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Not only is solar more than capable of supplying all the world’s energy, in the long term it is the only power source that won’t fry the planet

When it was first published in 1984, William Gibson's Neuromancer transformed sci-fi and instantly birthed the cyberpunk genre. Ahead of an upcoming TV adaptation, Emily H. Wilson revisits the prophetic novel to see if it stands the test of time

That the human mind treads a delicate line between order and disorder is a radical idea that’s gaining traction - and is changing our understanding of intelligence, consciousness and creativity

Surprising discoveries about the species responsible for 90 per cent of mushroom-related deaths is revealing the fungi kingdom to be even stranger than we had thought

You can feast guilt-free on farmed oysters and mussels as their production can have environmental benefits – but those probably don't include capturing carbon

A possible galaxy named Capotauro may have formed within 90 million years of the big bang – but astronomers can’t be sure that’s what it is

Two fossils found in Germany show very young pterodactyls with arm bones thought to have been broken in flight, probably because of severe tropical cyclones

A biodegradable glue that encourages bones to repair themselves can be applied during surgery using a hot glue gun, potentially offering a cheap and quick way to treat injuries

An experimental new method for extracting lithium from brine and even seawater promises to be more sustainable than existing methods

About half of people with generalised anxiety disorder don’t respond to common treatments with antidepressants – but psychedelics may offer relief

Flamingoes, a kingfisher and two red-crowned cranes are shown in all their glory in these images from the new book Aviary: The bird in contemporary photography

L-theanine supplements are touted for stress relief, focus and better sleep. Although the evidence so far is preliminary, studies suggest the compound may have several brain benefits

During his time as a Meta executive, Nick Clegg witnessed some of the biggest decisions to ever affect the online world. But this collection of tired tropes offers little insight, says Chris Stokel-Walker

A prototype of bifocal eyeglasses uses liquid crystals and electric fields to switch between modes that aid in nearby and distance vision

Seeking endorsements for her new book, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein finds herself staring at fundamental questions of space, time – and grammar

Four new species of aquatic birds related to modern penguins have been described from fossils found in New Zealand, showing how these creatures flourished around 60 million years ago

Societies can be united and inspired by ideas of the future. We urgently need more of them, argues futurist Sarah Housley

Scientists have mapped the activity that takes place across a mouse's entire brain as it decides how to complete a task - and the results could explain the origin of our gut feelings

In Love's Labour, psychoanalyst Stephen Grosz draws on 40 years of conversations with his patients about relationships. This compelling memoir is reminiscent of the writing of Oliver Sacks, says David Robson

An analysis of a range of dry dog foods finds that none are nutritionally complete, but vegan and vegetarian foods compare well with meat-based ones

People seem to spend longer on the toilet if they use a smartphone while sitting there – and all that scrolling may be boosting their likelihood of getting haemorrhoids

Governments are looking to ban social media for children but can't get enough of AI – a technology parents are far less equipped to deal with

As quantum computers get larger, they may become truly useful – 3D-printing a key component of some quantum computers may make it easier to build larger arrays of qubits to make them more powerful

Storing carbon dioxide underground is seen as a way to mitigate climate change, but the world could run out of safe storage space within 200 years if we keep on burning fossil fuels

Bizarrely, Iberian harvester ant queens lay eggs that turn into male builder harvester ants, and some of her offspring are hybrids of the two species

Being vaccinated against hepatitis B may reduce chronic inflammation levels in the body, which could help ward off diabetes

The drug rapamycin has been linked to a longer life and we're starting to understand how it might have this effect

Scrap cars could be used to build new electric vehicles thanks to a new process for turning various aluminium alloys into a strong and mouldable metal

From “trenfluencers” to complex drug regimens, influencers are reshaping how millions approach steroid use. Now, researchers are trying to catch up with what this means for our health

The discovery that a small blue blob of neurons, the locus coeruleus, controls your mode of thinking suggests ways to increase learning, creativity, focus and alertness

People who do several very short bouts of strenuous activity each day are much less likely to die in the next few years than those who do no exercise at all

The Solar Orbiter spacecraft sometimes lies directly between the sun and Earth, making it ideally placed to analyse powerful solar storms that could damage electronic systems on our planet

Authors including literary heavyweight Ian McEwan and big hitters John Scalzi, Yume Kitasei and Cixin Liu have new sci-fi novels out this month

New research tapping into decades-old concepts is challenging the notion that the only way to treat cancer is to kill every last cancer cell. Instead, scientists suggest, we could try a little persuasion

