A Times of India publication Volume 4 Issue 6

October 2014 `125

SCIENCE • HISTORY • NATURE • FOR THE CURIOUS MIND

take
a Trip
to hell
valley
Find out how Japanese macaques
battle sub-zero temperatures p32

R.N.I.MAHENG/2010/35422
 contents A Times of India publication

SCIENCE • HISTORY • NATURE • FOR THE CURIOUS MIND

Volume 4 Issue 6
October 2014 `125

TAKE
A TRIP
TO HELL
ANDREW NEWEY , Geoffrey Malins and John McDowell, esa/Andy Potts, Anup Shah and Fiona Rogers, yann hubert/flpa, illustrator: gluekit

Cover story
32 Northern Exposure
Anup Shah and Fiona Rodgers photograph Japanese
VALLEY
Find out how Japanese macaques
battle sub-zero temperatures p32
Macaques in Japan’s foreboding Hell Valley

features
24 Who Is The Greatest Genius?
Eminent scientists from across the globe nominate
their selection for history’s greatest mind

38 The Comet Chaser R.N.I.MAHENG/2010/35422

Find out what the rendezvous of the Rosetta space-

craft with the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko
means for space exploration
46 The Science Of Blockbusters
Decoding the seemingly impossible laws of physics
that govern the movie universe
56 The Scientific Legacy Of World War I
A hundred years on, the advancements made during
the First World War are in use today, though probably
not in the way their makers intended
58 Ten Photographs That Made History
Leading historians pick images, which captured their
era to commemorate the 175th anniversary of the
discovery of the Daguerreotype process
66 Animal Supersenses
Nature has gifted animals with senses and abilities
we’d normally associate with superheroes. We exam-
ine the most spectacular
74 World's Greatest Explorers
Follow the footsteps of history’s most intrepid
trailblazers as we chart out the voyages undertaken
by mankind’s greatest explorers
regulars
6 Q&A
Our panel of experts answer the questions you’ve always
wanted to ask
12 Snapshot
Outstanding photographs to inform and engage
18 Update
The latest intelligence – the speed of light may not be as
fast we think, and spiders with a taste for seafood
76 How Do We Know:
The Structure Of DNA
Unravelling the secrets of the building blocks of life, DNA
78 Ye Olde Travel Guide: Reykjavik, 1828
Visit the beautiful Scandinavian city and bask in the
beauty of 19th Century Iceland
80 Edu Talk
Interview with Dr. Saini, the principal of Delhi Public
School, R.K. Puram, New Delhi

2 October 2014
 24

58 38

12

81 Games Review
We review the biggest title in competitive
gaming, DOTA 2, and bring you nuggets of
gaming news from across the industry

82 Puzzle Pit
A veritable buffet of brain teasers guaranteed
to test your mind
88
86 Gadgets
Browse through a varied collection of some of
the coolest gadgets on the market

88 Inside The Pages

In this literary feast, we bring you the latest
titles, characters we love to hate, and get 82
your views on what’s worth reading

90 In Focus
By taming the Yangtze River and pioneering
irrigation, Yu the Great changed the course
of human history

66
 from the editor
Take a trip to Hell Valley. This
issue carries a few testaments
of tough times, visual journeys
into the worlds of nature and
history when they have been
at their demanding best. Don’t
be fooled by the cute pink
faces of the Japanese macaques,
it takes much more than hot
geysers to keep these primates
thriving in extraordinarily
extreme temperatures. Read and see on page 32. My
favourite and a must see is another photo essay, 10
Photographs That Made History, put together
with inputs from historians across the globe. These
are moments frozen for posterity that have come to
define our past.
As always, this edition is packed with knowledge.
Find out about the how the structure of the DNA
was decoded and the special senses of some animals.
And for you young movie buffs, just in case nobody
has told you about the impossibility of half the stuff
your action hero does, please read The Science of
Blockbusters (page 46).
Enjoy.
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Mrigank sharma (India Sutra)
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4 October 2014
experts this issue
Will Gater is a prominent astronomy journalist
and author. His articles have appeared in
Focus, New Scientist, and Astronomy Now.
Gater has a degree in astrophysics and is
also a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. In this
issue, he analyses what Rosetta spacecraft’s arrival at its
destination means for space exploration. See page 38
Helen Pilcher is a former stem cell biologist
and holds a PhD in Neuroscience. She is
currently a freelance science journalist,
specialising in writing about biology,
medicine, zoology, and unusual science stories. In this
issue, she examines the unbelievable science that our
movies are full of. See page 46
Helen Czerski is a science presenter for BBC
and oceanographer working at the University
College in London. In this issue, she rounds
up the fantastic abilities that animals posses
and how they use them. See page 66
Hannah Kent is the winner of multiple fiction
writing awards, including 2014 Indie Awards
Debut Fiction Of The Year. She is the
co-founder and publisher of the literary
journal, Kill Your Darlings. In this issue, she takes us
back to Reykjavik, Iceland in the year 1828. See page78
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 &
Your Questions Answered

Does urine ease the pain of jellyfish stings? p8 Why do children

dislike vegetables? p9 How does a NASA Starshade work? p10
Is there an advantage to having a beard? p11

How are planes A plane’s metal fuselage is

effectively a Faraday Cage,
protected from safely conducting the current
from where the lightning
lightning strikes to where it exits. But
lightning can potentially
strikes? induce secondary currents in
cabling beneath the aircraft’s
skin. So, for added protection,
wiring and computers are
electrically screened. The
latest aircraft, like the Boeing
787 Dreamliner, are made of
less conductive composite
materials. Conductive fibres
are woven into the skin to
guide lightning safely around
the plane’s body. GM

Flying through a storm is

still a terrifying experience,
regardless of how well
protected the plane is

Susan Blackmore (SB) A visiting and researcher. He is a Visiting Reader in

Expert PANEL

professor at the University of Plymouth, Science at Aston University, UK.

UK, Susan is an expert on psychology and
evolution. Gareth Mitchell As well as lecturing Ask the Experts?
at Imperial College London, Gareth is a Email our panel at bbcknowledge@
Alamy, getty x2

Alastair Gunn Alastair is a radio
astronomer at Jodrell Bank Centre
for Astrophysics at the University of
Manchester, UK.
Robert Matthews Robert is a writer
presenter of Click on the BBC World Service. wwm.co.in We’re sorry, but we cannot
reply to questions individually.
Luis Villazon
Luis has a BSc in computing and an MSc
in zoology from Oxford. His works include
How Cows Reach The Ground.
Why do humans show
affection by kissing?
It’s not just humans that enjoy a
smooch; lots of animals have courtship
behaviours involving the mouth.
Pigeons touch beaks, cats and dogs
nuzzle each other, male fruit flies lick
the females. At the most basic level,
kissing is just a way of tasting and
touching a potential mate, as part of
the process of assessing suitability.
Even pigeons
do it - well,
they touch
beaks
In primates though, kissing
might also be a behaviour that
has transferred from maternal
feeding. We depend for our first
meals on our ability to suckle,
and the positive feedback
mechanisms that evolved to
encourage infants to do this last
into adulthood. Kissing triggers
lots of hormone changes,
including raising oxytocin levels
– the hormone that creates a
sense of attachment.
Kissing is virtually universal
in all human cultures, so it’s
possible that it is instinctive. LV
Why do some
people sweat more
than others?
Receptors in the skin detect changes in
the external temperature and pass this to
the hypothalamus region of the brain,
which can make the body sweat in
response. An overweight person is better
insulated and has a smaller surface area to
volume ratio. Their core temperature
will be higher for a given external
temperature, simply because it’s
harder for them to dump excess
metabolic heat, and they will
sweat more as a result. Fit
people also sweat more than
normal. This is because
their bodies have
become conditioned
to start sweating
sooner in
response to
exercise, for
optimum cooling. LV

Office etiquette rule No. 1:

make sure you apply
antiperspirant in the morning

Why do people behave

differently in a crowd?
They may wish to fit in by imitating others,
feel constrained by being observed,
become excited by the noise and actions
of the crowd, or may respond to local
conditions and culture. An odd example is
that in different countries pedestrians step
right or left when meeting others on a
crowded street. This is unrelated to which
side of the road they drive on and appears
to emerge spontaneously and then stick in
each culture. Perhaps the most worrying
behavior is when people feel less
responsible for helping someone in trouble
when there are others around. This
‘bystander effect’ is quite rare but more
STATS
Finnish students gather at
VITAL
a festival to mark May Day; likely the larger the crowd. SB

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traditional hats enable them to

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 Q&A
If one of these
critters gets you
don’t look to Friends
for medical advice
Does urine ease
the pain of
jellyfish stings?
Regardless of what you saw on that one
episode of Friends, urine is completely
ineffective for jellyfish stings. At best it
will do nothing, at worst it could trigger
any remaining stinging cells. Rinse the
area liberally with seawater, then
scrape any attached tentacle fragments
off with a credit card. LV
Why do mosquito bites itch?
When a mosquito punctures your
skin, the chances of striking a
capillary on the first try are rather
low; only about five per cent of your
skin is blood vessel. So the mosquito
will saw its proboscis back and forth
as it hunts for a capillary, which
creates extra damage under the
What are the most common phobias?
Arachnophobia, or fear of spiders,
heads most Top 10 lists, although it’s
impossible to be precise about the true
order. Happily, most of us can avoid
seeing spiders very often, and
arachnophobia can be treated relatively
getty, alamy X2, nasa
easily with cognitive behavioural
therapy or hypnotherapy.
More damaging to people’s lives is
agoraphobia. The name literally means
fear of the market place (from the Greek
8 October 2014
Why does Saturn have rings?
It is not entirely clear why Saturn
possesses rings. Astronomers have
developed three theories of their
formation. They could have formed
from material left over from the
formation of the planet itself –
material that was unable to form a
moon. Or, they could have formed
from the debris of a moon that was
destroyed by a large impact, perhaps
by a comet or asteroid. Finally, they
may have formed from a moon that
broke apart due to the tidal forces
skin. On top of that the mosquito
injects an anticoagulant protein
to prevent blood clots from
clogging the proboscis. Your
immune system reacts by
increasing blood flow to the area
and sending lots of white blood
cells, creating an itchy bump. LV
word ‘Agora’). More generally it means
fear of open places and crowds, or
situations that are hard to escape from.
Agoraphobics can have panic attacks
and then become even more afraid of
BBC Knowledge sincerely apologises
for this image if you’re arachnophobic
One of Nature’s
great spectacles:
the rings of Saturn
from Saturn itself. If the rings were
formed along with the planet, then
they will have had about four billion
years to gather a large amount of
‘dirt’ from micrometeorite impacts.
However, Saturn’s rings (composed
mostly of water ice) are almost
completely devoid of such ‘dirt’,
implying they are actually quite
young. This may suggest the
impacted moon hypothesis is more
likely. However, the jury is still out on
this question. AG
further attacks. This can lead to them
staying at home, drastically restricting
their life. Again treatment is possible
and people can overcome agoraphobia.
Other common phobias include the fear
of being shut in (claustrophobia), of
social situations such as public
speaking (glossophobia), of snakes
(ophidiophobia), of heights (acrophobia),
and of germs and dirt (mysophobia). SB
 Q&A
Kids are merely
trying to avoid a
painful toxic death
when they refuse
to eat broccoli
Do animals have a sixth sense of
when disasters are about to strike?
The idea that animals can predict
impending natural disasters dates
back thousands of years, and
anecdotes persist to this day.
Following the Indian Ocean
earthquake and tsunami that struck
on Boxing Day 2004, reports emerged
of elephants, buffalo and other
animals running to higher ground
before disaster struck. More recently,
the respected Journal of Zoology
reported an exodus of toads from a
pond in L’Aquila, Italy, just before the
town was struck by an earthquake in
2009. The idea that animals can
detect such events ahead of time has
some credibility. In 1997, researchers
at the University of California
Alamy X2, science photo library
There were recent reports of bison fleeing the Yellowstone National Park, possibly because they could
sense an impending supervolcano about to erupt. At the time of writing, Yellowstone was still in existence
Why do children
dislike vegetables?
Our evolutionary ancestors lived with lots of
toxic plants and we evolved a gene that
makes the toxins in these plants taste bitter
to discourage us from eating them. Children
probably evolved a stronger aversion to bitter
tastes because they haven’t yet learned
which plants are dangerous. We learn which
plants are safe and lose half of our taste
receptors by the time we are 20, making
vegetables taste less bitter. LV
reported that elephants could detect
the stomping of others over 48km (30
miles) away, which may also allow
them to detect tremors ahead of the
main quake. Earthquakes also
release electromagnetic pulses and
positive ions which may be
detectable by animals. To get to the
bottom of the mystery, the space
agencies of Germany and Russia are
collaborating on Project Icarus,
which will tag around 1,000 birds and
bats and monitor them from space.
The aim is to find out if unusual
behavior is more common before
seismic events – a sign that animals
have an ability to detect coming
disaster. RM
Even the empty space in this vacuum
chamber has a temperature
What temperature is
a vacuum?
The temperature of a substance is a
measure of the kinetic energy of its
constituents. So, for example, nitrogen
at room temperature consists of
molecules whizzing around with typical
speeds of over 1,800km/h. Yet in
principle at least, a vacuum is utterly
devoid of constituents, making this
definition of temperature problematic.
In practice, however, genuinely perfect
vacuums don’t exist. Quantum theory
implies that even apparently ‘empty’
space is seething with energy, as a
consequence of the uncertainty
principle. The ‘hardest’ vacuum we
know of in real-life – that is, the closest
to a perfect vacuum – is space, yet even
this contains an average of around one
particle per cubic metre, plus radiation
left behind from the Big Bang. After 14
billion years, this radiation now has an
energy corresponding to a temperature
of around 3°C above absolute zero
(–273°C), making this the temperature of
the hardest known vacuum. RM
STATS
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Q&A
how it works

Nasa Starshade Tightly wrapped up for the

journey to space, the starshade
We know alien worlds are there - we’ve is launched as a package with a
detected over 1,800 of them. But as yet just a space telescope.
handful of images have been taken of only the
largest, giant Jupiter-type worlds as specks of
light. The quest is on to take a snap of a small,
rocky planet close to its parent star – a world
like ours. We could then analyse its spectra to
see if it could be teeming with life. The
problem is that stars are so bright that it’s
near impossible to see anything orbiting them. The starshade is released from
the telescope and begins to
But NASA has a surprisingly beautiful solution
unfurl its petals to reveal its
- a huge flower-like starshade that can be
flower-like form.
perfectly positioned in space to block the light
from the star. A telescope can then image its
surrounding worlds. While it’s just a concept,
NASA says it could be launched with a
telescope in the future.

