May 16 2016 New Scientist

7/26/2019 May 16 2016 New Scientist

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KING OF THE SWINGERSThe search for the worlds greatest ape

THE GALAXY TIME FORGOTStar cluster unchanged

for 13 billion year

WORLD WAR ZEROClash of civilizations athe dawn of histor

WATER INTO WINEA decent bottle of bubbly

no grapes required

INTERNAL INQUIRY Has the gut microbiome been overhyped?

BETTER THAN EARTHThe solar system more life-friendly than our own

WEEKLYMay 21 - 27, 2016

0 7 0 9 8 9 3 0 6 9 0 5

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21 May 2016 | NewScientist | 3

OTT Volume 230 No 3074This issue onlinenewscientist.com/issue/3074

Coming next weekSleep specialHow to make the most of your unconscious hours

Information overloadWe need to unclog the internet

CoverimageJulienPacaud

26

34

Grape-freewinemadeinlab

Wetrythesynthetictipplethataimstomimicfine vintage

8

RUIRICARDO/FOLIO

ART

AVA

LABS

Betterthan Earth

The solar systemmore life-friendlythan our own

King of theswingers

The search for theworlds greatest ape

News

On the cover

Features

12 The galaxy time forgotStarcluster unchanged

for 13 billion years

8 Waterinto wineNo grapes required

10 Worldwar zeroClashof civilisations

16 Internal inquiryHasthe gutmicrobiome

been overhyped?

34 King of the swingersWorlds greatest ape

News6 UPFRONT

Demise of worldssmallest porpoise. Magic

mushroom depression trial. Hottest April

but cooler timesawait

8 THIS WEEKThe warthatbroughtdown Europes first

civilisations. Comet might be an asteroid.

Galaxythattime forgot. First American

settlersheaded to Florida

14 INBRIEFShrinkingbirds. Whyyou get dandruff.

Dwarfplanet needs a name. Oldest

shooting stars. Liquid-solid spider silk

Technology20 Firsttest of hyperlooptransportsystem.

Sketch AI can match photos to your scrawl

Analysis16 Moonshot or mania? The gap between

gut microbiome science and its promise

18 COMMENTFakemountains tomake rain are a sign of

desperation. Beware clean-eating gurus

19 INSIGHTThe dangerous myth of cheap renewables

Features26 BetterthanEarth (see above left)32 Time andfree will Weneedthem both

for theworldto make sense

34 Kingof theswingers (see left)38 PEOPLE

Sadie Watsonon Londons buried treasure

Culture40 Springforward Great ideas, fromnerve

dictatorsand pointy eggsto guillotining

genius. Also thescienceof mind over body,

andseven bookson amazing animals

43 Get measuring Back to our statistical roots

Regulars52 LETTERS Morality and religion56 FEEDBACK Dogsfeet smell of popcorn57 THE LASTWORD Multi-trunk trees

Aperture24 The apologies of the petrified rock thieves

Leaders5 Celebrities dishing out dietary advice should

be made to substantiate their claims


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Thisdevelopment is intriguing andpromising. Lifestyle adviceisbigbusiness,butit is unusual forthosewhocashinonittogettheircomeuppance. Thislookslikeararevictoryfor evidence overcharlatanry, even though it wasGibsons deception, not healthclaims, that ledto herdownfall.

These victories should be

commonplace. Other areas ofconsumer adviceare much moretightlyregulated. In manyjurisdictions, for example,financial advice comes withstringent warnings, andthosewhoprovideit must have

professional qualifications and

adhere to codes of conduct.As a society, weseemless

protective of our healththan ourwealth.Whileaspiringfinancialadvisers are studyingto gainproper accreditation, anywellnessbloggercan pick upa worthlessnutritionalqualification for asmall fee. Pretty much anyonecandeclare themselves to bea dietexpert. Andwhen theonly arbiterof authority is popularity, theword recipecan quicklybefollowed byfor disaster.

21 May2016 | NewScientist | 5

L

Lifestyle advice is bigbusiness, but it is rare forthose who cashin togettheir comeuppance

BELLE GIBSON fell a very longway. A littleover a year ago, theAustralianself-styled healthguruseemed tohave it all. Builton aclaim tohave curedherownbrain cancer throughdiet andalternative medicine, she hadahuge social media following, a hitrecipe app,a glowingreputationas a philanthropistand a glossy

cookbook in theworks.Then it all came crashingdown.Under scrutiny fromreporters,sheadmitted that thewholethingwasa fabrication. Shehadnthadcancer andhadntmade thepromiseddonations to charity.Earlier thismonth, Gibson felleven furtherwhen theconsumeraffairsregulator of her home stateinitiated legal action againstherandher company formisleadingand deceptive conduct.

Lifestyle gurus whose claims

dont stand upto scrutiny arenothing new. But ConsumerAffairsVictoriaalsotook actionagainsther publisher, PenguinAustralia, for failingto fact-checkthebook,orderingittomakeaA$30,000donation to thestatesConsumer LawFund andissuinga warningover itsfuture conduct.From now onit will havetosubstantiateall healthclaims,train its staff better andpublisha prominent warning notice inbooks about alternative therapies.

Dish the evidenceHealth gurus should be held to much higher standards

Thatis inpart driven byaninsatiable appetitefor quick-fixhealthadvice. Thelatestexampleis the Hemsleysisters,UK foodbloggerswho have been criticisedfor promoting pseudoscience butnonetheless have a TV seriesabout theirownbrandofhealthy eatingfreefrom grains,gluten andrefined sugar(see

page18). Wouldit have been giventhe greenlight if Channel 4 hadbeen orderedto substantiateallhealthclaims?

Suggestions of policingfrequentlydraw allegationsofcensorship and conspiracy. Andindeed, we must preserve peoplesfreedom to shun grains, glutenandrefinedsugar or conversely,to eat onlydoughnuts. It is notthat youcanteat healthilywithoutgrains,but castingthemas dietary demons is unscientific:

the argument for going gluten-free,for example, is flimsy (NewScientist,12July2014,page28).

Butstandards could andshouldbe much higher.That meanstargetingnot justthose whomake unsupportedclaims,butalso thosewhoseemhappy topromote and cash in oncleaneatingor wellnessguruswithlittle or noduediligence. They,too, shouldcarry the canforthedamage financial or otherwise that results from their actions.

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6 | NewScientist | 21 May2016

WHATS thesecret?Last week,morethan 130researchers,lawyers,ethicists andothersmet

at HarvardMedicalSchool todiscussmaking largegenomesfromscratch. Butnojournalists

were allowedto attend.It is rumoured that themeeting

discussed plans for a 10-yearresearchprojectaimingto builda complete human genome.

This is a naturalextensionofthe humangenome sequencingproject, says Paul Freemont ofImperial CollegeLondon, whosayshe isvery familiar with themeeting. The HumanGenomeProjectsequencedour genomein2003 this project would writethe sequence by synthesising thecode chemically.

Such a feat might prove usefulin medical fields as diverse as drugscreening, stem cell research andorgan transplants. By designing

THEend is nigh. OnFriday,pharmaceuticalfirm Pfizerannouncedthat its drugs could

nolonger beusedfor lethalinjections.The deathpenalty is legal in

31 US states. Executionshavetypically involvedinjectingprisoners witha cocktailofsodiumthiopental, pancuroniumbromide andpotassium chloride.

Butin recent years,some firmshaverefusedto sellthe drugsto USprisons,makingit moredifficultforstates to execute people.

ANINDIT

OMUKHERJEE/REUTERS

Synthetic genome Lethal injections

OT

Should something somonumental be organisedand launched in such afashion?

Smallest porpoise on the way out

Its that time of the weather cycle

genomes and developingtheminto cell cultures,it may bepossible to tailor therapies tobetter match their recipient, orto function more effectively.

Synthetic biologistDrewEndyat Stanford UniversityinCalifornia decidednotto attendthe meeting. Shouldsomethingso monumental be organised andlaunched in sucha fashion?

So why allthe secrecy? It maybebecausetheprojectis linked toa paperthat will bepublished ina major journal,and those thatauthored it are bound to respectthatjournals press embargo.

NowPfizer says that whenit sells drugs to governmententities, it willask them to certifythattheywill beused onlyformedicalpurposesand willnot

be resold to someone else.FranklinZimring,a professor olawat theUniversityof CaliforniaBerkeley,saysthatlethalinjections lend the death penaltyan air of medicallegitimacy.

What youare witnessingnow is the last gasp of thatpretence,says Zimring.

Ifstates wantto keepthedeath penalty, they willhavetofindanotherwaytodoit.

ITSthe smallest porpoisewiththe biggestproblem.Thevaquita, found only in theGulf of California, nownumbersjust60orsoindividualsa92per centdrop since1997.

If Mexico doesntwiden itsconservationstrategythe speciesmay begoneas soon as 2022,according to the InternationalCommittee for theRecoveryof thVaquita. Theporpoises have fewpredators, but they often get

Vaquita apocalypse

FLIPNICKLIN/MINDEN

PICTURES/NATIONALGEOGRAPHICCREATIVE

Heat respite in sightAPRILwasthe seventh month ina row

to smashglobal temperaturerecords,buta briefrespite ison thecardswith

thepresentEl Nio comingto anend.

