Table of contents for March 2021 in BBC Science Focus Magazine

I’ve lived most of my life online. From AOL to MSN Messenger to message boards to Zoom, the internet has given me the means to build relationships with strangers, friends and family that I couldn’t even begin to put a price on. It has introduced me to art, culture and people that my parents would never have been exposed to, and I’m the richer for it. But of late, the web is becoming a thing I peek at through the gaps in my fingers. Somewhere between countless data leaks, conspiracy theorists invading the Capitol and whatever Gwyneth Paltrow is selling these days, the web has started to lose its shine. As we seem to be reaching peak dissatisfaction with the web, we asked some of the leading voices in online…

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In full bloom FRIEDRICHSHAFEN, GERMANY This is Europe’s first five-metre-diameter deployable reflector for radar satellites. It’s been designed to be able to send and receive higher resolution signals for better observations of Earth. Built by Airbus, it’s currently scheduled for launch in 2022. It’s special because it’s made from a semi-rigid material. Normally, dishes as big or bigger than this have to be flexible so they can be folded up to fit inside a rocket. It’s like putting a ship in a bottle, except the ship is a satellite and the bottle is the rocket carrying it into space. Once the rocket reaches orbit, the satellite is deployed and unfolded, and if all goes according to plan it begins transmitting and receiving signals. The trouble is, satellite dishes work better…

1. Orthophoto of SS Thistlegorm by Simon Brown This aerial image shows the wreck of SS Thistlegorm, a ship that sunk in the Red Sea in 1941. It is made up of 15,005 frames. (Winner – General Science) 2. Giants on the move by Rasmus Degnbol / REDUX Pictures A 78-metre long offshore wind turbine blade being transported across a roundabout in Tarp, Denmark. (Shortlisted) 3. Advanced VIRGO+ by Enrico Sacchetti This picture shows the northern arm of the Advanced VIRGO+ Gravitational Wave Observatory in Tuscany, Italy. (Shortlisted) 4. North Pole underwater by Sue Flood A signpost depicting the geographic North Pole at 90° north latitude, placed on sea ice largely covered with water. (Winner – Climate Change) 5. Synlight experiment by Christian Lünig Here are some of the 149…

WHAT IS BELLINGCAT? We’re a small, non-profit NGO [non-governmental organisation]. We have about 20 staff members and we carry out online open-source investigation. We use material that’s available online – from social media posts to satellite imagery from Google Earth – to investigate different incidents, like war crimes in Syria, Russian poisoning, and wildlife trafficking. The name is from Belling The Cat, a fable about a group of mice who are scared of a large cat. They come up with the idea of putting a bell around its neck, but they don’t know how to do it. So, we’re teaching people how to bell the cat. HOW DID YOU START OUT? Before this, I was working in an admin job. I had no specialisation, no affinity for what I did,…

The past 12 months have been a bumper year for the internet. Several billion people went online far more than they ever imagined. A US presidential election refocused the spotlight on disinformation, and how it might disrupt a democracy that was already shaken up by internet-fuelled alternative truths. We’ve witnessed the rise of cults, the demise of advertising, and the erosion of our mental health. By this account, it’s not been a bumper year for humanity. The pioneers of the internet never thought their invention would be at the centre of a global re-think. The internet project was famously funded by the US government, but its first use was to connect universities so they could share information. At its heart, this is what the internet continues to be used for:…

TIM HWANG Tim is a writer and a researcher. He is the author of Subprime Attention Crisis, a book about the bubble of online advertising. “Advertising was just one business model that people considered at the start. Google originally thought maybe 15 per cent of their revenue was going to come from ads; most of their money was going to come from licensing their search engine to corporate clients. It’s funny; their search algorithm was the origin of programmatic ads. Now everything relies on ads. In the old days, ads were sold the same way they’re sold by a newspaper: you got a call from someone who wanted to buy a banner ad on your website. Google invented AdWords in the early 2000s to give people the tools to use…

PROF ANDREW PRZYBYLSKI Andrew is an experimental psychologist at the Oxford Internet Institute. He studies how people interact with virtual environments. “We’ve had waves of panic around technology for decades, whether it be comic books or video games. Now it happens to be social media. And the fact of the matter is that parents and teachers, who are trying to raise their kids in the face of these panics, are being poorly served by the government when it comes to getting meaningful advice. It’s not that social media is good or bad for people. It’s that the science of social media and mental health is broken. We need to do research, but we shouldn’t be approaching it from the perspective that the world is ending. We need to be curious…