Fully deployed, thrusters on

the starshade itself
manoeuvre it into position. It
requires millimetre accuracy
to effectively block the
starlight for the waiting
space telescope.

The flower-like shape of the

starshade doesn’t just look
pretty. The jagged edge formed
by the petals means that light
rays from the star are bent less,
making the shadow of the
starshade very dark and
reducing glare. The telescope
is then able to snap the
orbiting planets.

10 October 2014
 Q&A
Can external sounds QuicKFIRE
influence your dreams?
Does every planet have
Yes. Many people have dreamed of a church bell an equator?
ringing or a fire engine’s siren, only to wake to The ‘equator’ of a planet is an
imaginary line on its surface,
the sound of their alarm. Sometimes dreams
equidistant from its poles. By
seem to build up gradually towards the final definition, any planet that rotates will
sound – walking miles to the church for therefore have poles and an equator.
example, or running through a blazing city Planets are formed by the
before the fire engine arrives. This may seem gravitational collapse of clouds of
impossible, or even paranormal, but it probably gas and dust around stars. Any initial
Kids: the ultimate rotation of this material will be
occurs as the brain tries to build a story from a in morning alarms greatly enhanced as the planet
lot of jumbled dream fragments as it wakes up. forms. In a turbulent Universe like
Dripping taps, distant voices, and traffic are ours, this means all planets will have
often claimed to affect dream content. a degree of rotation and hence
In recent experiments thousands of people equators. AG
have used an app that plays different
‘soundscapes’ when they are dreaming. Those
How would we
who listened to nature sounds were more likely keep time on Mars?
to report dreaming of greenery and flowers It’s a question that has already
while those who selected beach sounds were faced Earth-bound
more likely to dream of sunshine holidays. SB engineers monitoring
missions sent to
Mars. As a day on
the Red Planet lasts A day on Mars is

Why do we feel Is there an advantage

drowsy after eating
a large meal?
Steak and chips will induce a
‘rest and digest’ response
Contrary to myth, it’s not caused by
getty, thinkstock, alamy, nasa
40 minutes longer
around 40 minutes than on Earth
longer than on Earth,
to having a beard? engineers had to start
shifts 40 minutes later
Yes, if you want to attract women, but only
each day. So they all wear
watches that deliberately run
when beards are relatively rare. In Britain big slow by this amount. RM
beards are currently popular, but some say we
have reached ‘peak beard’ and hairy chins will
soon decline. How do governments
New research suggests that wearing a beard
prevent cyber attacks?
In 2007 much of Estonia was
may be similar to what is known in biology as knocked offline by cyber attacks that
‘negative frequency-dependent sexual had originated in Russia. State,
selection’. This means that a rare trait is more business and banking websites were
attractive to the opposite sex than a common overwhelmed by a barrage of
one. In biology this effect depends on genes requests for information in so-called
but in the case of beards it depends on an distributed denial of service (DDoS)
attacks. A year later, a cyber defence
idea: deciding to shave or not. In the centre was established in the country
experiments nearly 1500 women and 200 men and Estonia is now a leader in

blood being diverted from your brain to
your stomach. The drowsiness is partly
because your body activates a ‘rest and
digest’ mechanism (the opposite of the
‘fight or flight’ response) and partly
because high carbohydrate meals
increase the levels of melatonin in the
brain, which makes us feel sleepy. LV
were shown photos of men with varying national cyber security. Most
amounts of facial hair. When most of the governments base their defence
photos were of clean-shaven men the women plans on prevention, detection and
preferred the bearded ones, and vice versa. SB response. This is based partly on
intelligence to spot threats from
criminal organisations or even hostile
governments. Controversially, that
Bring back the involves harvesting terabytes of data
razor! We’re on web traffic and mobile phone
reaching ‘peak communications. GM
beard’ in Britain
 nature | Snapshot

snapshot
ANDREW NEWEY

12 October 2014
What a buzz
A Sweet climb
When members of the Nepalese
Gurung tribe fancy a taste of
something sweet they have to get
it the hard way. Instead of simply
pottering to a supermarket to
pick up a jar of honey, these
men dangle 60m (200ft) in the
air, probing at the giant rounded
combs made by the world’s
largest honeybees, Apis laboriosa,
with bamboo poles. The bees
grow up to 3cm in length.
“In certain areas, this bee
would struggle to find big trees
with cavities, so it’s easier for
them to find a place where they
can nest underneath an overhang
of a cliff,” says BBC presenter
and insect expert Adam Hart.
The Gurung tribe brave these
mountain faces wearing very little
to protect themselves. But with
each hive containing up to 60kg,
the Gurung tribe deem the hunt
worth the risk. “We’re so used
to sugar being everywhere, but
historically this wasn’t the case
and people would go through
huge lengths to get hold of it,”
says Hart.
MARK MOFFETT/FLPA
nature | Snapshot

14 October 2014
Explosive altruism
Ant attack
As far as taking one for the team goes,
Borneo’s carpenter ants are up there
with the best of them. When attacked
by predators, such as the larger
worker ant pictured here, the bomb-
like bugs grab onto their assailants
and hit the self-destruct button,
spraying toxic yellow glue into the air.
“Ants have a mandibular gland
that is normally confined to the
head,” explains entomologist and BBC
presenter Adam Hart. “However, in
some species of carpenter ants the
gland is enormous and runs down
the length of the body. As a last-ditch
defence mechanism, the ant can
violently contract muscles that cause
its abdomen and the mandibular
glands to rupture. This sprays the
sticky, corrosive contents all over
its attacker.”
This defence mechanism is known
as ‘autothysis’ and is also seen in
some species of termite.
 nature | Snapshot

Military mannequin
Sensory protection
This character is Porton Man, the
Ministry of Defence’s newest robot.
Taking its name from Porton Down,
the home of the Defence Science and
Technology Laboratory, it is used to
test the effectiveness of protective
military clothing.
“We have designed software that
enables the figure to run and walk at
different speeds and with different
styles of movement, such as a high-
stepping march,” says Jez Gibson-
Harris, director at i-bodi, the company
that built Porton Man. “The figure,
made out of carbon composites, can
simulate sitting, kneeling and sighting
a gun in a realistic manner. The head
is wirelessly controlled and can rotate
and tilt.”
After decking him out in state-of-
the-art protective clobber, Ministry
of Defence scientists then bombard
Porton Man with all manner of
chemical and biological weapons.
The 276 sensors – the metallic pits
all over his body – record exactly how
much damage makes it through the
protective gear.
PRESS ASSOCIATION

16 October 2014
 update the latest
intelligence

Not so dumb
cavemen
Studies suggest that Neanderthals weren't
intellectually inferior to Homo Sapiens

I
f you thought Neanderthals
were simple-minded brutes
that were driven to extinction
by the intellectually superior
ancestors of modern humans,
it may be time to think again.
Neanderthals thrived in a large
area of Europe and Asia between
350,000 and 40,000 years ago, but
died out after the arrival of
‘anatomically modern’ humans
from Africa. It has traditionally
been suggested that this was due
to the newcomers’ more advanced
hunting and communication
skills, and ability to innovate and
adapt. But a review of recent
The Natural History Museum, London
evidence that Neanderthals
probably herded bison,
mammoths and woolly
rhinoceroses to their deaths by
steering them off cliffs. This
implies that Neanderthals could
plan ahead and communicate
effectively as a group. Ochre – a
kind of pigment that may have
been used for body painting – and
ornaments have also been found
at Neanderthal sites, suggesting
they carried out complex cultural
rituals and used a symbolic
communication system.
“Researchers were comparing
Neanderthals not to their

studies on Neanderthals carried contemporaries on other

out at the University of Colorado,
Boulder has challenged this
long-standing assumption.
“The evidence for cognitive
inferiority is simply not there. What
we are saying is that the
conventional view of Neanderthals
is not true,” said Paolo Villa, a
curator at the University’s Museum
of Natural History. Villa cites
continents, but to their
successors,” says Villa. “That
would be like comparing the
performance of Model T Fords,
widely used in America and
Europe in the early part of the
last century, to the performance of
a modern Ferrari, and concluding When it comes to mental
that Henry Ford was cognitively capacity, Neanderthals may
inferior to Enzo Ferrari.” have been judged unfairly

who’s in What did he say?

The speed of light
Franson argues that light
moving through space
another photon. Franson
believes this process could

the news? may be slower than

currently thought.
may be slowed by
‘vacuum polarisation’.
slow the photons down.

Woah there… that sounds
James like a bold claim?
Franson It is. When, by international
Professor of Physics agreement, the speed of
at the University of light in a vacuum was
Maryland, USA determined in 1983 to be
299,792,458m/s, it was
largely assumed to be
xxx
Vacuum what?
As photons – particles of
light – travel through space
there is a slight chance that
any given photon will split
into an electron-positron
pair. These pairs exist
for a brief period before
What if he is right?
As the speed of light is
used in cosmological
calculations, many
measurements taken over
the last 30 years could
be wrong. However,
Franson’s paper is yet to
go through the peer

definitive. However, recombining to create review process.

18
 psychology SCIENCE

update the latest intelligence

Neuroscience zoology

Time for the truth Spiders are partial to a

fish supper
How honest people are
may be governed by
their body clock It’s news that’s likely to send mating period, when the
arachnophobes running for elevated energy and protein
the hills: spiders have been requirements of pregnant
observed eating fish. Don’t female spiders require
fret, they’re not working their increased food intake, or at
way up the food chain. times of limited availability of
Although spiders are invertebrate prey.”
typically thought of as These semi-aquatic, fish-
predators of insects, a team eating spiders typically live
at the University of Basel, around the edges of shallow
Switzerland and University freshwater streams, ponds or
Early to bed, early to rise, makes a probability, the scores should have of Western Australia has swamps. A number of them
man healthy, wealthy and wise, so averaged out to 3.5 catalogued five families are also capable of swimming,
the saying goes. However, it seems (1+2+3+4+5+6, divided by 6). of spider that hunt fish in diving or walking across the
‘morning people’ may become less However, larks in the night session the wild. water surface itself. They use
ethical as the day goes on. reported getting higher rolls (4.55) “The finding of such a large potent neurotoxins to disable
Researchers gathered together a than larks in the morning sessions diversity of spiders engaging the fish and have powerful
number of early risers, or ‘larks’, (3.86), while owls in the morning in fish predation is novel. Our enzymes that enable them to
and a number of ‘night owls’, who session reported higher rolls evidence suggests that fish digest fish up to twice their
are prone to staying up late at (4.23) than owls in the night might be an occasional prey own size. The feeding process
night. They randomly assigned sessions (3.80). item of substantial nutritional usually lasts several hours,
them to experimental sessions from “We assume that good people importance,” says study co- researchers say.
7 to 8.30am or from midnight to typically do good things, and bad author Martin Nyffeler. But fear not: although
1.30am and tested their honesty by people do bad things,” says the “Fish meat is high fish-eating spiders can be
asking each participant to roll a die study’s lead author, Christopher M quality in terms of protein found on all continents save
without the researchers seeing, and Barnes from the Foster School of content and caloric value,” for Antarctica, they are most
report back the number. A small Business, Seattle, “but there is adds Nyffeler. “Feeding prevalent in north America,
amount of money was given to mounting evidence that ‘good’ on fish may be particularly particularly in the wetlands
each participant, with higher rolls people can be unethical and ‘bad’ advantageous during the of Florida.
receiving a higher payout. people can be ethical, depending
According to the laws of on the pressures of the moment.”