Since October, eachmonthhas

exceeded the 1951-1980 global

temperatureaverage forthat month

bymore than 1C.The heatwave is

fuelledby a double whammyof global

warmingand a strong El Niocycle.

Therelativecontributionsof these

twophenomenaare hardto gauge,

butclues canbe foundin previous

El Niocycles, says Blair Trewin ofthe

Australian Bureauof Meteorology.

Ifyou compare thetemperatures

ofthelast12 monthswiththesame

stagesof thelast strong El Nioevent

in1997and1998, its about0.3C

warmer this time round, says

Trewin. This is consistent with

an overall warming trend.

However, the record run of highglobal temperatures may be

interrupted towards the end of the

year when La Nia kicks in, he says.

La Nia has the opposite effect to

El Nio, the cyclical weather pattern

that warms the central and eastern

tropical Pacific Ocean.

The present El Nio phase began

in 2015. Last week, the US National

Oceanic and Atmospheric

Administration reported that there

is a 75 per cent chance of it switching

to La Nia as early as September.

If records are still being broken

[during La Nia], it will suggest that

it is background warming that is

playing the key role, says Agus

Santoso of the University of New

South Wales in Sydney, Australia.


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21May 2016 | NewScientist |7

THEWhite House is taking aninterest inyourgut.It has just

launched its National MicrobiomeInitiative,a $500millioneffortto understand thecomplexcommunitiesof bacteria,fungiandother microbesthat live onor in everything.

Disruptions to our microbialmixhavebeenimplicatedinahostof diseases, butthe microbiomeaffectsthe environmenttoo.Microbial imbalances canlead tozones oflow oxygenin oceans killing offfish while agriculturaldepletion of bacteriacan result in

barrensoils. The plan is todeveloptechnology to optimisesuchcommunities (seepage 16), saysJo Handelsman at theWhite

House Office of ScienceandTechnologyPolicy.

Thegovernment willprovide$121millionfor theinitiativeover the nexttwo years, andmorethan 100 universities, charities,foundations andcompanies willchip ina further$400 million.

Thefunding andscope oftheprojectis comparable withandperhaps larger than thecontroversial HumanBrainProject,accordingto a WhiteHouse spokesperson.

Microbemoonshot

JERRYLAMPEN/REUTERS

Fornew stories everyday, visitnewscientist.com/news

StatinsnafuIT HASbeen brandeda farce.A software error means anunknown number of people intheUK havebeentoldto takecholesterol-lowering drugs whenthey didnt needto or told theydidnt need to consider thedrugswhen they should have done.

Statins are recommended for

those who havenothad a heartattack butare deemedto haveatleasta10percentchanceofhavingone inthe next10 years,becauseof riskfactorslikesmokingand overweight, or afamilyhistoryof these factors.There is an online calculator forthisheart attack risk,but somedoctors in the UKhave beenusing softwarethatmaygive thewrong result.

Abouta thirdof UK familydoctorspracticesuse a program

made by the ITcompany TPP. Lastmonth, the firm told theUKgovernmentthat there wasaproblem withthe software, andthatit has overstatedtherisk forsomepeoplewhile understating itfor others. Thegovernment tolddoctorsof thison Wednesday.

Only a limitednumber ofpatientsare potentially affected,a governmentspokesperson said,butadmitted the company hadnotrevealed what proportion oftestresultswere wrong. Hints ofpromise

tangled in the gill nets favouredby poachers targeting anothercritically endangered animal:a fish of similar size called the

totoaba. In China, Totoaba swimbladders fetch a lot of money asthey are considered a delicacy.

Despite government efforts tocrack down on poaching, vaquitascontinue to decline. This is duepartly to loopholes in regulationthat allow the use of gill nets tocatch other large fish. If thevaquita disappears, it is entirelyupon the government of Mexicofor letting that happen, says ZakSmith of the Natural ResourcesDefense Council in California.

60 SECONDS

Private presentThe first man in the US to undergo

a penis transplant, 64-year-old

Thomas Manning, says he looks

forward to returning to a normal life

after his own penis was amputated

as part of cancer treatment.

Surgeons at Bostons Massachusetts

General Hospital matched Mannings

skin tone and blood type with a

dead donor.

Floating wind farmScotland is to get the worlds largest

floating wind farm, with five

6 megawatt turbines generating

electricity by the end of 2017.

Norwegian energy company Statoilhas been granted a seabed lease for

the development, 24 kilometres off

the coast of Peterhead.

Dinosaur drillThe Chicxulub crater, in Mexicos

Yucatn peninsula, is about to yield

its secrets. It was made by an

asteroid that struck Earth 66 million

years ago and is thought to have

wiped out the dinosaurs. A drilling

project has taken samples from the

crater, which will be analysed in June.

Paint-on GMOsA US company, AgGenetics, has

developed a technique to custom-

design animals fur patterns through

genetic engineering. It hopes to

create a heat-tolerant version of

Angus beef cattle whose coats are

white instead of dark, so the animals

can thrive in the hot tropics. The

technique could also pave the way

for custom-designed pets.

Space fluidsBodily fluids created in space landed

on Earth on 11 May, when Elon Musks

Dragon capsule splashed down in

the Pacific Ocean. It was carrying

almost 1700 kilograms of scientific

material from the ISS, and included

bodily waste and other samples from

astronaut Scott Kelly, who spent a

year on board the station. The

material could tell us about the

effects of long stints in space.

Magic away depressionSHROOM for improvement? The first

clinical trial of magic mushrooms for

depression has produced some

encouraging results, but involved

only 12 people and no control group.

The trial aimed to test whether

psilocybin the active ingredient in

magic mushrooms might be a safe

treatment for depression. All the

volunteers had previously tried

at least two other treatments

without success.

Each participant underwent two

psychotherapy sessions, both

conducted after doses of psilocybin.

A week after the second session, all

of them had reduced symptoms.

After three months, five no longer

met the clinical criteria for depression

(The Lancet Psychiatry, DOI:

10.1016/S2215-0366(16)30065-7).

Although there was no placebo

group, the results are promising, said

Phil Cowen, a psychiatrist at the

University of Oxford, who wasnt

involved in the study.

Enthusiasts have long believed

that the drugs ability to induce

profound-feeling experiences could

be therapeutically useful. Brain-

imaging studies have shown that

psilocybin targets areas of the brain

overactive in depression.

Team member Robin Carhart-

Harris of Imperial College London

said that therapists are important

for a positive outcome, and has

discouraged people from self-

medicating. That kind of approach

could be risky, he said.


9/60


ChrisBaraniuk

WEcanturnwater into wine in15 minutes. So claims theAvaWinery, a San Francisco start-upthat is making synthetic winewithoutgrapes simply bycombining flavour compounds,water and ethanol.

Mardonn Chua and Alec Leecame up with the idea while

visiting a winery in CaliforniasNapa Valleyin 2015. There, they

wereshown the bottleof an iconicwine, Chateau Montelena, whichis famous for being the firstCalifornian Chardonnay to beatFrench contenders at the ParisWine Tasting of 1976.

I was transfixed bythisbottle displayed on thewall,says Chua.I could neverafforda bottle like this,I could neverenjoy it. That gotme thinking.

Traditionally, wineis madebyfermenting grapes yeast turnssugars in the grape juice into

ethanol. The process also developsmany hundreds of flavourcompounds, but takes timeand produces variable results.Could there be a simpler way?

Within days, Chua begancombining ethanol with fruityflavour compounds like ethyl

hexanoate, which has a pineapplelike aroma. The initial concoctionwas monstrous, he says.

But six months later, Chua andLee think they have produced anexperimental synthetic wine thamimics the taste of the sparklingItalian white wine Moscato dAsti(see Notes of peach and plasticbag, right). They are now turningtheir hands to producing an

imitation Dom Prignonchampagne.

The race is onto developsynthetic foodand drink. Thefirst in vitro beefburger grownfrommeat cells cultured inlaboratories was eaten inLondon in 2013, but it cost$325,000 to make.

In vitro meat isnt the onlyattempt to make ethicalalternatives to our favouritefoods. Hampton Creek, a foodfirm in California, is attempting

T W

Welcome to the wine labA Californian start-up wants to bring the taste of fine vintages to the masses,

by chemically mimicking classic wines no grapes necessary

I saw this iconic bottle ofwine that I could neverafford or enjoy. It got methinking

FAKING A FLAVOUR

Wine wouldnt be the first tastysubstance to be chemically mimicked.

Vanilla is the worlds second most

expensive spice after saffron, and is

facing a global shortage, with prices

of Madagascan natural vanilla

doubling to 158 per kilogram in

the last 12 months. But home

bakers need not fear chemically

synthesised vanillin , a phenolic

aldehyde, has been used as a

cheap but tasty substitute for over

100 years, costing only 10 per kg.

And you dont need life to give youlemons to be able to make lemonade.

A basic version can be made simply

by combining citric acid with sugar

and carbonated water. Some argue

this mixture doesnt taste as good,

but it is easier to preserve.

The artificial sweetener xylitol

is made by reacting xylose with

hydrogen. Sugar substitutes are

lower in calories than sugars like

sucrose, and may be better for your

teeth and blood sugar levels too.

AVALABS

A new kind of mixolog


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21 May2016| NewScientist | 9

to develop vegan eggs, madeby mixing plant proteins.

