New Scientist

New Scientist covers the latest developments in science and technology that will impact your world. New Scientist employs and commissions the best writers in their fields from all over the world. Our editorial team provide cutting-edge news, award-winning features and reports, written in concise and clear language that puts discoveries and advances in the context of everyday life today and in the future.

Elsewhere on New Scientist

Time to adapt • As the coronavirus mutates, we will need to adjust our approach to it

New Scientist

Origins of covid-19 • The World Health Organization has begun its mission to try to determine the source of the coronavirus, reports Adam Vaughan

The coronavirus evolves • Several new viral variants pose added threats – how worried should we be?

What are the new coronavirus variants?

Will vaccines work on new variants? • Some coronavirus variants seem able to partly dodge the immune system, but there is still hope for our vaccines, reports Michael Le Page

The global threat of the coronavirus variants

The coronavirus could end up mild like a common cold

Why eradication is unlikely

How water makes life possible • Our understanding of water’s role in the reactions of life is being overturned

NASA gives up attempt to dig below Martian surface

Superhuman sight in reach with lens that makes UV visible

Hope of saving rhino from extinction remains alive

A sea of gravitational waves? • We have found hints that the whole cosmos may be awash with strange ripples

AI dog-trainer could teach your pooch how to sit

Quantum internet signals sent using drones

Dinosaur found in Argentina may be largest land animal

Warty pigs adorning cave may be oldest art of its kind

You can tell a liar by the way they move

Sensory wings help flies dodge a bashing

Really brief

Quasar sheds light on early black holes

Plastic particles from clothes polluting almost all Arctic seas

Spice boosts solar panel performance

Vaccine transparency • We must start publishing ethnicity data for covid-19 vaccinations to make sure no group is treated unfairly, says Layal Liverpool

This changes everything • Trapped between an insurrection and a strike Silicon Valley has enabled the US to get into a huge mess. It must start taking responsibility for its political power, writes Annalee Newitz

Your letters

A rare beauty

At one with the ocean • Film-maker Mike deGruy survived a shark attack and captured iconic scenes of orcas snatching sea lion pups. Elle Hunt explores a fond documentary about him

A whole world to change • Millions of young people are fighting for action on climate change. Sandrine Ceurstemont listens to a podcast that tells their stories

Don’t miss

Playing with death • Remote Control tells the story of Fatima, a sickly Ghanaian girl who gains a terrifying superpower. It is a tale that mixes folklore with a thriller, says Layal Liverpool

Salt power! • The world desperately needs cheap, plentiful batteries. Can we make them from common sodium chloride? Katharine Sanderson investigates

Fresh lithium

Bizarre batteries • There isn’t going to be a single type of battery that will address all the world’s energy storage needs, which is why people have been dreaming up all sorts of variations

“What we found was shocking. The stress levels of burned-out parents were higher than those of people in severe pain” • Moïra Mikolajczak is at the forefront of research into parental burnout. She talks to Jessica Hamzelou about what causes this kind of extreme exhaustion, what to do about it – and the sometimes surprising impact of lockdown

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