4.5
4.23
3.86
Average reported dice socre

3.8

Expected
result (3.5)
alamy, PETER LILEY

Research into
whether spiders
are fond of
Larks Owls pickled eggs is
Larks aren’t just at their best in the morning – they’re at their most honest, too still ongoing
xxx

October 2013 19
 update the latest intelligence

Graphic science
Seeing research differently

new TITANOSAUR 77 Tonnes

20m

100 Million YEARS OLD The weight of 14

African Elephants

Argentinosaurus
15m 97 million years old

Fossilised bones
Height

found at La Fle-
cha, Argentina

10m
20m tall
Roughly the height
of four giraffes

5m

0m

The biggest dinosaur ever found

Dr Jose Luis Carballido/Dr Diego Pol, MIT

Discoveries don’t come much bigger than
this: palaeontologists in Argentina have
found the remains of what is thought to
be the largest creature ever to walk the
Earth. Using the gigantic thighbones,
or femurs, as a reference, scientists say
the animal was 40m long, 20m tall and
weighed in at 77 tonnes, seven tonnes
heavier than the previous record holder
the Argentinosaurus.
It is thought to be one of a new species of
titanosaur, a huge plant-eating dinosaur
that lived during the Cretaceous period.
The remains were first discovered by
a local farm worker in a desert near
La Flecha in Patagonia. The fossils
were then excavated by a team from
the Museum of Paleontology Egidio
Feruglio, which uncovered 150 bones A palaeontologist lies next to a femur
from seven animals. of the newly discovered titanosaur

20 October 2014
 e6
e 4 Issu `125
Volum r 2014
Octobe

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publica
India
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SCIE

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TO HLLEY
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aque
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Japa pera
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out ze
Find le sub-
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ENG/
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* Terms and conditions apply. Dates subject to change.

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History | Greatest genius

WHO IS THE

The history of science

and technology is rich
with great minds, but
who is the greatest?
We asked some of the
world’s top scientists
for their nominations

W
hat defines a genius? Traditionally, it’s the ability to be
more original and skilled than anyone else, or the first to
glimpse new shores of knowledge. In science, flashes of
insight often go hand in hand with persistence and methodical
working practices. You could also give kudos to someone
who’s worked across multiple fields, or whose discoveries have
influenced the largest number of people. All these are arguments
made by the top scientists we’ve interviewed for this article.
This isn’t just a list of great scientists, though all the nominees
are unarguably great. Rather, it’s a celebration of individual
achievement. So vote for the greatest genius by logging onto
BBC Knowledge’s facebook page.
 nominated by

Michael Mosley is writer and presenter of

Trust Me I’m A Doctor.

What Kepler achieved was extraordinary. He was the person who made
sense of astronomy. He realised, following in the footsteps of Copernicus,
that the Sun is not the dead centre of the Universe and that the planets go
round in ellipses. He was a wonderful, weird character: incredibly short-
sighted and yet he gazed at the stars. He would get into fierce debates
with Galileo about tides and why they happen. Kepler quite correctly said
that it’s because of the Moon – he basically predicted gravity.
Kepler was very stubborn too. He worked for Tycho Brahe for a while,
who had been studying all this data about the Solar System but wouldn’t
let Kepler lay his hands on it. One of the stories goes that Kepler poisoned
him – certainly Brahe died under mysterious circumstances. Either way
Kepler managed to nick all his data, and use it for his own purposes. He Johannes
spent 16 years just creating model after model after model, until finally he
got into ellipses. For too long, circles obsessed him: circles were perfect,
circles were what his hero Copernicus had championed. It turned out
circles were wrong and it was the data that swung it. What stands out
Kepler
was Kepler’s willingness to just grind away at the mathematics. One 1571-1630
of the most important things about genius is persistence.

nominated by

Sarah-Jayne Blakemore Director of Cognitive

Neuroscience at UCL

Rosalind Franklin systematically, methodically, and meticulously

spent many years encoding or deciphering the structure of DNA
using X-rays. It was her pictures, her X-rays, that made Watson and
Crick absolutely certain about the structure of DNA. They were close
but they needed the evidence. They were theoreticians, but her
work was the real data that solidified what they had been getting to.
Unfortunately she died of ovarian cancer at a young age and the
Nobel Prize is not given posthumously, so we’ll never know whether
she would have been recognised. She was working in very male-
dominated conditions back in the ’40s and ’50s.
The question of genius is an interesting one. Some people argue getty, alamy illustrator: gluekit
that genius is a leap of creative thought, where you take a few
disparate pieces of information, put them together and leap further
than anyone else would. I’d argue there’s another side, which is the
more methodical, precise, and meticulous route that’s equally vital.
The point is, even though she wasn’t the first to say it, the

Rosalind Franklin general consensus is that in her mind she knew what the structure
of DNA was before anyone else, but she wasn’t prepared to go out
there on a limb without knowing the evidence for sure. Perhaps
1920-1958 that’s something women suffer from even now: a lack of confidence
in their own convictions and their own findings. Perhaps if she did,
she might have aired her views earlier.

October 2014 25
 History | Greatest genius

nominated by

Rasik Ravindra is the Chair Panikkar

Professor at the Ministry of Earth
Sciences, India.

For me, Aryabhatta, the famous Indian mathematician and astronomer who
wrote his first monumental classic on mathematics, Aryabhatiyam,
incorporating among other complex subjects, spherical trigonometry,
quadratic equations, and sine tables at an age of 23 years. His explanations
of sine tables (sine, cosine, versine and inverse sine) are considered the
forerunner of modern trigonometry. He was correct up to 4 places of
decimals in assigning values to sine and versine from 00 to 900 . In times
when computing systems were not evolved, he could comprehend the value
of π, again correct up to 4 decimal places and the circumference of earth to
Aryabhatta
99.80% accuracy. Many mathematicians give credit of knowledge of zero to
Aryabhatta as it is considered implicit in his place value system as a 476-550
placeholder for powers of ten.
He also hypothesised, contrary to existing views then that the earth rotates
on its axis daily and that solar and lunar eclipses were caused by shadows
cast by sun and moon on the earth. He calculated positions of the planets in
terms of distance from the earth and calculated the sidereal rotational value
of earth correct up to seconds (23:56:4.1 as against modern value of
23:56:4.091). His calculation of the length of the sidereal year was correct up
to 3 min and 20 seconds over a length of full one year. Such accuracy and
insight, independent of time and space, can only come from a real genius.
wikipedia, thinkstock, julia nottingham, getty

nominated by

Marcus Du Sautoy Simonyi Professor for the Public

Understanding of Science and a Professor
of Mathematics at the University of Oxford.

Riemann discovered several branches of mathematics that

have had a massive impact since the middle of the 19th
Century. He pioneered what’s called ‘high-dimensional
geometry’, which was absolutely key to Einstein’s
breakthrough on relativity. He understood how you can go
from three dimensions to four to five to 11. That insight is
absolutely extraordinary – using a mathematical language to
go from the physical world around us to geometries in higher
dimensions. It’s crucial for physics and, without it, Einstein
wouldn’t have had the maths to develop his ideas.
Another of his great breakthroughs was concerning prime
numbers – numbers that can only be divided by one and
themselves. These are like atoms for a mathematician, and
he discovered their ‘DNA’, which basically tells us how they
are distributed. You might think prime numbers are rather

Bernhard esoteric, but they’re at the heart of internet cryptography –

they help us make unbreakable codes. Understanding these

Riemann
numbers has had a massive impact on the digital world.
Riemann created a new way of being able to talk about
geometry and numbers. His staggering breadth of work and

1826-1866 originality is what marks him out as a genius for me.

26 October 2014

Leonardo
da Vinci
1452-1519
nominated by
Heather Williams Medical physicist at Central Manchester
University Hospitals and director of ScienceGrrl.
Da vinci was a mathematician, engineer, botanist, cartographer, and
much more, so it’s hard to single out one achievement. He was
remarkable really. This is a guy who had no formal schooling. His trade
was a painter and he learnt what he did through deduction.
Da Vinci’s studies in anatomy started with his desire to create
realistic figures and therefore wanting to know how the body was
constructed. A lot of what he discovered in that process is consistent
with what we know today. When I look at his drawings they could easily
have been lifted from text books that I regularly refer to. This was in the
1400s, so I think to dismiss him as an artist who just dabbled in science
would be a misstatement.
greatest genius | history
He tells us a lot about what it means to be a scientist. The idea that
we have both artists and scientists is actually a fairly recent one. It’s
only in the last couple of hundred years that we’ve made the distinction.
Kids in school effectively have to chose between doing arts and science
subjects and cast themselves as one or the other, when actually doing
science well is a deeply creative endeavour, one that requires you
to observe and document the world in the same way that a good
artist would.
I nominate him as my favourite genius not just because he excels in
so many different spheres, but because he shows us what science is
really all about.
October 2014 27
History | Greatest genius

nominated by

Frances Ashcroft Geneticist at the University of Oxford and

author of The Spark Of Life.

I nominate Charles Darwin because he changed the way

we think about life on Earth and our place in it. He is one of the
most influential thinkers of all time. Not only did his idea of
evolution by natural selection revolutionise the field of biology,
but it has also influenced our views of society, ethics and religion.
At the time it created huge controversy and Darwin knew this
would be the case. He stated to his friend the botanist Joseph
Hooker (in 1844) that his idea that species were not immutable,
but evolved, was ‘like confessing to a murder’.
What I admire about Darwin is not just his insight, but also
the very detailed and careful way in which he worked. He
assembled a huge amount of evidence to support his ideas.
He was a superb observer and carried out extremely meticulous
and painstaking experiments.
Most people have heard of On The Origin Of Species, but
Darwin was a prolific scientist and published many other

Charles Darwin
wonderful works. He explained how coral atolls are formed,
published a huge tome on barnacles and wrote on the expression
of emotions in man and animals, and on carnivorous plants. My
particular favourite is his book – his little treatise he calls it – on
British orchids, Fertilisation Of Orchids. 1809-1882

For me it was close between Einstein and Newton, but in

Newton’s time there weren’t that many people doing
science. However, at the start of the 20th Century, when
Einstein was working, there were lots of other great
scientists such as Paul Dirac, Werner Heisenberg, Niels
Bohr and several others. Even amongst them Einstein was
considered special. Some people may say this is a lazy
choice but I have thought long and hard about it and I feel
it’s right.
The three theories that he published in four papers are
some of the greatest ideas ever to come out of the human
mind: he proved that atoms exist with his paper on
Brownian motion, discovered the fact that light is made up
of packets of energy, and the whole field of cosmology and
most of modern astronomy was born from the General
Theory of Relativity. Any one of those would have been
enough to put him up there as one of the greats.
He changed forever the way we understand our Universe.
Even now, when we talk about the possibility of a big idea
changing science we say ‘we need another Einstein’.

Albert Einstein
nominated by

Jim Al-Khalili Professor of Physics at the University

of Surrey and presenter of The Life Scientific
1879-1955 on BBC Radio 4.

28 October 2014
 Marie
Sklodowska
Curie
nominated by

Robert Matthews Focus columnist and Visiting

Reader in Science at Aston University, Birmingham.
1867-1934
Back in the 1950s, James Lovelock invented the ‘electron capture
detector’ – an incredibly sensitive piece of equipment that proved very
useful in the analysis of the chemicals responsible for destroying the
ozone layer.
If he’d done just that, he’d be a major experimental scientist. But
Lovelock is most famous for his Gaia hypothesis: the idea that
organisms and the planet they’re on interact to keep it suitable for life.
Organisms don’t just adapt in a Darwinian way to whatever
environment they’re put into – they can actually shape the
environment too. This idea was initially attacked, and there are still
problems, but the idea that organisms and planets interact like this
is being taken seriously now, and is stimulating a lot of important
research.
What I love about Lovelock is the variety of his work and the fact
he’s totally independent, being funded by the money from his
inventions. As a result, he’s free to say what he likes – and isn’t afraid
to change his views.
People talk a lot about Stephen Hawking and Peter Higgs. They’re
really smart guys, but what they’ve discovered isn’t going to change
our lives in any direct way. Lovelock’s work is both universal and
relevant to all our lives through its implications for the environment.
For me, that makes him our greatest living scientist.

nominated by

Aderin-Pocock Research fellow at UCL and

presenter of The Sky At Night on BBC TV.