Weve been making syntheticlemonade for decades (see Fakinga flavour, left), and now a start-up

in New York is turning its hand toluxury coffee. Highly prized kopiluwak is made from coffee beansfound in the excrement of theAsian palm civet Afineur ishoping it can copythe tasteby

fermenting carefully selectedmicrobes instead.

But the Ava Winery is aimingto make artificial wines simplyby mixing the right compoundstogether. For all the worlds love ofwine, our understanding of whichcomponents are most importantfor the taste and finish of a wine ispatchy at best. A bottle usuallycontains around 1000 differentcompounds, so identifying thosethat are fundamental for flavouris a significant challenge.

The team decided to combinechemistry with the expert taste

In this section

The war that brought down Europes first civilisations, page 10

Galaxy that time forgot, page 12

The gap between gut microbiome science and its promise, page 16

buds of a qualified sommelier.Using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and othertools, the team analysed the

composition of wines includingChardonnay, champagne andPinot Noir, identifying keyflavour molecules like theesters ethyl isobutyrate andethyl hexanoate and theirconcentrations (see Whatsin synthetic wine?, left).They then mixed thesemolecules and tinkeredwith the proportions, andhad their sommelier test theresulting concoctions.

$50 Dom Prignon

Tony Milanowski, a winemakingexpert at Plumpton College inEast Sussex, UK, has his doubts.Some flavour compounds likefatty acids and esters may bedifficult to dissolve straight intoa synthetic batch. These areusually produced as microbesferment the grapes, graduallyreleasing the chemicals in formsthat are able to mix with the

other compounds present.But Chua and Lee are notdeterred. The big secret here isthat most compounds in winehave no perceptible impact on theflavour or the aroma, says Lee.

Its absolutely going to besubstantially cheaper, Lee says oftheir method, which cuts out theneed to grow grapes and thenferment them over long periods.

They plan to sell an initialbatch of 499 bottles of theirDom Prignon mimic. At $50

a pop, they will begin shippingthis summer to customers keento experience the taste of aclassic champagne that couldotherwise cost upwards ofseveral hundred dollars.

But the team is likely tomeet with stiff resistancefrom classical winemakersand researchers.

Its nonsense, to be honestwith you, says Alain Deloire,director of the National Wineand Grape Industry Centre

AFP

NOTES OF PEACH AND PLASTIC BAG

Lisa Grossman tried an early version of

the Ava Winerys Moscato dAsti mimic.

Here are her tasting notes:I had high hopes for the synthetic

Moscato dAsti. Unfortunately, I dont

think its ready to compete with the

real thing.

We did a blind taste test between

the synthetic wine and a Ruffino

2014 wine from Italy. The smell was

the first thing that gave the synthetic

stuff away: while the Ruffino

smelled grapey and fruity, the

synthetic wine smelled astringent,

more like cleaning alcohol or plastic.

A co-worker described it as the smell

of those inflatable sharks you take to

the pool. Not very appealing.

The two wines were very different

in colour, too the Ruffino was a

deeper yellow, and the synthetic

wine was clearer with smaller

bubbles. The Ruffino was a bit

thicker, and when you swirled it in

the glass it left slight streaks runningdown the sides, a feature known as

legs. The synthetic wine didnt have

much in the way of legs at all.

SWEET AND FRUITY

The synthetic wine tasted better

than it smelled, though.

It was sweet, which I expected,

but not overpoweringly sweet. It had

some fruity notes like pear or peach,

and maybe something artificially

floral-scented, like a lavender soap.

But that essence of plastic bag

was back on the aftertaste. Overall,

Im not sure I would drink a whole

glass of this.

Ava Winery says it is now working

on improving its synthetic Moscato

dAsti prototype.

Tannins(astringency

and colour)

Glycerin and sugar(mouthfeeland

viscosity)

Flavour compoundslikeethyl

isobutyrate

Ethanol(~13%, varied

to match original)

Water(~85%)

Whats in synthetic wine?

The Ava Winery is mimicking wine byadding chemical compounds to ethanol

The big secret is most ofthe hundreds of chemicalsin wine have no perceptibleimpact on flavour

at Charles Sturt University,Australia, who has worked

for champagne specialistsMot & Chandon.

Deloire argues that thenatural origins of wine thelandscape and culture wherethe grapes grow, for example have an indispensable impacton the drink that is produced,and consumers look for thisin what they buy.

One thing that might putconsumers off is that anysynthetic wine is unlikely to havethe word wine on its label. There

are strict rules governing whichproducts may use this term in

the EU, for example, it must applyonly to the fermented juice ofgrapes, whereas in otherjurisdictions like the US otherfruits can be used.

But although losing someof the trappings of traditionalwine may make synthetic onesless attractive, French winemakerJulien Miquel can foresee aninterest in trying recreationsof classic vintages. There wouldbe some curiosity on how closethey could get, he says.


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T W

ColinBarras

THE Trojan war wasperhapsgrander thaneven Homer wouldhaveus believe. In fact, theepicconflict mayhavebeen a finalactin what onearchaeologist hasdubbedworld war zero aneventhe claims broughttheeasternMediterranean worldtoits knees 3200 yearsago.

Andthecatalyst? TheLuwians a mysteriousand arguablypowerful civilisation overlookedby archaeologists. So saysEberhardZangger, headof thenon-profit foundation, LuwianStudies,in Zurich,Switzerland.

The story goes like this.By thesecondmillenniumBC,civilisationhad taken holdintheeasternMediterranean.TheEgyptianNewKingdomcoexistedwiththe Hittitesof central

Anatolia andtheMycenaeans ofGreece.Then in little morethana generation, all of them hadcollapsed. Was the culprit climatechange? Earthquakes? Socialunrest? Experts cant agree.

Zangger says thats becauseone crucial pieceof the puzzle ismissing: theLuwiancivilisationin westernAnatolia played a

crucial role in the downfall. Andhe has built a case. The literatureshows that western Anatolia wasrich in mineral and metal oredeposits, making it an importantregion in antiquity, he thinks.

Through studies of satelliteimagery, Zangger has found thatthe area was densely populated.

Only a handful of the 340 largecity-like sites he has identifiedhave been excavated.

Some of these sites are so

large you can see them fromspace, says Zangger. Theresso much waiting to be found,its really just mind-boggling.

We know from Hittite textsthat the Luwian cities sometimesformed coalitions powerfulenough to attack the Hittiteempire. Zangger thinks that 3200years ago the Luwians did justthat and destroyed the Hittites.

Shortly after, Egyptian texts

document an attack force theytermed the Sea People. Zanggerthinks these were also Luwians,continuing their campaign for

wealth and power and, in theprocess, destabilising theEgyptian New Kingdom.

The Mycenaeans, perhapsanticipating an attack on theirterritory, formed a grand coalitioof their own, says Zangger. Theysailed across the Aegean andattacked the Luwians, destroyingkey cities like Troy eventsimmortalised in HomersIliad.

On returning to Greece, in thesudden absence of other threats,Zangger believes the Mycenaeans

squabbled and fell into civil war.Other archaeologists praise

Zangger for bringing attentionto this region, but question hisgrander conclusions.

Hes really getting the ballrolling to do larger holistic studiesof the area, says ChristophBachhuber at the University ofOxford. Archaeologists will needto discover similar examples ofmonumental art and architecturacross western Anatolia and

ideally texts from the same sitesto support Zanggers claim of acivilisation.

The textual evidence availableis from after the Bronze Age andcan be interpreted as supportingor undermining Zanggers theorysays Ilya Yakubovich, a historicallinguist at the University ofMarburg, Germany.

Trojan war final act

in world war zero

FINEARTIMAGES/HERITAGEIMAGES/GETTY

A rising number of objectsare being discovered thatblur the line betweencomets and asteroids

Gift horse Bronze Age D-day?

WHENis a comet not a comet?Its

a questionastronomers areasking

themselves more and more often.

Nowit seems oneof these supposed

iceballs might actuallybe an asteroid

thatgetswithina cosmichairs

breadthof thesun a mere8 million

kilometresfromit.

Thetwokinds ofspace rocksare

traditionally thoughtto be very

Sun-skimming

comet might bean asteroid

different. Comets are loose piles of

rock and ice on long, elliptical orbits

that heat up and develop a tail ofgases as they near the sun. Asteroids,

on the other hand, are lumpy bodies

of hard rock and metal that mostly

orbit the sun at a distance that falls

somewhere between Mars and Jupiter.

But an increasing number of

objects are being discovered that blur

the line between the two. The latest is

comet 322P/SOHO 1, discovered in

1999 by NASAs Solar and Heliospheric

Observatory. But SOHOs view is

shaded to protect it from intense

sunlight and its resolution is

comparatively low, meaning it cant

get a good look at 322P during the

comets closest approach to the sun.Now, Matthew Knight at the

University of Maryland in College

Park and his colleagues have used

ground-based telescopes and the

Spitzer space telescope to take

another look. They found there was

no sign of a tail from 322P as it got

close to the sun. They also found that

its density is at least 1000 kilograms

per cubic metre, double that of the

famous comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (The Astrophysical

Journal Letters, doi.org/bhjj).

The readings are a big clue that

322P may actually be an asteroid,

says Knight. If so, that would make

it the asteroid that gets closest to

the sun, coming to within about

5 per cent of the distance between

Earth and the sun.