Scientists have long and studiously avoided claiming that other animals have language. Now, using the power of AI, they are on the verge of deciphering one

Clues to our planet’s dramatic past are in the layers of rocks we might overlook. A great guide shows why they deserve our attention, says James Dinneen

An ancient skull has finally shown us what the Denisovans looked like. Now it turns out they, not Neanderthals, might be our closest relatives, redrawing our family tree and transforming the hunt for Ancestor X

An implant that monitors brain activity and provides personalised stimulation halved the discomfort of people living with chronic pain

Social upheaval across Europe between 1250 and 1860 correlates with volcanic eruptions, reduced sunspot activity and surging food prices

Psilocybin appears to alter brain networks linked to repetitive negative thoughts, which may explain how the drug helps to treat some mental health conditions

Sky watchers are in for a treat next month, says Abigail Beall, when there is a total lunar eclipse visible in much of the world

A tiny engine comprised of a glass bead zapped with electric fields behaves as if it is operating 2000 times hotter than the sun

Weather apps regularly differ in their predictions for the same location – why is it so hard to predict local forecasts, and where can we get the best weather information?

The New Scientist Book Club has just finished reading Alex Foster's sci-fi novel “Circular Motion”. We liked it – but there were calls for a bit more science in this slice of science fiction

The New Scientist Book Club is currently reading Ursula K. Le Guin's classic science fiction novel "The Dispossessed". Here, her son Theo Downes-Le Guin considers the artistic process behind it – and why it still resonates today

The New Scientist Book Club is currently reading Ursula K. Le Guin’s classic novel The Dispossessed. In this extract from its opening, we get our first glimpse of the planet Anarres

The new book "Gemini and Mercury Remastered" features iconic images from the earliest days of human space exploration

The history of carbon dioxide’s role in life on Earth combined with a call to climate action makes for compelling reading, finds Chris Stokel-Walker

Surgery, not antibiotics, might be the best way to treat chronic rhinosinusitis, a condition that leaves people with a permanently blocked or runny nose and a reduced sense of smell

Social media platforms will soon have to exclude children under 16 in Australia, but there are doubts over how age verification tools will work – and whether this is the right approach to deal with online harms

Several countries now offer at-home vaginal swabs to detect HPV status in place of traditional cervical cancer screening, but urine tests seem to work just as well

Eczema can be very distressing for children – and now it seems that its roots may at least partly lie in their mothers experiencing high levels of stress during pregnancy

In this latest instalment of Future Chronicles, an imagined history of future inventions, Rowan Hooper explores the advances that meant an optical telescope with an effective mirror size of 3000 km could be built on the moon

Feedback is alerted by a reader to the latest effort to create a quantum computer that can factorise extremely large numbers, and discovers an abrupt shift to K9 tech

We are happy to inject synthetic substances into our faces in ever-increasing amounts, but reluctant to eat plant-based or cultivated fake meats. This inconsistent attitude has implications for sustainability, says Sophie Attwood

Why did Christianity grow from a niche sect to a religion followed by billions? Michael Marshall explores Alice Roberts’s latest book Domination

A fossil discovered in Patagonia shows a 3.5-metre-long reptile from the late Cretaceous with large, serrated teeth capable of slicing through muscle

People used to experience an "unhappiness hump" around midlife, but declining youth mental health may mean that is no longer the case

Categorising the Denisovans as a distinct species would allow us to more comprehensively trace our own evolutionary development

The brightest and most colourful glowing plants yet have been created by injecting phosphorescent chemicals directly into the leaves, but it is little more than a cheap gimmick

A 165-million-year-old ankylosaur from the Atlas Mountains of Morocco was covered in an array of extreme armour including body spikes fused to its skeleton, a feature never seen in any dinosaur before

A system that generates images by inducing random fluctuations in a laser beam could slash energy use compared with standard AI tools

The aurora borealis has been remarkably bright recently. Space weather physicist Tamitha Skov reveals what's going on and how worried we should be about a major solar storm

After three consecutive and dramatic failed missions, SpaceX has successfully launched Starship to space in a key step for NASA's lunar programme

The rare sailback houndshark, which has an unusually large dorsal fin, was first described by scientists in 1973. That was the last record of its existence, until now

Performing CPR on a space station in microgravity involves doing a handstand on a person's chest and pushing against the walls with your legs – but now researchers say there is a better way

