting to find ways to build molecules, that could [...] Molecular Logic is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

World Book Day Offer: To celebrate WBD – 2013-03-06, I’ve made the e-version of Deceived Wisdom just 99p (about $1.50) for the day. You can buy it in PDF, mobi or ePub format for your computer, device or other e-reader from my publisher E&T through the Sciencebase site. Click the Paypal button below to buy [...] Deceived Wisdom World Book Day Offer is a post from the science blog of David Bradley, author of Deceived Wisdom

For the third year in a row, Colorado reigns as the least obese American state, whereas West Virginia is still the fattest, according to the results of just-released 2012 Gallup-Healthways poll.

Scientists have created mice that can't taste sweet, bitter or savory flavors, revealing how these tastes are processed in the brain.

Parallels with pygmy marmosets suggest that Homo floresiensis could be a distinct dwarf species rather than an unusual form of our species

A new study to be published in Astronomical Journal suggests that the subsurface ocean on Jupiter's moon Europa may be an abode of life. This conclusion is based on recent observations of an Earth-bound telescope in Hawaii.

When ice possibly swathed the entire world, the oceans underneath may have nevertheless surprisingly churned, potentially helping to provide life with vital nutrients, new research suggests.