Knowing where the line falls

between asteroid and comet is usefu

in helping us trace the history of the

solar system. Jacob Aron


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Jacob Aron

AGALAXYthatseemstoberelativelyunchangedsince it

was born shortlyafter the bigbang could help us understandthecosmosinthedeeppastandlearn howthe earliestgalaxiesformedstars.

Shortlyafter thebig bang,theonly elements in theuniversewere hydrogen andhelium,with a few traces ofother lightelements. Heavier elements,which astronomersrefer to asmetals, were only createdafterthehydrogenand helium formedinto stars, which forged new

elements throughnuclear fusion.Because of this, astronomers

measurethe abundance ofmetals within starsand galaxiesto track their evolution. NowAlec Hirschauer of IndianaUniversity in Bloomington andhis colleagues have measured asmall galaxy called AGC 198691,around 30 million light yearsfromEarth,with thelowestmetallicityever seen.

This galaxy is a close analogueto what we expectgalaxieswere

likeshortly after theyformedafter thebig bang, before theyhave hadthe timeto chemicallyenrich to the levels wesee in

local, nearby systems, saysHirschauer. It is a nearbylaboratory we can use toapproximate the conditionssoon after the big bang.

The galaxy is near theconstellation Leo Minor, so theteam nicknamed it the Leoncinodwarf. They used telescopes inArizona at the Kitt Peak NationalObservatory in Tucson, and theMMT Observatory in Mount

Hopkins,to analysethe lightfromLeoncinoandfound thatitsratio ofoxygento hydrogen a proxy for overallmetallicity is the lowestever seen, just 2 percent of our suns metallicity(TheAstrophysical Journal, doi.org/10/bhjk).

Leoncinohosts bright,bluestars, which could only haveformedrelatively recently, as stars

generally starttheir lives blue andhot and get redder and dimmer asthey age.Thatmeans thegalaxyprobably forms starsvery slowly,and is onlystartingto useupmaterial hangingaroundsincethebig bang.

Astronomers dontyetunderstandwhy somegalaxiesformstars moreslowly thanothers,thoughit seems to berelatedto their mass. AGC198691isasmallgalaxy,andsohasbeen inefficientat converting gas

into stars over the length oftimethat it hasexisted, saysHirschauer.

StudyingLeoncino further willhelp deepen ourunderstandingof thedifferences betweengalaxies, andalsogive us a lookback at howgalaxies behaved inthe earlyuniverse.

By studying how the stars ofAGC 198691 are forming, we havea glimpse into what very earlygalaxies were doing, saysHirschauer.

THE earliestAmericans migrated

quickly, butwere less quickto wipe

outtheir prey.That pictureis painted

byfinds from thebottomof a watery

Floridasinkhole9 metresdeep,

including 14,500-year-old stone

tools andthe remainsof a butchered

mastodon, a typeof prehistoric

elephant.

Having arrivedon thePacificcoast

at least 15,500yearsago, these first

settlers must have rapidlyspreadeas

and south to occupyvast swathes of

North America,the discoveries

suggest.Theyalso show thathuman

lived alongside large mammals for at

least two millennia before the anima

went extinct challenging the

assumption that we speedily drove

megafauna to extinction (Science

Advances, doi.org/bhjg).

We maybeneed toreopen ourline

of investigation into the interactions

between these early people and meg

mammals, says Jessi Halligan at

Florida State University in Tallahasse

Her team donned scuba gear to

recover the stone artefacts and bones

at Page-Ladson, in north-west Florida

For a long time, the first human

culture in America was thought to be

that of the Clovis people, who arrived

from Siberia about 13,000 years ago.

The new discovery adds to evidencethat pre-Clovis people reached the

Americas at least 2500 years earlier.

These people had successfully

adapted to their environment; they

knew where to find fresh water, game

plants, raw materials for making tools

and other critical resources for

survival, the teams paper says.

It is excellent proof of the

pre-Clovis occupation of eastern

North America, says Dennis Stanford

at the Smithsonian Institution in

Washington DC. Colin Barras

The galaxy thattime forgot

BABAKTAFRESHI/NATIONALGEOGRAPHICCREATIVE

These people knew whereto find game, raw materialfor tools and other criticalresources for survival

Kitt Peak eyes up the universe

First Americanshunted big

game in Florida

T W

Leoncino: slow star makerNASA;

A.H

IRSCHAUER&J.SALZER

,IU;

J.CANNON

,MACALESTERCOLLEGE;

ANDK

.MCQUINN

,UT


14/60

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15/60

14| NewScientist | 21 May2016

ITSa sticky business. Scientistshave uncovered how embryosstickto theuterusin the firstweek of life. Thediscoverymight oneday help improvetreatments for recurrentmiscarriages and pre-eclampsia,a life-threatening elevation ofmaternal blood pressure.

After a human eggis fertilised,it tumblesdown themothersfallopian tubes andinto her

uterus.There,it sticks to theuterinewall andthen buries itselfunder thewalls lining.

Now, HarryMoore andBikemSoygur at theUniversityofSheffield, UK, haveshown that aproteincalled syncytin-1 probablyplaysa vital role in this process.

Syncytin-1is known to helpembryosburrowinto theuterus,aswellasformaplacentaaprocessthat begins about sixdays

after fertilisation. ButMoore andSoygur found that theproteinissecreted earlier thanthis (HumanReproduction, doi.org/bhgt).

Moore thinksthe proteinisproduced thisearlyto help theembryostick to theuterus,asprevious researchhas shown thatsyncytin-1 makesdifferent celltypes stick together.

Hesaysitmaybepossibletousethe findingto developbloodtests that identifyembryos thathavent implanted properly.

JANVANDEKAM

Early Arctic melting famishesoverwintering birds in Africa

WHAT happens in theArcticdoesntstayin theArctic.

Climatechangeis affecting thehigh-Arcticbreeding

groundsof redknots. Theyoungsters among these

small shorebirds dontgrowas big as they did 30years

ago andso struggleto feed and surviveafterreaching

their wintering groundsin Africa.

Redknotsmakeepic journeys from theArcticOceanto

thetropicsand backevery year.For more than30 years,

Janvan Gilsat NIOZ RoyalNetherlands Institute forSea

Research and hiscolleagueshavebeen measuring the

birds eachautumnat a migratory stopover in Poland.

They found thatjuvenile birds weighedless and had

shorterbills in years whenthe Arcticsnowpack melted

early, probablybecause they hatchedafterthe peakof

insect abundance (Science, doi.org/bhgr).

Once theknotsreach their wintering groundson the

coast ofMauritania in western Africa,shorter bills prove

costly. Theknotspreferred food is a small clamthat lives

30 or 40 millimetres below thesurface of thesand,

and thebirdsbill is normallyalmostexactly that length.

Havinga shorterbill means they cantreachas many of

those clams, andhave to resortto eating shallower

clams which arescarcer or plant rhizomes, which are

nutrient-poor. Everymillimetrecounts,says van Gils.

Shorter-billedbirds were muchless likelyto survive

their first year,the researchers found.

How embryos get attached

Cannibal starsexplode violently

CALL it cosmic indigestion. InJanuary 2015, observers witnessea rarered novain the nearbyAndromeda galaxy that outshonordinarystellar explosions.

Using HubbleSpace Telescopeobservationsfrom a decade earlieMorgan MacLeodof the Universitof California at Santa Cruz and hicolleagues have concluded that alarge yellowstar ate a little red on(arxiv.org/abs/1605.01493). Its astar-eat-star universe, he says.

Normally,in a close binary, the

gravitationalpull of one star pinstheother,so that one side of onestar always facesthe same side oftheother star. Butthe lower massof thered dwarf left it vulnerableto so-calledDarwin instability,proposedby Charless son Georgein 1879. As thegiant star aged, itexpandedand spun more slowly.The red star couldnt keep facingits partner andfell towards it,eventually skimming the surfaceandtriggering theflare-up.

Dwarf planetdeserves a name

WHATS a planet gotta do to get amoniker? A bodybeyond the orbiof Neptune, known only as 2007OR10, maybe thethird largestdwarfplanetin the solar system yet it doesnthavea proper name

Itisoneofagaggleoftrans-Neptunian objectsdiscovered by

a teamled by Mike Brown at theCaliforniaInstitute of Technologyin the2000s. Theteam originallypeggedits diameter at about 1200kilometres, making it the secondsmallestdwarfplanet.

Butnow a teamled by AndrsPl of theKonkolyObservatory inBudapest,Hungary, has used datafromthe Keplerand Herschelspace telescopes to revise that to1535km, bumpingit up to thirdplace(The Astronomical Journal,doi.org/bhhb).


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21 May 2016 |NewScientist |15

Shooting starsoxygen mystery

FEWthingsseem more ephemeralthanshootingstars. Yetthe scorched

remainsof 60 micrometeorites have

survived 2.7billionyearsin the

limestone Tumbiana Formation of

Western Australia. They aresome

ofthe oldest space rocks ever

discoveredon Earth.

Thefact thatthe meteorites

containoxides ofiron alsoshows

thatthe upper atmospheremust

have contained oxygenat least

300million years earlierthan

ground-level air.