There are only four people who have won two Nobel Prizes and Marie
Curie was the first of them. She won a Nobel Prize in physics in 1903
for her work on radiation, and then one in chemistry in 1911 for the
discovery of the elements radium and polonium.
She did a lot of groundbreaking research looking into radiation and

James
into the fundamental nature of atoms. During the early 19th Century,
our knowledge of the atom was relatively limited. Her work was really
probing into exactly what matter consists of and getting a better

Lovelock understanding of the elements, and of the atom itself. And she made
all of her breakthroughs by slogging away in a lab. I think her genius
can be seen not only in her experiments and the physical doing of
1919-
getty X3, alamy

things, but also in her choices of exactly what to study. She had an
amazing insight to see where new science might be.
It’s also worth nothing that there weren’t many women doing
science at that time and I think the fact that she was doing work of
such a high standard as a woman in that era is impressive in itself.

October 2014 29
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portfolio

32 October 2014
 Portfolio | Nature

Unique physical and social adaptations allow

Japanese macaques to deal with sub-zero
temperatures. Get a poolside view into the lives
of these most northerly of non-human primates
Photography by Anup Shah and Fiona Rogers

Warm together
This family of macaques was
photographed huddling together
on a particularly cold morning,
when the temperature was well
below freezing. Higher-ranking
families tend to stay in large
huddles for longer periods than
lower-ranking ones.
Nature | Portfolio

Barber talk
These adult macaques are
engaged in intensive
grooming. We saw very
few insects or debris being
removed from their fur, so it
seems likely that the
monkeys were working to
improve social bonding
rather than their hygiene.

Social Grooming
While her infant son swims
in the water – he is too short
for his feet to touch the floor
– a high-ranking female is
groomed by a female
relative in a thermal pool.
Since grooming strengthens
relationships (see above), it
comes as no surprise that
females who are
matrilineally related groom
each other more often than
unrelated individuals.

34 October 2014
 “I am not
feeling cold”
This baby macaque has
just emerged from a
thermal pool. Though the
monkey’s fur is matted
and wet, it does not feel
cold. Its body retains heat
much better than humans
because its thick fur
means that it possesses
fewer sweat glands.
 Close encounters
This family is huddling
together early in the morning.
A macaque pair usually
huddles tummy to tummy,
wriggling to get close so that
the fur on their stomachs
touches to trap the heat.
 Portfolio | Nature

Yawn of the king

This is a high-ranking male
yawning as he rests at the
edge of a thermal pool.
He had a favourite spot in the
water and would placidly
sit there for hours, often
dozing off. We only saw him
stir when he felt hungry and
headed off to forage.

A mother’s touch
Bottom Females give birth
every other year – the baby is
usually born sometime
between midnight and dawn.
Pregnancy lasts about 180
days, and each female has,
on average, 10 babies during
her life. The species’
maximum life expectancy is
about 25–30 years.

The Location Jigokudani

The photographers –en
Monkey Park
Jigokudani Yaen-ko Sea of Japan

Jigokudani Monkey Park is in Nagano Prefecture,

Anup Shah and
Fiona Rogers This specifically the valley of the Yokoyu River which flows
from the Shiga-ko–gen mountains of Jo –shinetsu-ko –gen Kyoto Japan
husband and wife team
of wildlife photographers National Park. Jigokudani, or ‘Hell Valley’, is buried in
concentrates on primate snow for almost a third of the year; the place is thought Tokyo
projects in the wilds of Africa and Asia. Their to be named after its steep cliffs and thermal vents.
work has been published worldwide. Macaques have lived in the area for millennia.

October 2014 37
esa/Andy Potts

The Rosetta mission will deploy a lander

to analyse the make-up of comet 67P/
Churyumov-Gerasimenko – it should touch
down in November of this year
 Space exploration | Science

This month, 10 years after it launched, the

Rosetta spacecraft caught upto a comet
travelling at 135,000km/h, and deployed a
lander that will reveal its secrets.
Will Gater takes a look at the mission

October 2014 39
 s
ome 69km (43 miles) above the
Atlantic Ocean, things were
going very wrong for the
Ariane 5 rocket. Minutes previously,
it had thundered smoothly off the
pad in French Guiana carrying a
cargo of satellites. Now, though, its
engine nozzle had failed and it was
straying from its planned trajectory
dramatically. Less than eight minutes
after lift-off, the rocket self-
destructed, showering the sea below
with debris.
The malfunction would prove
costly in a multitude of ways, but for
the team working on the European
Space Agency’s Rosetta mission, it
marked the beginning of an
especially worrying period. The
same type of rocket was due to
propel their spacecraft skyward,
towards an historic rendezvous with
the comet 46P/Wirtanen, in January
2003 – less than four weeks later.
As launch day approached, it
became clear that the fallout from
the earlier Ariane 5 failure would see
Rosetta lose its one shot at reaching
the icy visitor. “Rosetta was
Rosetta launched onboard
effectively put in a shed, and no-one
an Ariane 5 rocket in 2004
knew what was going to be done,”

JANUARY 2003 March 2004 January 2014 Mid 2014

TIMELINE

A missed opportunity Lift-off! The spacecraft awakens BURN, BABY, BURN

Rosetta eventually For the past few

blasted off from months Rosetta
Kourou, French Guiana, has been making a
on 2 March 2004. Now number of thruster
it was heading for ‘burns’ that are
an entirely different necessary to
comet, Churyumov- ensure it makes a
Gerasimenko, which After several years of travelling through successful rendezvous
Rosetta was supposed to launch in had been discovered space in a state of electronic hibernation, with Churyumov-
January 2003 and visit the comet in 1969. the Rosetta spacecraft was woken up Gerasimenko. Some
46P/Wirtanen. But concerns about the on 20 January 2014. Soon it would be burns have lasted up
esa x6, ESO

rocket meant that the mission missed taking its first long-distance images of to seven hours.
this launch opportunity. Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

says Rosetta project scientist Matt
Taylor, who joined the team in 2013.
Second time lucky
The spacecraft didn’t languish there
for long, though. Rosetta’s scientists
soon identified another suitable
target for their mission, and in
March 2004 the probe safely
blasted off for the comet 67P/
Churyumov-Gerasimenko. This
month, it will at last arrive at the
comet, giving Taylor and his
colleagues a long-awaited close look
at Rosetta’s objective.
The team already know a fair bit
about Churyumov-Gerasimenko, of
course, thanks to ground- and space-
based observations. It’s what’s known
as a ‘periodic’ comet – it orbits our
star in almost 6.5 years – and it
rotates once every 12.4 hours. “It’s a
bit of a potato shape,” says Taylor,
“between four and five kilometres
across, depending on which way you
measure it.”
Crucially, the team also believe it
not to be a cometary wild child.
“Comets are inherently unpredictable,”
explains Taylor. “But by choosing a
periodic comet we have some level
August 2014 NOVEMBER 2014
ARRIVAL AT 67P Philae takes flight
In August 2014,
Rosetta will finally
arrive at Churyumov-
Gerasimenko. The
spacecraft will enter
orbit around the
comet and mimic its
trajectory as it moves
further into the inner
Solar System. November 2014 will see the historic event that
Rosetta scientists have been waiting years for:
the Philae lander will attempt to make a soft
landing on the comet’s nucleus.
Space exploration | Science
of predictability as to its activity.
We had measurements from its entire
previous orbit around the Sun,
which gave us an idea of how it was
going to behave.”
Churyumov-Gerasimenko is
unlikely to disintegrate in the
spectacular fashion that comet ISON
did earlier this year, then, but like all
comets, it should become more and
more active as it nears the Sun. Churyumov-Gerasimenko was first observed by
Romanian astronomer Klim Ivanovych Churyumov
in 1969
“Like all comets,
Churyumov-Gerasimenko
should become more active
as it nears the Sun”
Rosetta will be in a perfect position
to study these developments, because
it will be doing something that no
mission has ever done before: f lying
right alongside the comet.
“Previous missions have f lown by
other comets at kilometres-per-
second speeds, and at hundreds of The Rosetta spacecraft’s array of solar panels being
kilometres distance. So you only get assembled and tested in an ESA clean room
AUGUST 2015 DECEMBER 2015
67p at perihelion Mission ends?
On 13 August 2015,
Churyumov-
Gerasimenko will reach
perihelion – that is,
the point in its orbit
when it is closest to Rosetta’s mission is funded to last until
the Sun. Scientists will December 2015. However, the team is
be watching intently already exploring ways in which the
to see how the comet mission could be extended beyond this
behaves here. point, when the craft’s fuel and power
supplies will be dwindling.
October 2014 41
 a snapshot, you don’t see much of an
evolution,” says Taylor. “With
Rosetta we’re going to get in within
one metre per second relative speed
with the comet for over a year.”
That will allow the scientists to
watch as the warmth of the Sun
causes the comet to vent thousands
of kilograms of dust and gas he says.
“We’ll be able to see regions of

“We’ll be able to see

regions of activity start,
be fully active and then
reduce again”
Matt Taylor, Rosetta project scientist

activity start, be fully active and then

reduce again. Just to have that
observation gives you that leap
forward in really understanding how
comets work.”

Going boldly…
Rosetta’s most nail-biting moment,
though, will come this November,
when the spacecraft will send a small
lander, called Philae, to the frozen
surface of Churyumov-
Gerasimenko. Its instruments and
cameras should provide scientists
with an unprecedented view of a
cometary nucleus – the ice and rock
‘body’ of the comet. “As it touches
the surface, a little thruster will push
it down on the top,” says Taylor. “As
that occurs, ice screws from each of
the three feet will punch down into
the surface and then two harpoons
will fire down.”
Once it’s securely on the comet, If you’re going to spend 10
Philae will start to collect and
analyse samples as well as send back years and a billion Euros to
high-resolution pictures of its get to a comet, you’d best
esa/Andy Potts

surroundings. It’ll also work with make sure you’re carrying the
Rosetta to examine the three-
right equipment to study it
dimensional interior structure of
Churyumov-Gerasimenko using properly when you get there…
radio waves.

42 October 2014
Space exploration | Science
 Science | Space exploration
Humanity has been fascinated by these
night-sky wanderers since ancient times
In sending a probe to Churyumov-
Gerasimenko, Rosetta scientists are
simply following in the footsteps of
countless others who’ve sought to
decode the story of these enigmatic, icy
wanderers. This fascination with comets
has existed for much of human history,
says project scientist Matt Taylor. “It
dates back thousands of years, when
there is documented evidence of people
esa/Andy Potts
monitoring these bodies,” he says. “They
were originally seen as something that
was a sign of foreboding, of something
bad happening.”
44 October 2014
Inside Rosetta Mission
Control at the European
Space Operations Centre
in Darmstadt, Germany
“Imagine you’ve got the orbiter
on one side of the comet and the
lander on the far side, with a radio
signal propagating through it,” says
Taylor. “As Rosetta orbits the comet
you’ll see the variations [in the
In recent years, we’ve come to
realise that comets are a window into
the past, and may even hold the key to
understanding how life arose on Earth.
“From a modern science perspective
“In recent years, we’ve
we look at them as being a frozen time come to realise that
capsule of what the conditions were
like during the formation of the Solar comets are a window
System, some 4.5 billion years ago,”
says Taylor. “The planets formed, and
into the past”
from the leftovers of that process we had
the comets, hurled out into deep freeze
signal] and be able to build up a
beyond the outskirts of the Solar System,
reasonably accurate picture of what
as well as the asteroid belt.”
Taylor likens the task of unravelling a
the nucleus looks like.”
comet’s history to that of forensic experts Taylor is confident the lander will
at a crime scene. “You pick up dust in a make it down to Churyumov-
forensic scene to get clues as to what Gerasimenko. “It is very risky,” he
was going on and who was there,” he admits. “But then if it was easy, we’d
says. “In the same way we’ll gather dust, have done it already.”
chemicals and isotopes from the comet’s
coma to work out where it came from,
Will Gater is an astronomy
how it got to where it is today and also
journalist and author.
what was going on at that time.”
 e6
e 4 Issu `125
Volum r 2014
Octobe

tion
publica
India
es of
A Tim
D
S MIN
RIOU
E CU
R TH
t FO
TURE
Y t NA
t HI STOR
NCE
SCIE

TAKEP
A TREI LL
TO HLLEY
VA
s
aque
mac s p40
nese ture
Japa pera
how ro tem
out ze
Find le sub-
batt

2
/3542
2010
ENG/
.MAH
R.N.I
 Science | Blockbuster movie science

blockb
illustrator tim mcdonagh

46 October 2014
usters
Can you be hit by a
bullet and keep on
fighting, or escape from
a sinking car? Helen
Pilcher ponders the
implausible action in
big-budget movies

