This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Blood spatter on high — “Be prepared!” This enduring motto of the Scout movement will come to mind for many readers of a paper called “Bloodstain pattern dynamics in microgravity: Observations of a pilot study in the […]
Category: Extra-Improbable columns
Our columns in other publications — The ‘Feedback’ column in New Scientist magazine, beginning in September 2022, and the “Improbable Research”column that ran for 13 years in The Guardian newspaper.
Boxing, Walls, Surfing value, Car jeers and cheers, Dead ant repellant
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has five segments. Here are bits of each of them: Boxing: thinking outside — From time to time, the sport of boxing changes its rules. But for the most part, it still requires that each participant in a match be both human and alive. (Exceptions do occasionally […]
Dog tail wagging, Donald Duck dam jubilee, Anti-covid tea-gargling, Urine on acorns
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Chasing the tale — Silvia Leonetti and colleagues in the Netherlands, Italy, Austria, the US and Denmark don’t quite explain why dogs wag their tails, but they do explain that it is hard to explain. In a paper […]
Tea paving, Solar cells like razor blades, Alligator bellows, Ants for your arteries
This week’s Feedback column (that I write) in New Scientist magazine has four segments. Here are bits of each of them: Paved with good tea — What to do with all the waste from preparing zillions of cups of tea? Researchers in Malaysia propose converting some of it into infrastructure.Mohammad Al Biajawi at University Malaysia Pahang Al-Sultan Abdullah and […]



