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Like it or not, many people want to improve their looks with the help of biology, and pharmaceutical companies look set to help them. Regulatory bodies need to catch up.
Does the pharmaceutical industry's future lie at the boundary between drugs and cosmetics? Or is the prospect of effective 'cosmeceuticals' a beauty myth? Helen Pearson investigates.
Scientists at one of the world's most remote research outposts are tracking the air masses that swirl through the Arctic atmosphere in an attempt to understand why the ozone layer continues to thin. Quirin Schiermeier visits the Koldewey research station.
Despite their diminutive stature, phytoplankton have a huge global influence. The genomes of four strains of phytoplankton have now been completely sequenced, revealing their genetic adaptations to distinct marine niches.
Injecting vortices into a rotating sample of superfluid helium-3 shows a sudden switch from smooth to chaotic behaviour, and throws light on turbulence — one of the last unsolved problems of classical physics.
Evidence of a general learning ability in mice — that there is a good correlation between an individual's performance in tasks that make different processing demands — suggests a parallel with humans.
The mechanics of friction may seem the stuff of high-school physics, but only now are some aspects of the problem being understood. A spinning coin is the subject of a new exploration of frictional forces.
Estimating the proportion of rare species in particular habitats is a big issue for ecologists. Hence the intensity of debate over whether 'neutral theory' has predictive value for species abundances.
A quantum theory of gravity is proving elusive. Observations of radiation from the Crab nebula now place even stronger constraints on the likelihood of detecting the effects of quantum gravity.
Mars is a highly dynamic planet — at least as far as dust is concerned. A better knowledge of how dust is lofted into the atmosphere will help to untangle the complex evolutionary history of the planet's surface.
Despite centuries of human use of silk fibres from silkworm cocoons, and an emerging industry devoted to making artificial silk, questions remain about how insects produce it. New work in vitro tackles the problem.
The training takes longer, but those willing to invest extra time in getting to grips with both basic and clinical research can reap the benefits, not least in job satisfaction, says Karen Kreeger.