We were very surprised tofind

micrometeorites at all,let alone

those withiron oxides, says

MatthewGengeof ImperialCollege

London. These tiny spherules had

trapped ancient atmosphere, storing

it away like little treasure chests.

The presence of oxygen in the

meteorites means that levels of this

gas in the upper atmosphere,

75 kilometres high, at the time must

have beensimilar tolevelsfoundin

theatmosphere today roughly

20percent(Nature, doi.org/bhgs).

That oxygen might have come

from the suns ultraviolet radiation

splitting molecules such as water

and sulphur dioxide, thus freeing

oxygen at high altitudes. The

team thinks a methane-rich layer

in the middle atmosphere would

have separated the bulk of anoxic

air below from the oxygen-rich

upper atmosphere.

Time for a new dandruff shampoo?

LOOKS like ourknowledgewas a

little flaky. It seems bacteria, rather

thanfungi, could determine whether

youget dandruff.Since the19th century, the

prevailingwisdomhas beenthat a

fungus called Malasseziaisto blame

fordandruff.But nowwe have

bacteriain thecrosshairs.

Zhijue Xuof Shanghai JiaoTong

Universityin China and histeam

swabbedthe scalps of363 adults,

and usedDNA sequencing to

comparetheirfungi and bacteria.

They foundthat about90 percent of

scalp fungus in all people,regardless

ofwhether or nottheyhad dandruff,

wasMalasseziarestricta.

Butbacteria revealed a different

story. Peoplewith dandruffhad moreStaphylococcusbacteriaand much

less Propionibacteriumthanthose

whodidnt have dandruff, suggesting

that thebacterial balanceon your

headmay determinewhether you

sport snowyflakesin your coiffure

(ScientificReports, doi.org/bhgq).

Xu says his team will now

investigate methods for balancing

the proportions of scalp bacteria,

which they hope might be a way to

reduce dandruff.

ONEof thehardest steps leadinguptolifeonEarthmightnotbeso

hard after all.RNA, or something very likeit,

haslong been a strong candidatefor thefirst self-replicatingmolecule necessary for life. Itcarriesgeneticinformation andcanalso catalyse manybiochemical reactions.

Buthowcould a large, complexmolecule likeRNA formspontaneously?The main stickingpointwas thatno one knewof aplausible wayto make twocomponentsof it, adenosine and

guanosine neededto representAandGinthegeneticcode.

Making these subunitsseparatelyandlinkingthem together stepbystep generallyled to a uselessmess inwhich most ofthemolecules were thewrong shape.

Now a team ledby ThomasCarell, an organicchemist atthe LudwigMaximiliansUniversity in Munich, Germany,mayhavecracked it.Theystarted withsimplerprecursorchemicals andlet thewholeprocessunfoldat once, undermildly acidic conditions that

mimicked those of early Earth.Their approachproducedhigh

yields of adenosine, andsomeguanosine (Science, DOI:doi.org/bhgv).Better yet, Carells startingpointssuchasformicacidortheir precursors have been foundon comets andthus were probablyavailable at theorigin of life.

We nowhavea pathway thatwould allowus touse simplemolecules that were likelypresenton the early Earth,saysCarell.The next step is tolink thecomponentsinto a full-lengthRNAstrand,he says.

Lifes originnot so tough if youcan buildbitsof RNA in the lab

Spiders sticky silkhas a dual identity

SPIDER silk acts as both a liquidand a solid, a feat that couldinspire new types of robots.

Arnaud Antkowiak of the Pierreand Marie Curie University inParis, France, and his colleaguesstudied the sticky capture silk

that makes up the spiral of anorb-weaverspiders web. Whenstretched, thesilk extendslikea spring. Butwhen compressed,it remains taut, rather thansagging in the middle as anordinarythread might.

Mostmaterials that actlikethis areliquids: a soap film isan example.

It seems to adapt its length,says Antkowiak.The capturesilk appears tobe a liquid-solidhybridthat changes itssize

according to thespace it needsto fill. Its just weird, he says.This dual nature stems from thesilk being made of a filamentwrapped in glue droplets.

The team was able to mimic thisbehaviour with a range of plasticfilaments coated in silicone oil,ethanol or other liquids, creatingwhat they call liquid wires (PNAS,DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1602451113).

Antkowiak says this behaviourcould make the materials usefulin building soft robots.

For new stories every day, visit newscientist.com/news


17/60

16|NewScientist |21 May 2016

AREtheyforus,againstusorjustcohabiting?Itshard to know whatto think about the microbes thatliveinandonus.Inthesameweekthatresearchers announced thatthere is no evidence that probioticsupplements work, theWhiteHouse launched theNationalMicrobiomeInitiative.This

$500millionmoonshotisintended to understand thevastcoloniesof bacteria, fungi andviruses that coevolvedwith ourbodies,lands andoceans.Thehopeisthatitwillleadtobreakthroughs in healthandmany other fields of science.

We need the means to changedysfunctional microbiomes andmakethem functional,saysJo Handelsman,at theObamaadministrations Officeof

Science and Technology Policy.On the human health side,thousands of papers have beenpublished over the last few yearslinking changes in gut floracomposition to allergies, asthma,obesity, cancer, Parkinsons,Alzheimers, anorexia, autism,depression and even ageing.

The studies hint that we mayone day be able to affect these

conditionsby tweaking our gutbugs. Buttheres quite a gapbetweenthis promise andthecurrentscience. That vacuumhasbeen filled with misconceptions,snake oil andhype.JonathanEisen, a biologist at theUniversityof California, Davis, calls itmicrobiomania.

The National MicrobiomeInitiative seeks to bridge that gap,but it couldbe decades before itsscientists canunpickthe complexinterplay of microbeand humanbiologyto develop treatments.

So in themeantime,what should

wemakeof the dizzyingarrayof touted medicallinks, theriseof DIYmicrobialtransplantsandtheprobiotic foods industry,which someestimatesputat$96 billion by 2020? Not tomention the spectre of faeco-cosmetic treatments.

Lets start with that array ofmedical links. The intriguingassociations we are seeing can be

traced back to the trillionmicrobes in our guts producingchemicals that break downproteins and cell walls. This hasdownstream effects on aspectslike chemical regulation, theimmune system and the brain,the specific mechanisms of whichare just starting to be decoded.

Although possible connectionsbetween bacterialproductsand medical conditions aremultiplying fast, not everyoneagrees that the bacteria arecausing the observed effects,rather than the other way around.No doubt microbes drasticallyinfluence many aspects of ourbiology, says Eisen, but as withbrain scans, finding a differencebetween twogroupsof peopledoesnttell youa lot.

Whats more, says MickWatsonof theUniversityof Edinburgh,UK,a lotof peopledo reallybad microbiome research,without, for example, usingcontrol subjects.

And most of the good science isdone in mice. Several experimentshave suggested that autism-likebehaviours and gastrointestinalailments can be explained bymicrobiota, and in one case thesebehaviours were suspended byinjecting microbes from

neurotypical humans. But doesthat tell you much about autism?None of that makes any sense!says Eisen. Mice dont have autism.This is not autism. Nonetheless,it has led to headlines suggestingautism was cured by probiotics.

Much like Eisen, manymicrobiologists are worried aboutthe premature applications ofthese studies. Another bugbear ofhis is microbial forensics. Peopleare saying we should considerhaving criminals microbiomes

typed for a database, he says. Are

you kidding me? People have beeexecuted based on bad forensicsin thepast.

More immediatelyconcerningis theriseof faecal transplants taking faeces from someonehealthy and giving them, viarectal insertion, to someone else.

Inthe US and Canada, thetransplantation is regulated asan investigational drug, whichmeans itsuse is restricted toclinicaltrials the exception istreating Clostridium difficile

infections, for which thetransplants have a 90 per centsuccess rate. In the UK, however,the transplants arent consideredmedical procedures, so can bedoneif a supervising physicianagrees to it. TheTaymountClinic in Hitchin, UK, for examploffersthem for ulcerative colitis,multiple sclerosisand Parkinsondisease,and its counterpartintheBahamasis treating peoplewith autism (seeFaecaltourism, right).

LY OO

Moonshot or mania?The White House has launched a huge project into themicrobes that live on us. Sally Adee looks behind the hype

MARTINOEGGERLI/WWW.M

ICRONAUT.C

H

SWALLOWING A MYTH?

Its tempting to think that regulardoses of friendly bacteria will keep

your gut happy. This notion explains

the wild success of probiotic drinks,

yogurts and supplements.

But last week, the market got a

black eye from a review of existing

studies that found no evidence that

taking probiotics benefits healthy

people. In four of seven trials

analysed, no effects were observed

on the faecal microbiota composition

when compared with a placebo

(GenomeMedicine, doi.org/bg82).There are several reasons why this

could be. Some suppliers may use

bacteria that are dead. Others dont

put in the right mix, says Jonathan

Eisen of the University of California,

Davis. Even a well-made probiotic is

unlikely to survive the enzymes that

kill microbes traversing our bodies.

Three other studies did find some

changes to the abundance of certain

bacteria, but because of their poor

design, no conclusions can be drawn.

It may take decadesto unpick the complexinterplay of microbesand human biology


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All the microbiologistsNew

Scientistspoke to vehementlywarned against seeking out aclinic for this until trials havefound conclusive evidence thatthe procedure works for therelevant condition andis safe.They werealarmed bythegrowingtrend of DIYtransplants people armed with a blenderand an enema kit going it alone.