A comparison of the thylacine’s genome to other marsupials has revealed that the creatures lost genetic diversity long before humans and dingoes arrived in Australia

Observations from the James Webb Space Telescope reveal unexpectedly high levels of carbon dioxide coming off 3I/ATLAS, giving another clue to the comet’s origin

African countries imported a record number of solar panels in the past year, which could be the beginning of a green energy boom on the continent

Electronic devices that dissolve in water could make it easier to create and recycle technology prototypes – and they could even inspire more sustainable commercial devices

Microbes found buried deep in Siberian permafrost may be able to survive over extremely long timescales using protein repair genes

Millions of people may experience accelerated ageing as climate change drives more frequent and intense hot weather

In 2020, the world produced more than enough calories to feed the global population, but only half of those calories reached people’s plates due to rising meat and biofuel production

Research reveals that managers often take advantage of their hardest-working members of staff. David Robson has some advice for a frustrated reader

Human delivers an unusually clear picture of Homo sapiens as a species shaped by climate, animals, plants, other hominins and the interactions of its own nomadic groups. Bethan Ackerley is enthralled

A study of more than 6 million children finds that exposure to antibiotics in the womb or early in life tends not to increase the risk of autoimmunity – but the relationship is complicated

Immersing yourself in nature has repeatedly been shown to reduce stress and anxiety, but it could also have serious benefits for your physical health

The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has assembled a team of researchers to make communication networks more secure by injecting them with quantumness

A social media notification popping up on your phone can be quite distracting, even if you don't engage with it

A quantum computer that uses particles of light took about two dozen microseconds to complete a calculation that may take trillions of trillions of trillions of years on the world’s best supercomputers

From depression to dementia, we are now realising the profound impacts of long-term inflammation on the brain. A better understanding of the underlying mechanisms is unlocking new treatments to protect our cognitive function and mental health

Robin Hammond's photographs show the conservation battle to eradicate three species introduced to New Zealand, in order to protect the island nation's birds

We need to think about the purpose of noise in our daily lives and environments. Chris Stokel-Walker discovers a great guide in Chris Berdik's Clamor

An analysis of active US mines finds they already collect virtually all of the minerals the country needs for batteries, solar panels and wind turbines – but these critical minerals mostly go to waste

Dark-coloured cars can make a measurable difference on nearby air temperature, and in cities of millions the effect can add up and noticeably increase how hot it feels

The failure to agree a global treaty on plastic pollution highlights how the UN’s requirement for unanimity holds back environmental policy, but there are better ways to make progress

Astronomers have picked up evidence of an Earth-sized world, distinct from the previously hypothesised Planet Nine and Planet X, that might be warping the orbits of objects beyond Neptune

Inveterate cyclist Matt Sparkes, who has been knocked off his bike by human-driven cars several times, wonders if the arrival of driverless cars in London is a good thing - or a bad one

Feedback is horrified to discover that the owner of one of the internet's favourite cats, Pépito, has taken the crypto route…

A 1989 experiment offered the promise of nuclear fusion without the need for high temperatures, but this "cold fusion" was quickly debunked. Now, some of the techniques involved have been resurrected in a new experiment that could actually improve efforts to achieve practical fusion power

Previous research in macaques suggests that part of the brain reorganises itself when a limb is removed, but now a study in people has turned that idea on its head

Edible microbeads made of vitamin E and seaweed helped rats lose weight by absorbing excess fat in their guts

Free and unimpeded internet access is no longer a convenience or a luxury. It is high time it was made a human right enshrined in law, says philosopher Merten Reglitz

Rearing our unusually underdeveloped young may account for the evolution of language. Michael Marshall is intrigued, but wants more evidence from Madeleine Beekman's The Origin of Language

A billion or so years into its evolution, the icy dwarf planet Ceres may have had the right conditions to sustain life, which indicates the solar system may be more habitable than we thought

A new formulation of cement reflects and emits heat more effectively than normal Portland cement, so it stays much cooler on a hot day

Psychiatric medicine hasn't changed much since the 1960s. Could blocking the effects of chronic inflammation on the brain be the step change we need?

Frank Wilczek has one of the most brilliant and original minds in theoretical physics, having come up with the idea of time crystals among much else. Where is his curiosity taking him now?

A dietary supplement made from engineered yeast could help honeybees thrive despite the declining availability of high-quality pollen in their environment

An AI model trained on years of data from NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory can predict the sun’s future appearance and potentially flag dangerous solar flares