Contrary to expectations, the internet has a heart of cable and steel “GOVERNMENTS of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind.” So begins [...]

The little DeltaWing car at this year’s Le Mans aimed to do things differently. TO NO-ONE’S great surprise, Audi dominated last weekend’s 24-hour endurance race at Le Mans, in the bucolic Loire distict of France. [...]

Rich countries prospered without worrying much about the environment. Poor and middle-income countries do not have that luxury ON THE southern shore of Lake Naivasha, Kenya’s lush Rift Valley holds an unexpected scent of English [...]

The idea of planet-wide environmental boundaries, beyond which humanity would go at its peril, is gaining ground PULL a spring, let it go, and it will snap back into shape. Pull it further and yet [...]

Fleets of robot submarines will change oceanography SAILING the seven seas is old hat. The latest trick is to glide them. Sea gliders are small unmanned vessels which are now cruising the briny by the [...]

As robots grow more autonomous, society needs to develop rules to manage them   IN THE classic science-fiction film “2001”, the ship’s computer, HAL, faces a dilemma. His instructions require him both to fulfil the [...]

“There is no way forward without putting education as a priority, especially in the Arab world,”   When oil rich countries get involved in global education projects, it is easy to be cynical and only [...]

A geoengineering experiment has come unstuck. But there will be more   FOR the past few years, a European collaboration called IMPLICC (Implications and Risks of Novel Options to Limit Climate Change) has been looking [...]

A trial of thought-controlled robotic legs is taking its first steps   ANYONE who saw Claire Lomas complete this year’s London marathon on May 7th cannot fail to have been impressed by her grit and [...]

A much-vaunted new material may change telecommunications GRAPHENE, a form of carbon that comes in sheets a single atom thick, has gained a reputation as a wonder material. It is the best conductor yet discovered [...]

“Not for 55m years has there been oceanic disruption of comparable severity” IN 1998 a rise in sea temperatures caused by El Niño, a periodic eastward surge of warm Pacific water, caused a mass bleaching [...]

As manufacturing goes digital, it will change out of all recognition, says Paul Markillie. And some of the business of making things will return to rich countries OUTSIDE THE SPRAWLING Frankfurt Messe, home of innumerable [...]