One of the unanticipated consequences of COVID-19 is that we can no longer justify the sloth we once enjoyed in idle moments caused by Acts of God. Snow days, leaves on the line – these once perfect excuses to sit in front of the telly with bag of Doritos have been stolen back into productivity by connectivity – and not just because we have digital access, but also because we’ve got really good at using it. Offices that never imagined committing to remote working now expect employees to turn up (fully clothed) when transport is down. When plagues of locusts swarm, school schedules migrate online. In this new normal, Oz’s Dorothy would have been expected to log in to classes while her house was sucked into the tornado’s vortex. And…

reply@sciencefocus.com BBC Science Focus, Eagle House, Colston Avenue, Bristol, BS1 4ST @sciencefocus www.facebook.com/sciencefocus @bbcsciencefocus A shot in the dark In ‘Mysteries of the Universe’ (January, p49) you suggest that “Maybe the Universe is filled with dark stars and dark planets and dark life!” I suggest this is extremely unlikely. The one thing that we can detect is the gravity dark matter has. If there was a planet in the Solar System made of dark matter, why has its effect on the orbits of the other planets not been detected? Our space probes often use the ‘slingshot effect’ of a planet’s gravity on their journey. Have any of them ever had to take into account the gravity of a dark planet? On the other hand, perhaps the reason we haven’t observed…

The future of the endangered blackfooted ferret looks a little brighter, following the birth of this adorable little bundle of teeth and fur. Named Elizabeth Ann, the tiny kit was born on 10 December 2020 at the National Black-Footed Ferret Conservation Center (NBFFCC) in Colorado, thanks to the conservation efforts of a collaboration led by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Her birth marks the first time that an endangered species native to the US has been successfully cloned. “Although this research is preliminary, it is the first cloning of a native endangered species in North America, and it provides a promising tool for continued efforts to conserve the black-footed ferret,” explained Noreen Walsh, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Mountain-Prairie Region.“Maintaining and increasing wild populations and suitable…

Time to load up Ham Theft Auto: new research indicates pigs possess the mental capacity to play video games. The study, published in Frontiers In Psychology, tested the ability of four hogs (Hamlet, Omelette, Ebony and Ivory) to play a simple joystick game with their snouts, moving a cursor to four targets on the screen. Although the animals didn’t demonstrate the dexterity to win a round of Fortnite any time soon, they did show a conceptual understanding of this rudimentary game. Performing well above chance, the pigs appeared to recognise the movement of the cursor was controlled by the joystick. The fact they did so well despite a lack of opposable thumbs is “remarkable”, according to the researchers. “It is no small feat for an animal to grasp the concept…

PERSEVERANCE In the Jezero Crater, a dried-up lake, NASA’s Perseverance is making itself at home. Equipped with five science cameras, the rover will search for signs of microbial life that may have existed in shoreline or lakebed sediments billions of years ago. Rock core samples will be collected, and some of these priceless commodities are scheduled to make their way to the UK in around 10 years’ time. An oxygen source will be critical for future crewed missions to Mars, which is where Perseverance’s onboard oxygen generator comes in. Equivalent to running a fuel cell in reverse, MOXIE will demonstrate technology that splits atmospheric carbon dioxide molecules into oxygen and carbon. But for now, it’s the helicopter Ingenuity that’s making the headlines. Scientists are preparing it for the first-ever powered…

560 billion tons The amount of organic carbon locked up in submarine permafrost in the Arctic, according to a massive international survey. Human activity has released about 500 billion tons since the Industrial Revolution. 100 million The number of plants and animals trafficked globally each year to sell as pets, traditional medicines and ‘luxury’ foods, as estimated by researchers at the University of Sheffield. FIVE YEARS The amount by which hearing aids can delay the onset in dementia in people with hearing loss, according to a study carried out at Ulster University in Northern Ireland.…

SCIENCE BEHIND THE HEADLINES “Because of the constant mutations that occur as the virus replicates, there are likely thousands or even millions of variants of SARS-CoV-2” WHAT CAUSES A CORONAVIRUS VARIANT? During every coronavirus infection, the SARS-CoV-2 virus makes many new copies of itself. For each new copy, the virus has to duplicate its genome. And during this duplication, small errors can occur, so that each new copy of the genome is slightly different from the last. In short, these errors are the mutations that create a coronavirus variant. These mutations happen all the time, creating more and more variants, but most have no effect on how the virus behaves. Occasionally though, a mutation will cause a change in some aspect of how the virus behaves. These are the “variants…