October 2014 47
Science | Blockbuster movie science
SURVIVE nearby
EXPLOSIONs
the Scene
A bomb explodes nearby.
The hero must f lee the
blast uncharred and unharmed.
The Science
Powerful explosives
generate a sphere of compressed,
rapidly expanding gas travelling
faster than the speed of sound.
Although this blast wave lasts just a
few milliseconds, it can cause ‘hidden’
injuries whose effects may not
become apparent for several days,
including brain trauma and ‘blast
lung,’ a potentially fatal
haemorrhaging of the lungs.
Immediately after comes a
hurricane force blast wind of
negative pressure that can raze
buildings, shatter glass, and throw
debris large distances. Flying debris
can eviscerate, amputate and
disintegrate body parts, smash bones,
cause deep penetrating wounds and
kill. The heat from the explosion can
cause burns and if the bomb is laced
with nails or other shrapnel, the risk
48 October 2014
of injury is increased. “If you’re close
enough to the blast, you’re one of the
things that’s thrown,” says Michelle
Hoffman of Biodynamics
Engineering, a US company that
studies the physics behind accidents.
No one, except the most extreme
of terrorists, plans to be near a bomb
when it blows, so for the most part,
survival comes down to good
fortune – the size and type of the
bomb and your distance from it.
America’s Federal Emergency
Management Agency offers
guidelines on safe evacuation
distances for bombs. To avoid injury
from a suicide bomber wearing 9kg
(20lb) of TNT, stand at least 415m
back. Or a mile back from a van
packed with 13,607kg (30,000lb) of
the same.
Is it plausible?
Get real. Stand too
close and no-one is
going to walk away from an
explosion unharmed. Not even
Iron Man.

fight on after
being shot
the Scene ballistics. Travelling at speeds
The villain is shot of well over 250 metres per
several times, but second, bullets are pumped
just keeps on going, with kinetic energy, much of
Terminator’ style. which is then rudely transferred
to the unlucky target. The
injury inf licted is related to
The Science this kinetic energy, which in
The scientific study turn is related to the bullet’s
of what bullets do size and velocity. High-speed,
to bodies is called wound high-calibre bullets are likely
to f loor a man, as are bullets
designed to expand on impact,
Blockbuster movie science | Science
the likes of which are used by
the US police force. Smaller,
slower, pointier bullets can pass
straight through a body, and
because skin and tissue are
elastic, the cavity created may
close up. There doesn’t have to
be huge, immediate blood loss,
and a person may be able to
keep going, especially if fuelled
by methamphetamine, adrenalin
or the like.
Whether or not you fall or
f lee also depends on where you
are hit. A shot to the spine or
head will stop you in your
tracks. But if the bullets miss
vital organs, you may be able to
keep going, for a while at least.
“I’ve had cases where people
have been shot through a major
artery and kept running for
several hundred feet,” says
Parris Ward from Biodynamics
Engineering, which simulates
wound ballistics for legal cases.
“I’ve also had cases where
people didn’t realise they’d
been shot in the leg because the
bullet didn’t hit a bone or an
artery.”
Is it
plausible?
Provided your vital
organs don’t take a hit and the
bullet is on the dainty side, you
may be able to keep going, but
not for long. If the bullet
doesn’t f loor you, blood loss
eventually will.
illustrator tim mcdonagh
October 2014 49
 Science | Blockbuster movie science

Escape from a car

underwater
the Scene
A hapless victim is
in a car that
plummets from a bridge into
deep water and is sinking fast.
They must get out alive.
the Science
Every year 400
people drown in
their cars in North America.
Many erroneously think you
should let the interior of the car
fill up with water, so the door
can be opened once the
pressure equilibrates.
But most people drown well
before that happens, says
Manitoba University’s Gordon
belt off as soon as you hit the
water, open the windows, get
any children out then get
yourself out. Most cars f loat for
about five minutes before
sinking, nose down, so the
escapees will likely have to
manoeuvre through a back
window. Calling emergency
services wastes time and can be
fatal. Giesbrecht laments the
recorded 911 calls offering
advice to people ‘already dead’,
who spent that critical first
minute on the phone.
Is it
plausible?
Plausible, but only

Giesbrecht, who reconstructs
underwater escapes from cars
in outdoor gravel pits. In
reality, you have about a
minute to get out alive –
the time it takes for the
water to seep in and stop
the electric windows
from working.
Giesbrecht’s advice:
take your
illustrator tim mcdonagh
be thrown
if you get out fast… or are in
James Bond’s Lotus Esprit.
through glass
the Scene
A hero is hurled
through a window.
They have a smashing time, but
don’t get hurt.
the Science
In the movies,
breakable windows
are made from sugary stunt
glass. But in the real world,
there are many types of glass
and your injuries will depend
on which you have the
misfortune to meet. Plate glass,
commonly used in buildings,
glass, used in skylights,
skyscrapers and storefronts, is
incredibly strong. “You can
jump up and down on it, or hit
it with a huge metal ball and it
still doesn’t break,” says
materials scientist Mark
Miodownik from University
College London. If it does
yield it creates a hole, but the
rest of the glass doesn’t shatter.
is it
plausible?
The safest way to
exit a window, undoubtedly, is

shatters into large shards that always to open it first.

can sever arteries and cause
deep lacerations. Toughened
glass, found in phone boxes
and windscreens, crumbles
into thousands of tiny, granular
chunks that cause smaller cuts
and grazing. Laminated safety
Smashing through plate or
toughened glass could cause
serious harm. Run into
laminated glass and you’re
likely to dent your pride more
than the pavement on the
other side.

50 October 2014
 Blockbuster movie science | Science

fall from
a building
the Scene
A hero falls spectacularly
from a building –
and survives.

the Science
“It’s not the fall that kills
you, but the sudden stop at the end,”
says Michelle Hoffman who analyses
falls at Biodynamics Engineering in
Phoenix, Arizona. In the movies, falls
are commonly slowed by trees, power
lines, roofs, and the like. “Awnings are
good,” says Hoffman. “Multiple
awnings are really good.” Dividing one
big fall into multiple smaller ones slows
your descent, reducing the force
of impact and increasing the odds
of survival.
For the same reason, what you land
on is also important – you come to a
stop more quickly on concrete than you
do on bark chips. A few years
ago in Melbourne, Australia, a young
woman attempting suicide by
jumping from a freeway bridge
survived by accidentally landing on
the back of a truck carrying fruit in
cardboard boxes.
How you hit the ground also
inf luences whether or not you
survive. Land head first from
any height and you’re dead.
Land on your back, spreadeagled,
and by spreading your weight over
the largest area possible, you might
just live to see another day.

is it plausible?
Plausible but unlikely.
‘Survival’ is, after all,
relative. “If you fell from a 10-storey
building into a 6ft-deep snowbank
and landed on your back with your
arms out, there’s a pretty good chance
you could survive,” says Hoffman.
“But that doesn’t mean you can hop up
and run around.” Brain injury, skull
fractures, broken bones and chest
trauma are common.

October 2014 51
 use a car door as
a bullet shield
the Scene
Besieged by gunfire, a
cop saves his bacon by
sheltering behind a car door.
the Science
The average car door
offers virtually no
protection from gunshot wounds.
“A handgun bullet can go in one
car door and out the other,” says
ballistics expert Tom Fleenor
from US company International
Armoring Corporation (IAC).
American police cars with their
Kevlar-reinforced doors might
offer protection from handgun
fire, but not from high-powered
rif le bullets travelling at up to 850
metres per second. “Police officers
do get shot through car doors,”
says Fleenor. Fear not, though.
If you’ve upwards of $6,000 to
spend, IAC can reinforce your
car doors with ballistic steel and
lightweight, laminated fibres,
enabling them to shrug off most
high-speed, non-armour-
piercing shells.
is it
plausible?
Not unless you happen
to own a bona fide armoured
vehicle, or have pimped your ride
into a mobile panic room.

Jump from one The Scene bigger the force and the more
illustrator tim mcdonagh

A goodie is on the effort it takes to stay standing.

train to another
roof of a fast-moving
train being chased by a baddie.
They must a) not fall off, b) run
away and c) leap across carriages
looking cool.
the Science
As a train moves
forward, the air forced over its
roof creates a resistive force
opposing any would-be train
surfer. The faster the train, the
Remove the threat of
decapitation by bridges,
electrocution by overhead
power lines and serious injury
by precipitous falls, and the
scenario is not so different
from being in a wind tunnel.
“You can just about stand
in winds of 60mph,” says
David Marshall, manager of
Southampton University’s
wind tunnel. “But you’d
struggle to walk and you

slice through
steel with a blade
the Scene
A samurai cuts
effortlessly through
steel using nothing but muscle
power and a sword.
the Science
Who needs
adamantium, the
indestructible metal used by
Wolverine that can cut through
anything? In industry, carbide-
tipped steel rotary blades are used
to cut steel. “A steel sword could
do the same thing in principle,”
says materials scientist Mark
Miodownik. “But it would need
a high enough velocity to melt
certainly can’t run. And if you
tried to jump, the wind would
pull you backwards.”
In India, the Bhopal Shatabdi
Express trains reaches speeds of
around 160km/h, engineering
works permitting, while
elsewhere, magnetic levitation
or ‘maglev’ trains notch up top
velocities of over 480km/h
(300mph). Attempt the same
thing on one of these moving
at full pelt and it’s not going to
end well. Added to that, any
imperfection on the line or
Blockbuster movie science | Science
the steel it’s cutting.” So it’s best
to make your sword relatively
thick, and coat it with tungsten
carbide: with a melting point of
2,870°C, this will stop the blade
from melting. Or just hope the
steel you’re slicing is as wimpy as
a tin can. “If steel is thin enough,
you can cut it with scissors,” says
Miodownik.
is it plausible?
Machines can do it,
but we humans lack
the muscle power to wield a
sword fast enough to cut through
thick steel – unless you’re a
mutant freak, that is.
sideways jolt to the carriage is In 2012, a 24-year-old
likely to physically tip you over Moldovan man got off lightly
the edge. when he was arrested for
surfing a Russian Sapsan
Helen Pilcher is a science
train wearing nothing but writer and comedian.
is it purple pants, but many others
plausible? have died.
Indian trains are
more likely to run on time
than you are to run along the
roof of a speeding train and not
get seriously injured or killed.
But that doesn’t stop some
adrenalin junkies from illegally
hitching train roof rides.
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History | History of science

The scientific legacy of

World War I
On the 100th anniversary of the war, Ned Lebow explores the more
surprising advances that came out of the conflict

Blood transfusions
E
arly attempts to transfuse blood into
humans often proved fatal because of
an immune response that destroys red
blood cells. In 1901, Karl Landsteiner of
Austria discovered that humans had different
blood groups and in 1907, the Czech Jan
Janský identified four distinct groups.
The first transfusion of stored blood was
performed in 1914 by Belgian physician
Albert Hustin. British surgeon Geoffrey
Keynes would later devise a portable
machine to preserve blood which would
facilitate battlefield transfusions, while it
was an American physician, Oswald Hope
Robertson, who created the first blood bank
in France during the war.
These transfusions required blood
collection and typing, storage and accurate
matching of blood type from donor to
patient. Doing this helped forge new
links between civil servants and the Blood transfusions
became common
medical profession that would prove during the last two
essential for later developments such as years of the war
the National Health Service.

Mass manufacturing General Relativity

The war made huge demands on production and distribution. Weapons For the most part the
and supplies had to be produced in vast quantities. By 1916 the second conflict stifled scientific
largest concentration of British nationals outside London was the progress, but in one case
British Expeditionary Force in France. Keeping these forces fed, clothed the thirst for knowledge
and supplied required new railways, warehouses, barracks, hospitals, overcame the war. Britain
and roads. Just 1.5km of trench required 1,450km of barbed wire, six had banned the circulation
million sandbags, 28,320m3 of timber, and 33,445m2 of corrugated of German scientific
iron. Production and distribution need labour, and this was increasingly literature, which infuriated
supplied by women. Arthur Eddington, the
As for science specifically, in 1914 Britain imported most of its chief astronomer at the
scientific equipment from Germany. It now had to manufacture Albert Einstein and Sir Arthur Eddington University of Cambridge.
its own and draw on native scientific knowledge. All this helped to together in Cambridge, 1930 This was because he had
professionalise science and encourage science education, and led to the noticed that the orbit
creation of numerous state and public scientific institutions. of Mercury varied much less than Newton’s laws suggested
and suspected Einstein’s theory of General Relativity held the
World War I saw women entering answer. One of its key ideas is that space is shaped by mass, which
the workforce in vast numbers provided an explanation of Mercury’s anomalous orbit. Eddington
realised that he could prove Einstein’s contention that light waves
are deflected by mass by taking pictures of stars during the solar
eclipse of May 1919. He overcame the anti-German sentiment
of the Royal Society to gain funding for an expedition to the
West African island of Príncipe, where the eclipse would be
total. Photographs that Eddington analysed provided the first
observational confirmation of Einstein’s theory.

