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Winchcombe Meteorite: Insights from the First Scientist on the Scene
Science, Maths & Technology

Winchcombe Meteorite: Insights from the First Scientist on the Scene

...Solar System fingerprinting’ to help inform scientists about where meteorites originated in space. These analyses have shown that the Winchcombe rocks are a member of an important group of meteorites known as carbonaceous chondrites. These are very primitive materials and very old, containing objects known as calcium aluminium-rich inclusions that are used to date the...
Dr Benny Peiser - Stories of Change
Nature & Environment

Dr Benny Peiser - Stories of Change

...energy? BP: Well, that’s a historical question! Thinking back, the first concern about energy really start in my family’s home in the early seventies, my father read The Club of Rome, Limits to Growth, and the fear that we are going to run out of energy was one of the big features of that report and in ’73 it then became almost a reality in Germany and I...
Knickerbocker glory: Explore healthy eating
Education & Development

Knickerbocker glory: Explore healthy eating

...energy because this sugar is made up of ‘simple’ carbohydrates. But some fruit, like bananas and apples, give you long-lasting energy because they contain ‘complex’ carbohydrates. Sweets and syrup taste good and give you a quick boost of energy because they contain sugary simple carbohydrates which are burnt up quickly by our bodies. The problem is sweets and...
Animals at the extremes: hibernation and torpor
Nature & Environment

Animals at the extremes: hibernation and torpor

...energy-efficient survival when ambient temperatures are so low that foraging or simply maintaining normal core body temperature and basal metabolic rate are either energetically too costly or impossible. Polar endotherms can maintain a high T b even when living actively at sub-zero temperatures. Such animals have very good thermal insulation and may have a plentiful food...
Working with our environment: an introduction
Nature & Environment

Working with our environment: an introduction

...energy and materials to all ecosystems. It is, then, difficult to make a clear distinction between a 'managed environment' and a 'natural ecosystem', although we can all understand the difference in principle between planned management and inadvertent change. Not only are we part of nature, but, as Figure 1 suggests, we exert an increasingly dominant influence on our...
Emmy Noether: Bucking the historical trends
Science, Maths & Technology

Emmy Noether: Bucking the historical trends

...energy, which cannot be created or destroyed. It is Noether's theorem that relates this conservation law to the underlying symmetry of space itself – in fact, the conservation of energy is a result of the fact that empty space 'looks the same' from one moment to the next. Put another way, if empty space were rough or lumpy, then energy would be lost as things moved...
Retrofitting older buildings to help mitigate the climate emergency
Nature & Environment

Retrofitting older buildings to help mitigate the climate emergency

...energy demand and associated carbon emissions is, therefore, a key strategy that has been highlighted by the UK Committee on Climate Change and is acknowledged in the Government’s recent heat and buildings strategy. However, 20-30% (that's over ten million homes) of the UK housing stock have heritage value. Many of these buildings aren’t officially designated, meaning...
Can eating seaweed and algae keep the world fed?
Nature & Environment

Can eating seaweed and algae keep the world fed?

...energy to do so, leaving less energy for growth and reproduction. Consequently, they up smaller in size. Aside from the impact this has on shellfish, several of the species affected, such as corals in the tropics or coralline algae in the waters around the UK, also play a key role in providing food and nursing grounds for fish. And less fish food leads to fewer fish for...