So if faecal transplants are an

application too far, at least for

now, and probiotics have littleimpact (see Swallowing a myth?,left), what can microbes do for usin the next few years?

Think beyondthegutmicrobiome,says ElisabethBik,a microbiologist at StanfordUniversity in California.Researchers have long sought tomanipulate oral microbiota forthe treatment of bad breath or

Friend or foe?-

tooth decay.Osel, a companyin California, is modifying thevaginal microbiome to treatbacterial vaginosis; andat

Washington University,researchers are supplementingtheskin withprobiotic bacteriatotreat wound infectionsor acne.

Bik sees these as legitimateapplicationsthat arent toofar off.

Thejuryisstilloutonwhether eye-catching disease

cures will ever materialise. Itslike the post-genome blues, saysEisen.We spent $2 billion on thehumangenome,and it was soldas being critical to developingcuresfor allsortsof humanailments.So far,it has led tomore questions than answers.

Watson thinks the problem isthat todays microbiome researchis incomplete and focuses mainlyon bacteria. Most of it ignoresfungi, protists, viruses and other

parts of the microbiome, he says.Even if those were included, itwouldnt be enough for many[microbial] genes, we simply donot know what they do, he says.For microbiome research todevelop, the field needs to becomemore focused, build standardsand change from being a mostlyobservational science.

Thats exactly what the NationalMicrobiome Initiative aims to do.Were looking for the principlesthat govern the response of the

microbiome, says Handelsman.In the meantime, scientists and

press officers should take care toavoid hype. You cant put out apress release that says youvesolved autism oh, footnote, itwas in mice, says Eisen. Its naiveto think this wont send people toclinics to get a faecal transplantfor an autistic child, he says. Whilemoonshot programmes unpickthe impossible complexity of themicrobiome, people will try toapply it by any means necessary.

FAECAL TOURISM

The Taymount Clinic in Hitchin, UK,

is the UKs premier destination for

those looking for a faecal transplant.It offers them for conditions such as

ulcerative colitis, multiple sclerosis

and Parkinsons disease. The faeces

come from non-smoking, non-

drinking, naturally slim donors.

Glenn Taylor, who runs Taymount,

says rising demand has forced the

clinic to build an extension that more

than doubles its size.

Sixty per cent of its clients come

from the US and Canada, so in July

2015, the clinic opened a branch in

the Bahamas just a half-hour

flight from Florida, in a beautiful

environments, says the website.

Taylor says the Caribbean outpost

has carried out faecal transplants

on people with autism. They are

changing the way that autistic

patients present just by changing

the microflora, he says. And its the

same with obesity: We hear all the

time from patients with transplants

who suddenly have no trouble

losing weight.

NOTSOCLEAN BREAK

The clinic is also developing a

wellness treatment for healthy

people as a kind of spring cleaning

for the gut, a week-long retreat

involving a series of colonics followed

by a selection of faecal transplants.

It would freshen you up if you

were feeling a little sluggish,

or after a holiday, says Enid Taylor,

a co-founder of the clinic.

However, so far, faecal transplants

have been shown to work only for

Clostridium difficileinfections.

The microbiologists New Scientist

spoke to were uniform in their

condemnation of faecal transplants

whose safety and efficacy hasnt

been shown in clinical trials. Melanie

Thomson, a microbiologist at Deakin

University in Geelong, Australia, is

concerned by hyped hopes raised

by practitioners. But I understand

the frustration and hope that drives

people to engage with [unproven]

science in the hope of a cure for

intractable conditions, she says.

Microbiome research isincomplete. We simplydo not know what manymicrobial genes do

For daily news stories, visit newscientist.com/news

Searching for answers-


19/60


OT

Last-gasp thinkingAn artificial mountain to make rain in the desert? The idea alone mayreflect a new thirst for risky geoengineering, saysJamais Cascio

RISING to nearly830metres,theBurj Khalifain Dubai part oftheUnited Arab Emirates is a marvelof engineering, andthe worldstallest building, for now.

It may soon pale incomparison

toa new megastructure in thedesert nation.The UAE, withthehelp of theUS National Centerfor Atmospheric Research, isconsidering buildinga mountainto increaserainfall. Thestudyisonlybeginning, but researchersexpect to havethe firstmodellingresults showingnecessaryheightand slope thissummer.

While an artificial mountainmaysoundoutrageous, thisisntthefirst such suggestion.In 2011,

aDutchgrouplookedintobuildinga 2-kilometrepeakfor sport andrecreation.While it did notgetoff thedrawingboard,researchconcludedit could be done.

A mountainin theUAE,oneof the 10 driest nations on Earth,

wouldnt be for skiing, however,but for triggering cloud formatioand much-needed rainfall. Risingwater demand in the country,combined with the effects ofclimate change, takes a toll on a

total annual rainfall that averagejust 75 millimetres. Hence theheavy use of expensive, energy-hungry desalination plants.

Talk of mega-scale projects tolessen impacts of global climatedisruption is growing. Thats nosurprise, as anthropogenic globawarming is so intense that werenearing the point where evenaggressive emissions-reductionplans may not avert disaster.

Seawalls may protect against

rising tides, while reflectiveblankets and paint may slowglacial melting, and temperaturerises may be slowed or stopped byseeding the upper stratospherewith megatonnes of tiny particle

None of these are solutions to

Hard to swallowTrendy clean-eating fads are best taken witha big pinch of salt, warns Anthony Warner

IT IS in the nature of science tobe full of uncertainty. This is aresult of its innate need to doubt,challenge and confront beliefs. Itsconclusions are carefully weighed.This is its great strength, but canbe a weakness when engaging apublic hungry for clear answers.

This is particularly true in theworld of food. Ask a dietitian or

foodscientist which foods areunhealthy andthe likely answerwill bealongthelines of: Wellthats an interesting question,butit really dependswhat youmeanby healthy nofoodshouldreally be classified as healthy orunhealthy as that is notreallyhelpful wethink thatyoushould try to achieve a balance.

Ask thelatestinternet healthy-eatingguru andthey willdeclarewhite rice, sugar andanythingwith gluten.

Whodo you think the human

mind, withits instinctive biasfor tuningin to simple messages,is mostlikely to believe? Thebalanced, cautious voice ofscience, or the clear-cut opinionsof a self-appointedinsta-guru?

Should we care? If clean-eatingproponentsthe Hemsleysisters whose prime-time TV show began

in theUK lastweek and otherslike them manage to get a fewpeople to eat more vegetables,thats good, right? Perhaps, but atwhat cost? When you scratch the

surface of such messages, badscience is often lurking beneath.

The Hemsleys advocateexcluding perfectly nutritiousfoods for no sound reason cereal grains, for example. Worsethough, is that they have in thepast endorsed the GAPS diet,a brutally restrictive, pseudo-scientific regime that makes anunsubstantiated claim that it cancure autism. A leading paediatricdietitian has said that a childmade to eat the GAPS diet could

When you scratch thesurface of clean-eatingmessages, bad science isoften lurking beneath


20/60


Michael Le Page

Germanyhad so muchrenewable

energy onSunday that it had to pay

people to use electricity. Thatwas the

striking headline on the Quartz news

sitelastweek. Excess electricitycan

overloada grid,so toeventhings out

some bigconsumers were paid toup

theirenergyuse.

Wind andsolar provided 22 percent

of Germanys electricityin 2015. That

isnt typical butits not theonlyplace

with too much energy attimes.In

Texas thereis now so much wind

energy that somefirmsgive electricity

away to households for free at night.

It sounds like wonderful news.The cost of wind and solar is falling

so dramatically that they are finally

becoming competitive with other

electricity sources. The tempting

conclusion is that the days of fossil

fuels are numbered. Clean, green

energy is going to deliver cheaper

power for us all. Problem solved.

Except this is not how it works.

To understand why, imagine youre a

potential solar investor in a free market.

The question you have to ask is will

you be able to sell electricity for more

than it costsyou toproduce it.If youre

thefirstto install solarin an area,the

answercould well be yes. Butas more

solar comeson line, theresgoing to be

a surfeit ofelectricityon sunnysummer

days,meaningno onewill wantto buy

yours. Youwill have tosell it cheapif

you can sellit atall whereas your

fossil-fuelled competitors, who can

adjust production to demand, will still

be able to sell theirs for a decent price.

In reality, the market is not free.To make renewables profitable,

governments have had to subsidise

them: most wind and solar firms get a

guaranteed price for their electricity.

This means they can sell power even

when too much is produced hence

why Germany was paying customers

to use electricity. Rather than being

something to celebrate, this is a sign

of a serious economic problem that

could bring the renewables revolution

grinding to a halt.

We cant keep subsidising forever.

The UK is alreadyslashing subsidies

because they cost so much and wind

and solar only supply around 3 per

cent of the countrys energy. Globally,

its 1 per cent. It would be exorbitantly

expensive to keep subsidising as that

figure rises, says Varun Sivaram at the

Council on Foreign Relations, a think

tank based in Washington DC.

Whats that, you say? Batteries?

Well, very cheap batteries would help

but they are still costly. And while they

are ideal for smoothing out the daily

variation in solar, batteries dont help

much with the seasonal variation.