MAGNETIC ATTRACTION Chemists at the University of Pennsylvania have separated rare earth metals for recycling by exploiting their differing levels of attraction to a magnetic field. The method can separate heavier rare earth metals from lighter ones. CHEMICAL BREAKDOWN The University of Birmingham is setting up a facility to recycle rare earth metals used for magnets in hard drives, appliances and electric cars. Hydrogen breaks down the alloys into a powder that can be separated from the other components. OLD BECOMES NEW The Critical Materials Institute in the US recycles rare earth metals by stripping the coatings off the magnets found in hard disks, before crushing them into powder. The powder is then heated with a plasma torch to form another magnet.…

A sustainable waterproof shell Conventionally speaking, waterproof coats are sprayed with a water-repellent chemical that makes rain bead up and roll off the coat, instead of soaking in. The coating also means the material beneath it can be breathable, stopping from you getting too hot underneath. Unfortunately, those chemicals have a habit of washing off, shortening the coat’s life and polluting the environment. Now, Helly Hansen is using a new kind of material that has small enough pores to keep water from coming in, but lets hot vapour (sweat) out. This potentially means the coat could stay waterproof for its entire life, with no need for extra coatings, or the pollution that comes with the process. Helly Hansen Odin Minimalist Infinity Shell jacket £600, hellyhansen.com Backpacks that give back The…

PROF SIR TIM BERNERS-LEE Computer scientist Sir Tim Berners-Lee is best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web. He is also a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), founder of the Open Data Institute and a recipient of the Turing Award. In 1989, while tinkering with a system to share scientific notes, a 34-year-old CERN scientist named Tim Berners-Lee invented something that would change everything. You might have heard of it: the World Wide Web. Fast-forward three decades and 4.57 billion users later, he’s on a mission to save his creation. Specifically, save it from a mounting privacy problem. In the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal – in which the data of 87 million Facebook users was obtained without consent – Berners-Lee (now Prof Sir…

NINA JANKOWICZ Nina studies the intersection of democracy and technology. She is the author of How To Lose The Information War: Russia, Fake News, And The Future Of Conflict. “Domestic disinformers in the United States are probably the best in the world at creating and spreading disinformation. They don’t really have to launch a campaign: they just plant seeds that grow with the infrastructure that exists online, and that are distributed with the help of the acolytes they’ve created. They partner with influencers who launder the messages for their followers to consume. Pair that with microtargeting – sending really specified pieces of information that they learn about us using things like Facebook groups combined with the public voter file that shows how we voted, what our issues are, who we…

Your resting heart rate is a good measure of fitness and also a powerful predictor of future health. According to a study published in The Lancet in September 2008, patients with heart rates above 70 beats per minute are at greater risk of heart attack and hospital admission. With regular exercise you should see your resting heart rate fall. Your resting heart rate is easy to find. Turn your hand so your palm is facing you. Use the index and middle finger from your other hand to measure it at the wrist, just below the thumb. Measure it when you’re sitting down and relaxed, preferably first thing in the morning. Top athletes can have a resting pulse as low as 40 beats per minute. Mine is around 54. The greatest…

YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED … IF WE DON’T DESTROY IT, WHEN WILL THE WORLD COME TO AN END? … I LOOK LIKE A PANDA. HOW CAN I GET RID OF THE BAGS UNDER MY EYES? … WOULD DINOSAURS HAVE GOT EVEN BIGGER IF THEY WEREN’T WIPED OUT? … HOW DOES SOLAR ENERGY ACTUALLY WORK? … WHY DO ROAST POTATOES STAY SO HOT FOR SO LONG? … WHAT DAY OF THE WEEK DID THE BIG BANG HAPPEN? … HOW BIG WOUL D A SPIDER HAVE TO BE BEFORE IT WAS UNABLE TO STICK TO THE WALL? … COULD BEING HAPPIER HELP US FIGHT INFECTIOUS DISEASE? Email your questions to questions@sciencefocus.com or submit on Twitter at @sciencefocus OUR EXPERTS KATY WILKINS, ABERDEEN DOES CRACKING YOUR KNUCKLES CAUSE ARTHRITIS? Our joints contain synovial fluid,…

