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I am minded to note at this juncture, that in the past, Australia decided to wage war against Emus. This did not end well. The Emus won.

Just seen this blog post by Derek Lowe (he of "Things I Won't Work With" fame, including the classic "Sand Won't Save You This Time" that I've covered in the past). Just read the comments following the blog post, and find out what crazy things people did in labs in the past. I think this one takes t...

... to discuss Lepdoptera reproduction, along comes this paper ... Digestive Organ In The Female Reproductive Tract Borrows Genes From Multiple Organ Systems To Adopt Critical Functions by Camille Meslin, Melissa S. Plakke, Aaron B. Deutsch, Brandon S. Small, Nathan I. Morehouse & Nathan L. Clark, M...

A team of entomologists, including three Japanese scientists, have discovered four new species of Psocoptera, that exhibit a remarkable feature - genital reversal. In the four newly described species belonging to the Genus Neotrogla , living in caves in Brazil, the females have a penis. In addition,...

It's time for another game! And while this one is a driving game, it's one with several big differences from the norm, as becomes very apparent when you learn the title - Bus Driver . Yes, that's right, someone went to the trouble of providing the PC gamer with a bus driving simulator. If you're tem...

That blog also has, much to the amusement of many here, an entire sub-section devoted to the matter of, ahem, foreign bodies in rectal passages.

Enjoy ...

The paper covered here deserves a special award ... The best use of CAT scans to date: bacon quality prediction. Measurement of belly composition variability in pigs by in vivo computed tomographic scanning. “The belly region composition of a representative commercial pig sample of 130 castrates was...

What I came here to see, is if Devogue delivered a spleenfest over succubus May's schmoozing with the DUP. Which would be gold medal winning reading if he'd unleashed it. She really has dragged everyone around her into a galactic clusterfuck. Her kapok-brained "strong and stable" Dalek act, has deli...

Guess it's time for this ... possibly the best commentary on Trump's election you'll ever see

Ah, Plutella xylostella . Which selects various Crucifers as larval foodplants, but only those that produce glucosinolates (mustard oil precursors). One effective method of control is to plant Wintercress, which not only contains glucosinolates, but also produces saponins, which kill the larvae. The...

Whilst large stars do indeed live fast and die young, the question is, do they do it at a fast enough rate? Large stars have to form before they can run through the cycle and deliver heavy elements. At the moment, stars large enough to end their days as supernovae comprise around 0.1% of all observa...

As I've said elsewhere on several occasions, there's also another possibility. Namely that we're the first. As in the first life forms to start systematically exploring space and working to move beyond our home planet. The observable universe is 13.6 billion years old. According to the data availabl...

Well, whilst Chirac's health reasons in question probably aren't funny, the manner of reportage definitely is. Leaving aside the obvious exceptions, viz: [1] Healthcare professionals and support staff who work there; [2] Friends and relatives of existing patients visiting; [3] Suppliers of essential...

For those who are interested, the full scientific paper can be read here.