56 / FOCUS / AUGUST
SUM M ER2014
2014
 XXXXXX

Aviation
Early aeroplanes were handicapped by the
weight of their engines, which had steel
radiators and water for cooling. In 1908,
French engineers invented the rotary
engine, which had spinning, air-cooled
cylinders. Aircraft engines in 1914
produced a measly 50hp, but the output
was soon greatly improved by British,
French and German engine manufacturers
competing for aerial supremacy.
For example, the Rolls-Royce Eagle
and Falcon were the first in a famous
line of engines.The Mark VII had 375hp,
powering the Vimy heavy bomber that
John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown
flew across the Atlantic in June 1919.
Better wings were also developed to
exploit the power of these new engines.
At the Institute for Theoretical Physics
at the University of Göttingen, Ludwig
Prandtl did pioneering work on aerofoils,
drag and the lift properties of wings.
Using a wind tunnel, Prandtl pioneered
the science of aerodynamics and created
the ‘thick wing’ that gave fighter planes
the ability to climb at much steeper angles
without stalling.
Better aircraft needed better control
systems and navigation. Early ground-
to-air signalling used flags and lamps. But
in 1916, technicians in San Diego sent
a radio message 225km (140 miles), and
then messages between planes. By 1917, In 1919, Alcock and Brown made the first non-stop
the US Army had two-way radios on its transatlantic flight in a World War I Vimy bomber
fighter planes in France.

Sanitary towels
science and society x4, science photo library
Public health had improved greatly during the 19th Century, and World
War I witnessed further improvements with the development of the sanitary
towel. Where women had traditionally used washable underwear or rags,
French nurses on the frontline were the first to employ the newly invented
cellulose material that was used for wartime bandages. British and American
nurses soon adopted the same practice, as did many women in uniform. In
1920, US company Kimberly-Clark began to produce ‘cellucotton’ sanitary
towels commercially under the brand name Kotex (cotton plus texture).

Richard Ned Lebow is a professor in the

Department of War Studies at King’s College
Disposable sanitary towels were London, and author of Archduke Ferdinand
a World War I invention Lives: A World Without World War I.

October 2014 57

SUM M ER 2014 / FOCUS / 57

alamy
 10 photographs that made history | history

photographs
10
that made history
To mark the 175th anniversary of the
daguerreotype process – a precursor of modern
photography – we asked 10 leading historians to
select what they consider to be some of the
most important photographs of all time.
Interviews by Charlotte Hodgman

October 2014 59
 History | 10 photographs that made history

Photographer: Jeff Widener

A lone protest in
Tiananmen Square
Beijing, 5 June 1989

When this image of a lone protest-

Photographer: William Anders Earthrise
er standing before a line of tanks in Apollo 8, 24 December 1968
Tiananmen Square first appeared on
Few would argue the importance
newspaper front pages, its message
of this, one of the first images of
seemed simple. Here was a powerful
Earth rising over the Moon, taken
regime brutally dealing with protesters,
during the Apollo 8 mission – the first
and this was the point at which that
manned voyage to do a full lunar orbit.
regime would, and should, end.
The image was soon circulated around
Except it didn’t collapse or democra-
the globe, allowing people to see the
tise; instead China became a huge
planet in a way that earlier generations
economic superpower, making this image
could only have dreamt of. But its signif-
hard to interpret as part of a liberal
icance in our understanding of Earth as
historical sequence.
NASA/PRESS ASSOCIATION, CORBIS

more than just somewhere we inhabit

This photo pulls together the factors
was slow to sink in – arguably it is still
that have shaped not just events in 1989,
doing so.
but the whole trajectory of Chinese
Photographing Earth from space was a
history: the supremacy of the state;
feat in itself, but its influence on our
the continuing impact of conflict; and
views of Earth as a living organism that
the enduring power of the individual
connects us all, is ongoing.
to re-emerge.

Rana Mitter is professor of modern Chinese history OA Westad is professor of international

at the University of Oxford. history at London School of Economics, UK.

60 October 2014
Photographer: Alexander Gardner The dead of Antietam
Nr Sharpsburg, Maryland, 19 September 1862

Taken just two days after the Americans, who purchased

battle of Antietam, this image
is among the first in history to show
dead soldiers on the field of battle.
The impact of this and other similar
images of civilians was extraordi-
nary. One reporter wrote: “If he
[Mathew Brady, who exhibited the
images] has not brought bodies
and laid them in our door-yards and
along streets, he has done some-
thing very like it...”
This and other photographs like it
found their way into the homes of
tens of thousands of 19th-Century
stereograph images to view in 3D,
presumably with a mixture of horror
and disgust.
Antietam was the bloodiest day
of the American Civil War up to that
date, with 3,600 dead and 17,000
wounded. The battle triggered an
escalation in the brutality of the
fighting, marking the end of the
first, more restrained period of
the war.
Dr Adam IP Smith is senior lecturer in
history at University College London, UK.

Ali floors Liston “Ali standing exultant over

Maine, 25 May 1965
Liston encapsulates, what
In the words of Malcolm X: “The
revolt of the American negro”
Malcolm X called, ‘the revolt
was part of “the rebellion against
oppression and colonialism” that
of the American negro’”
characterised the postwar world. It’s
this rebellion that the image of the
23-year-old Ali, standing exultant over
the defeated Sonny Liston during the
rematch to retain his world title in May
1965, encapsulates.
When Ali (then known as Cassius
Clay) first defeated reigning heavy-
weight champion Liston, in February
1964, sports fans were shocked. When
Clay then converted to Islam and
named himself Muhammad Ali, he
captured the attention of the world.
By the 1970s, Ali’s was among the
most famous faces on the planet and
sport had been established as a
global lingua franca.

Dr Peter Thompson is a lecturer in American

history at the University of Oxford.

Photographer: Neil Leifer

October 2014 61
 The nightmare
of Hiroshima
Enola Gay, 6 August 1945

Taken from the aircraft that

dropped the first atomic
bomb, this photograph of the giant
mushroom cloud that rose above “Caron’s photo captured the
Hiroshima within minutes of
detonation brought home to the
awesome power of modern
world the sheer magnitude of what
had happened.
military technology”
Released on 11 August and
published in the US press the
following day, Caron’s photo
captured the awesome power
of modern military technology
and prepared the world for other,
more striking shots of an image
that would most haunt the
postwar imagination.
ALAMY, GETTY/IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUM

The photograph’s focus on the

mushroom cloud distanced viewers
from the horrific destruction on the
ground – shots of which were
censored for weeks – making it
easier to rationalise the use of an
atomic bomb on an urban area.

Dr Adrian Bingham is a senior lecturer in

modern history at the University of
Sheffield, UK. Photographer: George Caron
ALAMY

44
 10 photographs that made history | history

Nelson Mandela’s walk

to freedom
Paarl, South Africa, 11 February 1990
When Nelson Mandela left prison after 27 years,
he carried with him the great hopes of the
majority of South Africans – but also the fears of those
who supported white minority rule. To many, this image
of Mandela – his right fist raised in the power salute
of the ANC – symbolised the beginning of the end
of apartheid.
No photograph had been seen of Mandela in a
generation, so few people knew what he looked like.
Just before his release, a photograph with President de
Klerk showed Mandela standing stiffly, with grey hair.
But his first steps to freedom showed that – now 71 –
his commitment to the struggle for a non-racial,
democratic future was undiminished.
Mandela’s walk to freedom was celebrated across
the world. Four years later, he became South Africa’s
first black president.

Dr Susan Williams is a senior fellow at the School of Advanced

Photographer: Ulli Michel Study, University of London.

Fear and pain

at the Somme
July 1916, northern France

Although not technically a

photograph – it’s taken from
the 1916 film The Battle of the
Somme – this image sums up the
grim realities of trench warfare. A
far cry from the straight, neatly
sandbagged ‘stage trenches’
constructed in London’s Kensing-
ton Gardens, the real things on the
western front were revealed as
confused, crumbling and shallow
– offering minimal protection.
Nearly half of all Britons saw the
film, which was released barely a
month after the bloody campaign,
in which more than 1 million Allied
and German troops were killed
or wounded.
The fear and pain on this
soldier’s face as he struggles with
a wounded comrade still serves as
a reminder of extraordinary lives
forced upon ordinary men.

Dr Rachel Duffett is a lecturer at

the University of Essex, UK. Cinematographers: Geoffrey Malins and John McDowell

October 2014 63
 History | 10 photographs that made history

Raising the red flag

over the Reichstag
Berlin, 2 May 1945

First published in the Soviet

magazine Ogonek, on 13 May
1945, this image of a soldier flying the
Soviet flag from the roof of the
Reichstag in Berlin, high above the
smoking ruins of Hitler’s capital, has
become one of the most recogni-
sable symbols of the destruction of
Nazi Germany and the Allied victory.
Far from being a candid shot, the
photograph was carefully staged by
photographer Yevgeny Khaldei, and
subsequently manipulated, yet it
remains a symbol of some of the key
aspects of 20th-Century history, not
least the appearance of the USSR as
a power that would dominate Europe
for the next 45 years.
The image resonated with
war-weary Europeans as a symbol of
Nazi defeat, the end of the bloody
conflict, and the dawn of a new era.

Evan Mawdsley is professor of international

history at the University of Glasgow.

Photographer: unknown

Stalin erases Trotsky from history

Outside the Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow, 5 May 1920
Stalinism as a system was peculiar in many ways but perhaps unique in
one – in its morbid, almost paranoid, fear of its own revolutionary past.
This is why Stalin killed the old Bolsheviks during the 1930s, why history was
constantly being rewritten to fit into the needs of the Soviet state, and why one
of the most famous revolutionaries of all – Leon Trotsky – had to be deleted from
the historical record.
This image is one of the most famous examples of Stalin’s attempts to
‘airbrush’ history. In the top image, Trotsky leans against a wooden pulpit as
Lenin rallies troops; in the second image, he is nowhere to be seen.
Its significance still resonates today. Vladimir Putin would of course deny that
his own regime and that created after 1917 have anything in common, yet I think
they do: they both believe in the old Stalinist maxim that ‘history’ has no other
GETTY/PA

purpose than to serve the needs of the authoritarian state.

Michael Cox is emeritus professor of international relations at London School of Economics.

 Photographer: Yevgeny Khaldei

The burning girl of to justify or sustain it. But it made the

Nixon administration anxious in the
Trang Bang build-up to the presidential election
South Vietnam, 8 June 1972 campaign. White House tapes for 12 June
1972 reveal Nixon’s aide, HR Haldeman,
suggesting the image may have been
This image of nine-year-old Kim
“fixed” by Nixon’s political opponents for
Phuc (centre left), her features
electoral gain.
contorted with pain and fear as she and
Five days after this conversation,
other children flee their burning village,
burglars operating for the Campaign to
is not one that can be forgotten quickly.
Reelect the President entered the Demo-
The sight of Phuc – a victim of the
cratic National Committee’s HQ at the
accidental napalm bombing of civilians
Watergate offices in Washington, the result
fleeing Trang Bang village, carried out by
of which really did change the world.
the planes of US-backed Saigon –
The terrified girl survived her injuries and
prompted questions that revealed not
later established the Kim Phuc Foundation,
just the horrific pain and disastrous
providing medical and psychological
personal impact of the conflict, but war’s
assistance to child victims of war.
capacity to produce appalling conse-
quences from grotesque error.
Anti-war sentiment was well estab- Richard Carwardine is president of Corpus
Photographer: Nick Ut lished by 1972; it did not need this image Christi College, Oxford.
Photographer: Nick Ut

October 2014 65
 nature | zoology

ANIMAL
SUPERSENSES
There are animals with keener hearing and sharper eyes
than us, but as Helen Czerski reveals, some creatures
have different sensory systems altogether
bbc, thinkstock x3, robert harding, getty

66 October 2014
dolphin
hearing
a master of acoustics
The mammalian ear is a
sensory marvel. Our ears
funnel sound down to the inner
ear, the cochlea, into a fluid-
filled tube lined with hairs.
Different parts of the tube
vibrate in response to different
frequencies, and so as a sound
travels down the tube, the fluid
vibrates in specific places
along its length. The tiny hairs
are moved by the vibrating
fluid, and they send nerve
signals to the brain.
Evolution has shown just
how much the ear is capable
of. About 50 million years ago,
there was a land mammal
called a pakicetid. The
descendants of this animal
moved into the ocean, and
split into two groups: baleen
whales, like the blue and fin
whales, and toothed whales,
like orca, dolphins and sperm
whales. The baleen whales
evolved to use very deep
sounds to communicate, and
their cochlea is adapted to
hear frequencies as low as
68 October 2014
3Hz. The toothed whales went
the other way, using high-
frequency echolocation to hunt.
It’s thought that some dolphins
can hear up to 280kHz. So this
technique for hearing works
over at least 17 octaves, a
huge range, although no single
animal can hear all of it.
But in spite of having very
sensitive hearing, whales and
dolphins don’t have external
ears. There’s no need, because
sound travels from water into
the dolphin’s body quite easily.
Sound travelling through air
will just bounce off your body,
so land mammals need an
external ear to help steer the
sound inside. Instead of being
funnelled down a small hole
on the side of the dolphin’s
head, most of the sound
passes directly into the lower
jaw and along the bone to
reach the ear. Their whole
jaw is doing the listening.
So for a dolphin, there’s no
equivalent of sticking your
fingers in your ears!
 zoology | nature

How we compare
When it comes to hearing, humans
are pretty impressive. We can hear
about 10 octaves, from around
20Hz to 20kHz. We can also detect
a huge range of loudness without
damaging our ears. The faintest
sounds that we can hear move our
eardrum a million times less than
the loudest sounds we can hear. Of
all our senses, hearing is probably
the one we are best equipped
for, and the one we notice the least.