The solution is to keep reducing the

cost of installing solar, so companies

can still turn a profit even as the price

of their electricity falls. The bad news

is this might not be possible with the

silicon solar panels currently used. But

other, more efficient solar technologies

in the pipeline might do this better.

So although it may look like some

places are getting close to realising

the renewable dream, with existingtechnologies this is an illusion. The

only way forward, Sivaram and others

argue, is to keep investing in new

technologies that can deliver even

cheaper power.

This is why its worrying to see

headlines like Why the renewables

revolution is now unstoppable. This

is hubris. If left to market forces, the

revolution is all too stoppable. The

message politicians need to hear is,

The renewable revolution will only

happen if you make it happen.

Thedangerousmythofcheaprenewables

T ee eey

ROLFSCHULTEN/BLOOMBERGVIAGETTYIMAGES

Too much of a good thing

It may look like we areclose to the renewablesdream but with our currenttech this is an illusion

For more opinion articles, visit newscientist.com/opinion

global warming theyare, atbest, tourniquetswhile wetryto decarbonise economies.

All would have unintended

consequences.Generatingcloudsbyblockingairflowwitha mountain wont make waterappear magically out of nowhere,but alter where moisture collectsand falls. Rainfall patterns willshift. Somebody else may lose out.

This could affect othercountries on the Arabianpeninsula, the Middle East ingeneral, even eastern Africa.Rainfall changes in alreadyprecarious environmentswouldnt go unnoticed, and may

spark conflict in an unstable area.Even if the UAE builds a

mountain, the larger climateproblem remains. Whats more,oil-rich nations in the region facea double-whammy: temperaturesreaching levels beyond thosehuman civilisation can handle,alongside the imminent end ofthe fossil-fuel economy.

This could be a last gaspattempt by the UAE to stave offunbearable heat by cashing in on

the fact that oil is, for now, still indemand around the world.

Jamais Casciois a distinguished fellow

at theInstitute forthe Future, and

writesabout the impact of innovation

at Open the Future

be seriously harmed or die.A combination of likeability,

photogenic appeal, a clear simplemessage and certainty in yourbeliefs is a powerful combination.

That brings us to Belle Gibson,the Australian health blogger whoclaimed diet and natural healingtechniques cured her cancerbefore confessing she made it up.You would hope that no sensibleperson would reject conventionalmedicines might in favour of theuntested opinions of one person.Sadly many did, and to great cost.

Anthony Warneris a food industry

development chef who blogs about

pseudoscience as The Angry Chef


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TOLOY

Hyperloopsfirst flightThe first tests of Elon Musks ambitioushigh-speed transport system for Californiaare already taking place, finds Aviva Rutkin

IS THE future of transportbarrelling towards us? Over thepast week, several groups in the

US unveiledearly models for theHyperloop, Elon Musks imaginedfifth modeof travel afterplanes, trains, cars and boats.

Musk, co-founder of SpaceX,first published hissketches for theHyperloop in August2013. In hisvision,pods of people wouldshoot downlow-pressure tubesat speeds up to 1220 kilometresper hour, propelled by linearinductionmotors similar tothose used on roller coasters.

Muskclaimed thecommutefromSan Francisco to LosAngeles,whichtakes about6 hoursto

driveor more thanan hour to fly,couldbe cut to 35minutes.

On11 May, inthe Nevada desert,an independentcompany namedHyperloop Oneheld thefirst

public demonstration of itstechnology. A metal sledshotalong a 900-metre open-air trackin 1.1seconds although withoutanyof thecomplexities of low-pressuretubes that a realsystemwouldneed.

Wewhooped, high-fivingallaround, and hugs.I had tearsmixed withsand, HyperloopOne co-founder ShervinPishevarwrote ina blog post.A larger-scaletest is slatedfor laterthisyear on a longer track.

Meanwhile, SpaceX is holdingan open competition to build thepods that will travel on theHyperloop. On Friday, a studentteam from the MassachusettsInstitute of Technology becamethe first to show off their pod,

at an event in Cambridge,Massachusetts.TheMIT designs,whichrely

on magnetic levitation, wonan interim prize from thecompetition in January. Laterthis year, they and other teamswill have a chance to test theirversions at a track outside theSpaceX headquarters inHawthorne, California.

The Hyperloop is once aconcept, now very much indevelopment, says MIT team

captain Philippe Kirschen.The dream is a mode oftransportation that is incrediblyfast, incredibly convenient andits conceivably carbon-free.

In a 57-page document settingout his original Hyperloop vision,Muskestimatedthat theprojectwouldcostno morethan$6 billion, but many have sincesuggested it could come to at leastten times that much. Musk alsoclaimed that a one-way ticketwould cost only $20.

The dream is a mode oftransportation that isincredibly fast, convenientand carbon-free


22/60


For more technology stories, visit newscientist.com/technology

Clockwise from top left:MITs mock-up of its first

pod; the test cart crashes

into a sand bank after the

first run; playing inside

mock-ups of the tubes;

shooting along the track;

a test sled waits its turn;

crowds gather at the site;

preparing for launch


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TOLOY

VINCENTMIGEAT/AGENCEVU/CAMERAPRESS

DOODLERS, rejoice.A computerprogram canscan your sketchesandsearch for a photograph thatlooks justlike them.

Its an exciting steptowards asearch engine based on drawings,says James Hays, a computerscientist at the GeorgiaInstituteof Technology in Atlanta.

For some types ofimages youwantto find, it would beveryhard

to expressthat thing withjustlanguage,he says.What if youcould justdraw what youwant?

In the pastfew years, artificialintelligence hasbecomeadept atrecognisingphotosof cats orfaces. Butsketches arent asstraightforward few of us aregood enough at drawing, for a

start. We tend to exaggerate somefeatures and skip over others, orsimplify objects to stick figures,even adding bits that dont belong.

Hays and his team recruited664 workers on crowdsourcingplatform Amazon MechanicalTurk to make sketches. A photowas randomly selected from astack of thousands and thenshown to the worker for 2 seconds.

Each snap fell into one of 125categories of recognisable objects,such as beetle, sword, banana orrocket. Then, the worker drewwhat they had seen from memory.Altogether, the crew spent nearly4000 hours sketching.

To match the sketches to theoriginal photographs, two neural

networks collaborated. Oneanalysed the sketches, the otherevaluated the photos, thenthey looked to see which pairswere the most similar. Thework will be presented in Julyat the SIGGRAPH conferencein Anaheim, California.

In a test, the AI correctlymatchedthesketchtothephoto

37per centof the time.Thatmightseem low, but the answer wasonly marked right if theprogrampickedthe exact photo thatinspiredthe sketch no half-marks for close guesses. Humansonly got it right about 54 per centof the time. For AI, thats not an

insurmountable goal, says Hays.Computationally, we might beable to beat the human baseline.

Work like this could open upexciting possibilities for sketch-based search, says TimothyHospedales at Queen MaryUniversityof London.In thefar future,he envisions aprogram that helps catchcriminals by searching policeimage databases using drawingsmade by criminal sketch artists.

A more immediate application

might be e-commerce.Hospedales and his colleaguesdeveloped a program that canmatch sketches of shoes andchairs with similar photographs,which they will present nextmonth at the Computer VisionPattern Recognition conferencein Las Vegas. Maybe you wantto express the style with a sketchand then retrieve photos in thatstyle from your favourite onlineshopping site. It provides adifferent way to shop, he says.

Police could catch criminalsby searching databaseswith drawings made bycriminal sketch artists

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Ask the AI

ONE PER CENT

New AI in your pocket

Move over Siri. The creators of

Apples intelligent assistant have

unveiled their latest AI project: Viv.

Dag Kittlaus, co-founder of Viv

Labs, demonstrated the assistant

in New York last week. Viv can

follow complicated verbal

instructions such as sending

money to a friend, or telling you

if the weather will be warmer

tomorrow. It isnt tied to any

operating system, so could work

for any type of smartphone.

Kittlaus said Viv should be

available later this year.

70KThenumberofusers ofdatingsite

OKCupid who had usernames and

answers to personal questions posted

online by researchers last week

Robots you swallowAn origami bot made out of driedpig intestine could one day unfold

in someones stomach and hunt

down foreign objects or patch

wounds. The device, developed at

MIT, folds up small enough to be

encased in a swallowable capsule

of ice that melts once ingested.

Slits in the material which is the

same as that used in sausage

casings dictate how it unfolds

and then moves.

Match that doodleAI can find the snap that inspired your scrawl, says Aviva Rutkin


24/60

Whatsthefutureofbusiness?

We atNew Scientistdecided totake a lookat how three ofthe key

drivers of business energy, moneyand automation might change

over the next decade. To do that, weve asked three writers withdeep understanding of theseareas to tell us how they think the

future couldunfold, and how it mightconfound ourinitial

expectations.

The author of our second GameChangers report in the series is

Steven Cherry, whofor 15 yearscovered theworksector forIEEE

Spectrum, and nowdirectsTTI/Vanguard,a members-only forum

thatexplores the impact and implicationsof futuretechnologies for

senior businessleaders.