ELLIS SMITH WHAT CAUSES PEOPLE’S PERSPECTIVES TO CHANGE SO MUCH ONCE THEY BECOME PARENTS? For many parents, when their first child is born, it’s the first time in their lives that their number one priority shifts from themselves to another person. And this little person happens to be extremely cute, but also hopelessly vulnerable and needy. It’s a profound change that requires a monumental shift in perspective. Thankfully, as parents we seem to have evolved to anticipate and adapt to our new responsibilities at a neural level. In 2017, a team of neuroscientists at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona scanned the brains of pregnant women during and after pregnancy and found reductions in the amount of grey matter in areas of the brain that are involved in so-called ‘social cognition’ –…

Every week on BBC World Service, Crowdscience answers listeners’ questions on life, Earth and the Universe. Tune in every Friday evening on BBC World Service, or catch up online at bbcworldservice.com/crowdscience COULD BEING HAPPIER HELP US FIGHT INFECTIOUS DISEASES? We’ve all heard the saying ‘laughter is the best medicine’. And there might be something in this idiom: numerous studies have shown that people who report greater happiness tend to have better medical outcomes. For instance, a 2017 study at the University of Nottingham tested the effect of mood on 138 pensioners receiving the normal flu jab. Those that felt happy on the day of the vaccination went on to produce more flu-fighting antibodies. Earlier work at Yale University and the University of Florida has also shown that your mood affects…

MOYA SARNER A new trial is trying to find out if psilocybin is better at treating depression than antidepressants. Health writer Moya met the team to find out more. →p72 PROF AVI LOEB Was ’Oumuamua, the weird object that passed by Earth in 2017, a sign of alien tech? Astrophysicist Avi reveals why his research suggests it was. →p24 PROF SIR TIM BERNERS-LEE Thirty years ago, Tim invented the World Wide Web. Now, fearing a digital dystopia, he’s looking to upturn the system he created. →p54 DR JEREMY ROSSMAN As the UK’s vaccination rollout competes against the potential emergence of new, COVID-19 variants, virologist Jeremy race →p30 Does cracking your knuckles cause arthritis? →p79 CONTACT US → Advertising daniel.long@immediate.co.uk 0117 300 8287 → Letters for publication reply@sciencefocus.com → Editorial enquiries…

WHAT DID THEY DO? Researchers from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, US, fitted fitness trackers to the front legs of a herd of captive Asian elephants and monitored their activity levels. They also took measurements of the animals’ body fat percentages and fertility levels. WHY DID THEY DO THAT? Many researchers believe that a large proportion of the elephants living in captivity are overweight and are concerned that this may be contributing to their low birth rates. Until now, no one had actually investigated the relationship between elephants’ body fat and fertility. WHAT DID THEY FIND? The trackers revealed that the elephants were walking similar distances to wild animals. They also found that body fat percentages ranged from 2 per cent to 25 per cent. The male elephants averaged…

PROF AVI LOEB Theoretical physicist HOW DO WE KNOW THAT ’OUMUAMUA WASN’T JUST A REGULAR COMET? Most of the objects from the periphery of the Solar System have ice on their surface. The ice warms up when the sunlight hits them, and they end up surrounded with vapour and shrouded with dust. So, we end up with this cometary tail surrounding these icy rocks. The first suggestion was that ’Oumuamua must be a comet. The only problem was that it didn’t look like a comet. It didn’t have a cometary tail. There was no gas surrounding it. And in fact, the Spitzer Space Telescope looked very sensitively around it and couldn’t find any carbon-based molecules or dust. So it’s not a comet. WHAT OTHER THEORIES HAVE BEEN PROPOSED ABOUT ITS…

Smartphones, tablets, laptops and electric cars may help the environment by being rechargeable, but they’re not doing it many favours when it comes to recycling. The batteries, magnets and motors used inside them contain rare earth metals, such as lanthanum, neodymium and dysprosium, which are expensive and time-consuming to separate and process so they can be reused elsewhere. To make matters worse, extricating the metals from the gadgets can produce harmful waste. As a result, rare earth metals are rarely recycled – currently the rate stands at around 5 per cent. But in February, a team of material scientists from Iowa State University in the US Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory submitted a patent application for a new method that would make recycling such metals easier, cheaper and cleaner. “RARE…