The dolphin’s entire lower jaw

feeds sound to its ears

Ear

Sound waves pass through

the dolphin’s lower jaw

yann hubert/flpa ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS

 Platypus
Electro-
Sensitivity
hunting with
electricity
Imagine you’re an aquatic mammal, searching
for prey buried in the mud of a stream.
You close your eyes, ears and nose, dive
underwater, swim down to the bottom, and
then what? This is how the platypus hunts.
Blind, deaf, and unable to smell anything, it
pays attention to something else. Shrimp and
other prey are moving around, and each bit of
movement could give their position away. All
muscle contractions involve electric pulses, and
because water conducts electricity those pulses
dave watts/naturepl.com, getty ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS

are broadcast out.

The secret weapon of the platypus is its beak,
which is covered in mucus glands capable of
sensing electric fields. Each gland has nerves
and the mucus transmits the electricity to the
nerves. It’s a fearsome arsenal of sensors –
each platypus has an estimated 40,000 electro-
sensors. It’s also got 60,000 touch sensors on One of the most unusual
its beak, and it uses the two systems together animals on the planet, the
to search for objects in the mud and then platypus hunts its prey by
decide whether it might be suitable for dinner. detecting electrical impulses
As the platypus swims along, it sweeps its
bill from side to side, and it uses the changing
signal from each sweep to work out the
direction of the prey. Not only will they swim
straight towards a shrimp, they’ll quickly home
in on the DC voltage from a buried
battery as well. This is highly effective
hunting – a platypus finds half its body
weight in prey every single night.

How we compare
We live in an environment buzzing with
electric fields of one sort or another, In experiments
but even if we could sense them, most The position of the platypuses were
of the time there would be nothing platypus’s electro-sensors able to detect an
to detect. That’s because we live can be seen here as solid red object set at 2Hz
in air, which is a poor conductor of areas on the right and left of from roughly 30cm
electricity. If we did have this sense, the beak; its touch receptors away. The range of
we’d rarely be able to notice it. The are shown as open rings. It’s the beak is shown
closest we come to electro-sensing is thought the animal may have here in red
being able to feel our hairs stand up on 100,000 individual sensors
end if there’s a balloon charged with
static electricity nearby.
 zoology | nature

Make a movement in the water

and the pressure sensors
running along the length of this
Great White will pick it up

Shark Scale

pressure Surface pore

the ultimate Tubule (open to

sea water)
motion detector Lateral line canal
Gelatinous Dome

Sharks are the kings of the sensory world. They

have incredible sight and hearing, sensitive
nostrils and tastebuds, delicate touch detectors
and the ability to electro-sense. But they have
one other sense that completes this amazing
set, giving them a completely different type of
information. This is their lateral line system,
and it allows them to detect tiny pressure
changes in the water around them.
On each side of the shark’s body, a jelly-
filled canal runs from the head to the tail,
just underneath the skin. The jelly is exposed
directly to the water at intervals via pores,
and as the pressure changes in the water, it
pushes and pulls gently on the jelly, making
it flow inside the canal. Hair cells protrude
into the jelly, and as they move backwards
and forwards with the flow, they send nerve
signals back to the shark’s brain. This system
is incredibly sensitive, picking out the
tiniest changes in pressure at single locations,
and also pressure gradients along the
length of the shark.
LATERAL LINE
Imagine a shark swimming over a reef. As
smaller fish swim past, they leave a wake of
disturbed water behind them, and this wake
can last up to 30 seconds. Larger fish leave
larger and longer-lasting wakes. A crashing
wave above might send a pressure pulse
down into the water. The ocean surrounding
the shark is full of delicate patterns, flowing
swirling water movements, and each pattern
tells a story. The lateral lines let the shark
listen in to what the structure of the water
itself has to say. This complements the rest
of the shark’s senses perfectly. Sensory
knowledge is power, and the shark has it all.
Nerve
Sensory cells
How we compare
Air doesn’t transmit pressure pulses as
well as water, so direct pressure sensors
aren’t much use. We might detect a breeze
because it cools our skin, or because hairs
on our arms are moved. If there’s a large
change in air pressure, we may detect it
indirectly – when our ears ‘pop’, they’ve
readjusted. Of course humans hear pressure
differences as sounds, but we have nothing
to match the lateral lines of sharks.

October 2014 71

catfish taste
the swimming tongue
On most animals, it’s easy to point to the
sense organs. They’re located in specific
places on the animal’s body. But in some
cases, evolution has thrown that limitation
getty, yann hubert/flpa ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS
out of the window. For example, the
channel catfish has been described as a
‘swimming tongue’, because its entire
body is covered in taste receptors. There
are higher concentrations on its lips and
on the barbels that protrude from its face
(their similarity to whiskers is why they’re
called catfish), but there are also four or
five taste buds per square millimetre over
the whole of the rest of its body. The
detector molecules are at the surface of
the skin, continually probing the water.
It sounds as though the catfish would be
overwhelmed by the variety of chemicals
from plants, animals, humans and anything
else in the water. But these taste receptors
are very specific, firing only when two
72 October 2014
The catfish is able to enjoy
the taste of its dinner long
before it actually eats it
Mouth: five tastebuds per
square millimetre; 25 per
Body: five tastebuds
square millimetre in places
per square millimetre
Gills: seven tastebuds per square
millimetre, with patches of 50 per
square millimetre
types of amino acid float past. These types
are common in invertebrates, and when How we compare
it senses them, the catfish starts snapping. Our sense of taste is pretty sophisticated,
The catfish can also detect and swim and we can detect many more flavours than a
up a concentration gradient – closer to catfish. We get a huge amount of information
the invertebrate, the amino acids will be about our food, because we have many types
more concentrated. Near the bottom of a of flavour receptor. For example, a sweet
muddy stream where visibility is poor, a flavour indicates an energy-rich food, and
sense that can lead you right to dinner is a bitterness warns us of potentially
really valuable asset. toxic chemicals.
 zoology | nature

gecko vision How we compare

the one-eyed wonder The human eye is a complex organ.
Light flows in through a circular
aperture called the pupil, which
The nocturnal helmeted gecko’s eyes work eyes show off a really unusual strategy. The controls how much light reaches the
on the same basic principles as ours, but with gecko’s pupil becomes slit-shaped in bright back of the eye. It constricts when
a few nifty twists. These lizards were active light, but it’s also got four notches along each it’s bright, so that only a thin, intense
during daytime for a significant chunk of their side. When the slit closes up, instead of having beam of light hits the retina at the back
evolutionary past, and with all that bright light one single pupil like ours, the gecko has four in of the eye. The small region where that
around there was no need for sensitive rod a line. Each one will form a separate image on beam lands is called the fovea and it’s
cells, which let us see in low light. So the rod the back of the lens – unless the object is a full of densely packed cone cells. We
cells disappeared and the geckos are left with specific distance away, in which case all four have colour vision because there are
three types of cone cell covering their retina, images lie on top of each other. It’s thought that three types of cones, for red, green
for green, blue and UV light. These days, they the gecko uses this to judge distance. They and blue light. But when surroundings
are active at dusk, and even with wide-open don’t have stereoscopic vision like ours, so are dim, our pupils open up to allow
eyes, they still have colour vision in dim light. they can’t calculate distance by comparing the in more light, illuminating the sea of
But these geckos are still out and about in different images from each eye. But with those rod cells that make up the rest of the
bright light sometimes, and this is when their four pupils in each eye, they don’t have to. retina. These only distinguish black
and white, but they’re very sensitive
In low light the gecko’s pupil to low light. That’s why everything
dilates (left), but in bright light looks washed-out at dusk – the light
it closes to reveal four notches is mostly falling on rod cells, so our
(right) that help it judge distance colour vision is poor.

Not only can this Tokay Gecko

see in UV, it can also judge
distance without stereoscopic
vision, thanks to a remakable
adaptaion to its irises

Helen Czerski is a physicist,

oceanographer and BBC science
presenter who appears regularly
on Dara O Briain’s Science Club.
 World’s
Greatest
Explorers
Out into the wild to uncover wonders untold, these bold and intrepid
explorers returned from their exciting and perilous expeditions with
information that would come to define the geographical understanding
of the world. Moshita Prajapati recaps their journey of discoveries

Francisco de Orellana Meriwether Lewis and William

- Mapping of the Amazon River
Spanish Conquistador Francisco de Orellana was the first
European to travel and explore the length of the Amazon
River. An expedition team led by Gonzalo Pizarro to explore
the regions of Peru started their journey in April 1514
towards the jungles of South America. Dwindling food and
water supplies forced the expedition to set up camp near a
river. Orellana carried on with 50 men to travel further
down to the river from the confluence of the Coca and
Napo Rivers. On 11 February 1542, the Napo River emptied
into a bigger river, the Amazon. Their journey continued
until they reached the Spanish-held Island of Cubagua, off
the coast of Venezuela. He named the River Amazon
because on the trip, they encountered a tribe of fierce
women who reminded him of the women warriors in Greek
mythology called Amazons.
Clark - Explored United States of America
In 1803, American President Thomas Jefferson had purchased
the territory of Louisiana from France (comprising of 15 states
of present day USA and two Canadian provinces) for a sum of
$15 million and annexed it to the USA. An unexplored area of
2,140,000km2 beckoned and he commissioned the Corps of
Discovery Expedition. Led by Lewis and Clark, the three-year
journey began on 14 May 1804 from the city of St Louis along
on the east bank of the Mississippi River. The expedition
consisted of 33 men who explored 11,265km of land recording
at least 200 not seen before plants and animals (grizzly bear,
prairie dog), the geography of the area, and establishing trade
routes and relations with 72 local tribes.

Captain James Cook

- Mapping the Pacific, New
Zealand, and Australia
Cook was a skilled navigator,
cartographer, and an astronomer, which
made him the perfect candidate
according to the Royal Society to lead an
expedition to chart the passage of Venus
across the Sun in Tahiti. The hidden agenda of
this expedition was to explore the southern seas
and the islands there. After reaching Tahiti and
measuring Venus’s transit, Cook charted routes and Johann Ludwig Burckhardt
courses for New Zealand and discovered the East
coast of Australia via Botany Bay and named it New
- Rediscovered ruins of Petra
South Wales. He then proceeded onto Indonesia, Burckhardt was hired by the Association for
WIKIPEDIA X9, 123rf.com X3

Cape of Good Hope and finally Africa. In his second Promoting the Discovery of the Interior Parts of Africa
voyage (1772) he circumnavigated the course to search for the source of the Niger River. After
around Antarctica and discovered several islands learning Arabic in Cambridge University, he left for
chains in the Pacific Ocean. His third and final Cairo and adopted the name of Sheikh Ibrahim Ibn
voyage in 1776 was when he headed east of the Abdallah. It was on the trip to Nazareth, when he
Indian Ocean, where he navigated a route between overhead locals talk about ruins near the tomb of
the North and South of New Zealand islands, called Aaron, Moses’s brother. Under the guise of wanting to
Cook Strait and sailed to North America. sacrifice a goat, Burckhardt hired a local guide to the
ruins, which he identified as the rose-city of Petra in
1812. Afraid of being unmasked as an infidel and
74 October 2014 killed, he sacrificed his goat and resumed his journey
to Cairo. While he discovered the lost city of Petra, he
never did find the source of the Niger River.
 David Livingstone - Explored Africa
David Livingstone, in his role as a medical missionary to Africa, explored
and mapped many of the regions of the continent. His first expedition
was across the Kalahari Desert towards the north, where he sighted the
Upper Zambesi River (1849). To discover routes for commercial avenues,
he mapped the region providing westerners with a detailed map of the
central and southern region of Africa. Continuing on the path of the river, in
1855, he came across a waterfall, which locals called Mosi-oa-Tunya – the
Smoke that Thunders, which he renamed Victoria Falls in honour of Queen
Victoria. A year later, he reached the mouth of Zambesi River on the Indian
Ocean, becoming the first European to travel from the west to the east coast
of southern Africa. After an interlude in Britain, he returned to Africa twice,
first to lead the failed Zambesi expedition (1858) to examine the natural
resources of the region and open the river. His final expedition landed him in
Zanzibar (1866) to find the source of the River Nile, whereupon he was
reported missing from his last port of call, Lake Tanganyika.