In his report, Cherry examinesthe arguments forandagainst the

ideathatautomation willultimately outsource every human job,

and explores the paradoxes inherent in both. If cognitively complex

jobs arethe only ones that are safe, why is therestill such high

demandfor cashiers? If automation generates newjobs, whyis GDP

slowing? And when can you expect therobots to take your job? To

find out, registerto downloadyourfree copyofGameChangers:

Automationand ArtificialIntelligence today.

Sally Adee

Editor, GameChangers

GET YOUR COPYNEWSCIENTIST.COM/GAMECHANGERS

GAMECHANGERSAUTOMATIONAND ARTIFICIALINTELLIGENCE

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Steven Cherryis the Director of TTI/Vanguard, a membership forum based inNew York that explores future technologies. Previously he was a journalist andeditor atIEEE Spectrum, the magazine of the Institute of Electrical and ElectronicsEngineers. Prior to that he was an editor at the Association for ComputingMachinery (ACM). He founded and co-hosts the award-winning podcast series,Techwise Conversations, which covers technology news, careers and education,

and the engineering lifestyle.

IN THIS EXCLUSIVENEW REPORT FIND OUT:

Why every technological breakthroughtakes twice as long as we expected, but

were still not prepared for its arrival

Why GDP is an increasingly limited toolfor measuring productivity, and what thatmeans for jobs and automation

Which jobs might be safe and which wont

INTRODUCING THE SECOND IN A NEW SERIESOF WHITE PAPERS FROM NEW SCIENTIST


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T


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21May 2016 | NewScientist| 25

Petrified with guilt

GUILT can be a powerful thing. Over the years,

these rocks actually chunks of ancient

petrified trees have proved irresistible tomany light-fingered visitors to the Petrified

Forest National Park in Arizona. Eventually,

often decades later, conscience prompts some

to return their souvenirs anonymously, along

with a little note of apology.

Its easy to see the temptation. These chunks

of organic matter gain a rich, colourful beauty

as minerals such as quartz, cobalt, iron and

copper fill the pores of the original material

over hundreds of millions of years.

So many pieces have been returned that

park rangers have created a conscience pile to

store them, as well as displaying some of the

1200-plus letters.

The rocks were very appealing, writes one

visitor, and in a moment of exuberance we took

the rock with us as a memento of our trip.

Im returning this rock that belongs in the

forest, writes another. My conscience has

bothered me ever since I brought it home.

But its not only guilt that prompts a change of

heart. These rocks hold a secret: a curse said to

plague anyone who steals them. From car troubles

and cat attacks to financial losses and even a plane

crash, all have been attributed to the prophecy of

the rocks. The final straw was when I stepped

thru the ceiling of our new house, one letter reads.

Photographer Ryan Thompson, who stumbled

upon the conscience pile during a trip in 2012,

was interested by the combination of humour

and heartbreak in the letters.

I was immediately curious about the

attribution of power to an inert mineral, he

says. Its not difficult to imagine what possesses

visitors to pick up a small souvenir, but its a lot

more interesting thinking about the reasons for

their return.

And Thompson admits yearning for them

too. When I arrived home after my second trip,

he says, I purchased a few pieces of petrified

wood on eBay in an attempt to satisfy the desire.David Stock

PhotographerRyan Thompson

badluckhotrocks.com

Letters: Petrified Forest National Park Archives


27/60


Earth and the solar systemhave always been our

benchmarks for life-friendlyenvironments. No longer.The system next door mighttrump ours (page 27), whileobservations further afieldare forcing a fundamentalrethink of where life canflourish (page 29)

MATTHEW

BORRET

THEBESTOF

ALL POSSIBLEWORLDS


28/60


>

OV TOY

Paradise next door

One reasonEarth might not topthechartsin terms ofits habitablelifetimeisthesizeofthesun.Thesmaller a star, themore efficientlyit usesits fuel andthe longer it lastsbefore blowingup, taking any nearbyplanetswithit. Thesun is a G-type star,thethird smallestvariety. So planets

orbitingdiminutive K andM-typestarscan expect longer lives.

Butwater is a factor here too. Thepresenceof liquid water is thought tobe a prerequisitefor life. And to hostthislife-givingstuff,planets shouldideallyreside in a habitable zone:theband ofspacearounda star withthe appropriatetemperature. Thehabitable zones of M-type stars mustbe far closer in than in those of warmerstarslike our own. So snug, in fact, thatthestars gravityis likelyto wreak

havoc on anyplanets. Thedifferencebetween the gravitationaltug on thefrontand back ofthe planets candeform them into an egg-shape,whicheventually stops them spinning.Hardly ideal for life. A K-type star, ontheother hand, would have just therightconditions. And thats exactlywhat Alpha Centauri B, thesmaller starof the pair, is (seeSweetspot, p 28).

A second thingthat makes a planetmore likely to bebenignfor longer isits size. Rocky planetslikeEarth canhave liquid metal cores, a boon for life

becauseit drivesplate tectonics, whichin turnrefreshesatmosphericgases.Theliquid metal alsospins, creatinga magnetic shield around the planetthatdeflectsbiomolecule-destroyingradiation. Once thecore cools andsolidifies,those effects vanish. A planetbigger thanEarth would take longer tocoolbecause there is morebulk for theheat to dissipate through.

Could a large rocky planet be orbitingAlpha Centauri B? In 2012XavierDumusque at theHarvard SmithsonianCenter for Astrophysics and

WHENIwasakid,Iwasalwayslookingat AlphaCentauri,saysEduardo Bendek.One

ofthethingshediscoveredaboutitwhilegrowingupinChilewasthatourclosestneighbouring light hada secret:itisnotonestar,buttwo.

Morethan 30 years later, Bendek,

nowan astronomer at NASASAmesResearchCenter, suspects that hisfavourite celestialbeaconmightjustbe hiding another, moremarvelloussecret. There could be a planet orbitingone ofthe stars.And notjustanyoldspacerock. This couldbe a placesoburstingwith lifethat it makes Earthlook post-apocalyptic.

And at a mere 4.4 lightyears away,we might feasiblydevelop a probethat could visit within decades.Thats precisely what a project backed

by StephenHawking andbillionsofdollars now plansto do. We couldcatch our first glimpse of thisbucolicworld within a generation.

We areusedto thinking smallwhenit comes to alienlife. Our listoflivingworlds has a sole datapoint, Earth, andevenour convivialplanetseemsto havebeena trickyplaceforlifeto get started.How couldweexpect morethan a self-replicatingbagof biomolecules anywhere else?

Thatmight betoo lofty a view ofEarth.After all, hugeareasof our

planet, includingthe poles anddeserts,are rather barren. Andwhole epochsof time were inhospitable to life.

Time was perhaps the mostimportant attribute identified byastrophysicist Ren Heller of the MaxPlanck Institute for Solar SystemResearch in Gottingen, Germany, whenin 2015 he was considering the factorsthat make a planet more habitable thanEarth. Habitability isnt just about havingthe correct balance of temperature andchemicals. Life takes aeons to get started,so its also about how long those persist.

Planets even balmier than our own couldbe just a cosmic stones throw away,finds MacGregor Campbell


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as theAlpha Centauripair.SoBendekandBelikov came upwith aninstrument theycall ACESat. Thiswouldsuppressbothstars light using

a coronagraph in conjunctionwith adeformablemirror.Subtleripples in themirrordeflectthelightofeachstarseparately, andsimulationsshowitwould be ableto revealEarth-sizedplanets in thehabitablezone of eitherone.I realised youcoulddirectlyimagean Eartharound AlphaCentauriwithatelescopeas smallas 25centimetres,says Belikov. Thatis small enough toflyintoorbitatwhatis,inspacefreightterms, rockbottom price.

Once its there, Belikovknowsexactlywhereto point it. Computer

simulations show theres nothingfurtherout fromthe starsthan roughly2.5times theEarth-sun distance, sincesuch an orbit will not bestable,he says.

Atthemoment, however,NASAis notaboutto take upthe Ames duos plan.

Sweet spotThelifetimeof stars variesaccordingto their size. BothM- andK-typestarslive longer than our sun, which wouldgive planetsorbiting themlonger to developlife.But which is theperfect place to hunt for a habitable world?

200 billion years

Radiusof orbit relative toEarth

Whereliquidwater canexist

50 billion years

Planets in this habitable zonewould experience

a very stronggravitationalpull.This canmake

them turnegg-shapedand stopspinning

Optimalspot for superhabitable planets

Paradise found?

10 billion years

3 billion years

SUN

0 0.1 1

ALPHACENTAURI B

1 billion years

TYPE OF STAR HABITABLE ZONE LIFESPAN OF STAR

A

F

G

K

M

10

Alpha Centauri

is a star we could

conceivably visit

ESO/DIGITIZEDSKYSURVEY2

/DAVIDEDEMARTIN

colleagues turned their telescope onthe star, looking for the characteristicwobble caused by a planetsgravitational tug. They found evidence

for a planet about 10 per cent largerthan Earth with an orbit of just overthree days.

Cue serious excitement. These initialobservations made the planet look alittle hot, but here nonetheless wasevidence for a planet with some traitsthat could make it superhabitable and right in our cosmic back garden.

The excitement was short-lived. Lastyear, Suzanne Aigrain at the Universityof Oxford showed that the wobbleDumusque spotted was almost certainlya measurement error. Still, that is no

reason to give up hope

May 16 2016 New Scientist

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