The 25th anniversary meeting of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation in the Kyrgyz capital may offer a glimmer of hope that international relations do not need to be defined by endless confrontation, writes KENNY COYLE
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Imminent arrival of tardigrade aliens greatly exaggerated
The half a millimetre-long creatures that look like a tiny eight-legged caterpillar are resiliant beyond imagination and fascinate scientist as much as science-fiction writers
(L to R) SEM (scanning electron microscope) image of Milnesium tardigradum in active state and a drawing of a tardigrade on a grain of sand from 1840
[(L to R) doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0045682.g001 and E de Laplante - Doyere/both Creative Commons]
The artist, who has just died, is embedded in the subconscious of the Palestinian people
The five young men killed in the A66 crash were responsible for a devastating tragedy — but the crash should force us to ask difficult questions about wider society, argues RENATA MEDEIROS MIRRA
Britain funds the policing of black culture 16 times better than the culture itself. The Diamond Jubilee is the moment to end that, argues CLAUDIA WEBBE
Despite Andy Burnham’s declaration defending the continued partition of the island, all major international and internal trends are converging to make Irish reunification inevitable
Humans are part of the ‘animal kingdom’ – and of nature in general – but also distinct from it and labour (work) is part of what makes us unique, declared Engels. His insights 150 years ago into how our species came to be and how we differ from the rest of nature, are as important today as they were then, says the MARX MEMORIAL LIBRARY
Committee for the Defence of the Iranian People’s Rights general secretary GAWAIN LITTLE discusses the impact of the US-Israeli war on the Iranian people and economy
Lithopanspermia is a proposed method of life being distributed around the universe, whereby extremely hardy organisms might travel on rocks ejected from one planet that crash land on another. It means alien life forms travelling from one planet to another to start a new life.
The organisms that could potentially complete this journey would need to be very tough indeed. In the first place, they would need to survive within a rock travelling through space, which would subject them to very high doses of cosmic radiation.
The precise radioactive dose would depend on how long the rock is travelling between the two planets. Rocks that travel between Earth and Mars would be travelling so long that the dose received even deep in the centre of the rock would be enough to kill any known living organism.
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