Henry Morton Stanley Roald engelbregt

- Mapping the Congo region gravning Amundsen
Henry Morton Stanley’s second expedition to the
- The Polar regions
African continent is always overshadowed by his He is counted as one of the greatest Polar Regions
first, to find David Livingstone in 1871. After explorer of his time. Roald Amundsen, the Norwegian
locating him, Stanley began his expedition (in explorer, was the first man to traverse the Northwest
1874) to map the region of Congo by following Passage, which was sought for centuries as a trade
the Congo River and explore the Lualaba River route. Amundsen, on a three-year expedition
and lakes (Lake Victoria, Albert, and Tanganyika) (1903-06), navigated his 70-foot slop
in central Africa. Failing to interest the British through the treacherous waters and
government in developing the Congo region, he pieces of floating icebergs, mapping
accepted King Leopold I of Belgium’s offer to a trade route. On 18 October 1911,
explore the region further under his sovereignty. Amundsen and his crew set out from
the Bay of Whales on Antarctica’s Ross
Ice Shelf for their journey towards the
Hiram Bingham III South Pole. Passing over mountains
- Rediscovered the ruins of Machu Picchu and steep crevices while battling
harsh weather conditions for two
In 1911, Hiram Bingham III, a lecturer with Yale University,
months, on 14 December 1911,
travelled to the Andes in Peru to discover the lost cities of
Inca as part of the Yale Peruvian Expedition. On 24 July Roald Amundsen raised the flag of
1911, the expedition cast their eyes on the intricate stone Norway at the South Pole. In 1926
artwork that was the entrance to Machu Picchu. Abandoned along with Umberto Nobile, aboard
and forgotten for over 400 years since its re-discovery, a dirigible he flew
the citadel of the Incas stretching over five miles with over the North Pole,
30,000 stones linking different levels would proclaim the making him the
following words from Bingham, “Surprise followed surprise first expedition
until there came the realisation that we were in the midst leader to reach the
of as wonderful ruins as any ever found in Peru.” North Pole.

Jacques-Yves Cousteau - Oceanographer

Enlisted in the French Navy, Cousteau became a celebrated marine
explorer due to a near fatal road accident. To strengthen his weakened
arms, he swam vigorously in the ocean and one day a fellow marine
gifted him a pair of goggles to protect his eyes from the stinging salt. He
could now see a new unexplored world under water. From 1936
onwards, he explored the world’s water from the Amazon to the Antarctic
ice shelf to identify, map and bring to attention the beauty, diversity, and
fragility of the sea and the creatures living in it. A pioneer in exploring
the oceans, Cousteau invented the Aqua-Lung in 1943, which now allows
deep-sea divers to spend considerable amount of time underwater and
was instrumental in the development of a waterproof camera.
 How Do We Know?
The structure of

DNA
Before the discovery of the gene-carrying
molecule DNA, we had no idea of the
fundamental mechanics of life. How we
described its iconic double helix form is one of
the greatest scientific achievements

I
t’s the key to all life on Earth: a simple molecule Need to Know
known as DNA that sits in every cell of your body.
Nucleotide Phosphate groups, along with
It took several breakthroughs to realise its true The basic subunit of DNA. Each deoxyribose sugars, make up
form and understand the extent of its role in biology, nucleotide is made up of a base the ‘backbone’ of the long
triggering a scientific revolution. (the ‘letters’ of DNA: adenine, DNA molecule.
guanine, thymine or cytosine),
a sugar and a phosphate group. X-ray crystallography
The nucleotides form the two This is the study of the structure
The Key discovery parallel complementary chains of
DNA, with adenine matched to
of crystals by firing X-rays at
them.The X-rays bounce off the
It was a photo taken by biophysicist and crystallographer Rosalind thymine and guanine to cytosine. regular arrangements of atoms
Franklin that held the key to determining the make-up and structure in crystals, and the patterns they
of the DNA molecule Phosphate group make are captured on film. An
A phosphorous atom equation is then used to work
Rosalind Franklin’s key experiment represent the planes of symmetry surrounded by oxygen atoms. out the crystal’s structure.
– the results of which James in a helix viewed from the side;
Watson glimpsed – was a series of the ‘zig’ and the ‘zag’ of its turns.
painstaking X-ray crystallography There are 10 spots on each arm The famous ‘Photo
experiments with DNA samples of the cross before you reach 51’, taken via X-ray
containing different amounts the large black patch at the top, crystallography by
of water. The most famous which corresponds with 10 bases Rosalind Franklin, that
outcome of this is May 1952’s stacked one on top of the other in reveals DNA’s double
‘photo 51’ (see right), which each turn of the helix. The fourth helix structure
revealed key details about the blob from the centre is missing,
structure of DNA. which indicates that one strand
The more a feature is repeated of DNA is slightly offset against
within a structure, the more the the other.
film will be bombarded with Rosalind Franklin turned her
X-rays diffracted in the same way, attention to photo 51 in early
and the darker the corresponding 1953. Her notebooks suggest
patch in the image. The large dark that she had gleaned all its
patches at the top and bottom of key information and may,
the picture represent DNA’s bases, in time, have reached the
and the X-shaped blobs indicate a same conclusions as Watson
helix. The arms of the cross and Crick.

76 October 2014
 How do we know | Science

cast of characters It took the efforts of these science greats to finally realise the structure of DNA

1898-1961 1816-2004 1916-2004 1920-1958 1928-

 Francis Crick  Rosalind Franklin

was born near Northampton was born in London to a
to the owner of a shoe rich Jewish family. The
factory and became a X-ray crystallographer
British biophysicist and and biophysicist provided
molecular biologist. much of the experimental
After co-discovering the evidence for the structure
structure of DNA, he went of DNA before switching
on to determine how DNA her focus to viruses at
codes for proteins, before Birkbeck College. She died
venturing into neuroscience. of cancer at the age of 38.
G William Astbury
was a British molecular
biologist and physicist G Maurice Wilkins G James Watson is an
who spent much of his was a British physicist American geneticist and
working life in Leeds. His and molecular biologist molecular biologist born
work focused originally who was born in New in Chicago, who gained
on the structure of Zealand. As well as his PhD at just 22. After
proteins in textiles but, his DNA research, he co-discovering DNA’s
along with his PhD worked in fields such as structure in Cambridge in
student Florence Bell, radar and microscopy. 1953, he worked at Harvard
he took the first X-ray He remained at King’s University and then the Cold
photographs of DNA College until his Spring Harbor Laboratory
in 1937. retirement in 1981. until he retired in 2007.

timeline A series of experiments, which started in the 19th Century, culminated in DNA’s structure being unravelled in 1953
1869
Friedrich Miescher
discovers DNA in his
preparations of white
blood cells extracted
from the pus in surgical
bandages. He calls
it ‘nuclein’.
1912-14 1920
Phoebus Levene discovers
nucleotides – the
combination of a sugar,
base and phosphate group
– and suggests they form
short lengths of DNA called
‘tetranucleotides’.
1952
Rosalind Franklin takes ‘Photo
51’, a highly detailed image
of the ‘B’ or hydrated form of
DNA. The photo is later seen
by James Watson (pictured)
without her knowledge.
1953
Watson and Crick propose
a model for the structure
of the DNA molecule.
They publish the structure
in the scientific journal
Nature and suggest that
the structure indicates
DNA’s function.

William Henry Bragg and
son William Lawrence Bragg
lay the foundations for the
field of X-ray crystallography
when they realise they
can infer the structure of
crystals from the patterns of
scattered X-rays.
1937
Florence Bell arrives in
William Astbury’s lab and
takes the first X-ray images
of DNA (pictured). Astbury
makes an attempt at a
structure the following year.
Katherine Nightingale is a
science writer with a degree in
molecular biology.
 History | ye olde travel guide

Historical Holidays: guidebooks from the past

Reykjavik In the latest instalment of our historical

1828
holidays series, in which experts imagine
they’re writing a travel guide in the past,
Hannah Kent invites visitors to sample the
raw beauty of Iceland’s largest settlement

Y
ou can expect a warm welcome from Icelanders – you’ll need it if you are to
conquer the country’s famously harsh climate, not to mention its cramped
accommodation and putrefied shark flesh

When to go accommodation, information, and food.

Iceland’s mountains are still covered
with snow and the passes of its
thoroughfares impassable until the end
of May. Go in the middle of June, when
the seas are less treacherous, and when
any horses you might need for travel are
no longer half-starved from the winter’s
scarcity of food and will be able to bear
your weight.
What to take with you
Icelanders are necessarily compelled
to depend on foreign countries for a
considerable part of their supplies, so
ensure you have everything you need
before departing. Plenty of warm
woollen clothing is advisable, as are
sturdy leather boots – unless you wish
to wear the flimsy Icelandic slippers
of fish or seal skin – and a private
Illustration by jonty clark , www.jontyclark.com, alamy
Don’t be surprised, however,
if Icelanders willingly give you such
things for free – they are a hospitable
and gentle people and curious about
travellers, who are uncommon. You
may receive similar courtesy and
generosity from the more prosperous
Danes who govern Iceland, but be
aware that the cultural and political
divide between the two countries
is significant. Icelandic nationalist
sentiment is slowly gaining influence.
Should you wish to escape the
Sights and activities mercantile atmosphere of Reykjavik,
Towards the end of June, Icelanders head to the south-west’s hot springs,
from all over the country travel on geysers and waterfalls.
horseback to Reykjavik with goods to
trade. The town comes alive as Danish Dangers and annoyances
merchants establish trading stations, Nature rules in Iceland, and bad
district authorities examine weights weather can scupper even the best-laid

supply of writing materials, candles
and food won’t go amiss. Remember,
also, to bring gifts for those who may
accommodate or guide you. Books
– rare and therefore treasured in this
country – are a good idea.
Costs and money
Bring a money pouch well stocked
with Danish rigsdaler to buy anything
from the merchants in Reykjavik: all
are Danish (the country is currently
under Danish rule) and notorious
swindlers of Icelanders, who suffer
under their monopoly on trading.
Should you wish to purchase items
from the native countrymen, liquor,
in shops – fining those with defective
measures – and Icelanders pour in from
the outer reaches of the country with
fish, salted mutton, tallow, wool, skins,
feathers and sulphur to trade for hooks
and line, cotton, and indigo.
“Parts of Iceland
are home to live
volcanoes, and
earthquakes
plans. As well as the perishing cold, the
wind can blow so violently as to make
travel near impossible.
Many parts of Iceland are home to
live volcanoes, and earthquakes are
frequent. The eruption known as
Skaftáreldar occurred only 45 years
ago, poisoning water and animals, and
wiping out a quarter of the population.
Should you see smoke on the horizon,
prepare for a swift departure.
Other annoyances include the absence
of doctors, an almost total lack of fresh
fruit, damp lodgings and unavoidable
bed bugs. Smallpox, leprosy, and
tuberculosis are also rife.

tobacco, grain and coffee can be

swiftly and quietly traded for are frequent” Sleeping and accommodation
There are no formal inns in Reykjavik,

so expect to rely on the hospitality of
local authorities, clergymen of a
high standing, or better-off Danish
families if you wish to sleep in relative
comfort – or at least in a wooden house.
A letter of introduction prior to arrival
should suffice.
Icelanders live in cramped crofts
constructed of turf. While you can drop
in and expect a warm welcome at these
farmhouses, you will be required to
sleep in the same communal bedroom
as the family, and possibly share a bed.
If all else fails, you can always pitch a
tent outside or find an empty church to
shiver in.
Eating and drinking
Icelanders are generous to strangers, and
will go to great lengths to feed you – as
there are no restaurants or food markets.
Depending on the social station of your
hosts, you might find yourself served
a feast of boiled mutton and coffee, or
dried fish with whey to drink.
Don’t be put off if the butter is rancid,
the shark flesh putrefied, or your meat
smoky – all are methods of preservation
in Iceland.
Make sure you try the skyr, an Icelandic
fresh cheese with the consistency of
yoghurt, and expect to eat a lot of cod
and haddock – Reykjavik lies close to
fishing stations.
Getting around
Horses are necessary should you wish to
venture out of town, as are the services of
a guide. Not only are there no roads, the
weather can change in an instant, and the
skeletons of many have been found days
after they disappeared in a sudden fog or
snowstorm. Remember to provide yourself
with enough horses, and tie the forelegs
of your beasts together at night to prevent
them from wandering.
If horse riding doesn’t appeal, engage a
willing oarsman to take you across the bays
around Reykjavik in a boat.
Hannah Kent is author of Burial Rites
(Picador, 2013), a historical novel set in
19th-Century Iceland.
Reykjavik
today
There are, no doubt, still lonesome
fishermen to be found navigating Icelandic
waters, and that’s not all of Hannah Kent’s
vision of 19th-Century Iceland that can still
be found. Inclement weather, an overly
exuberant natural environment and, if only
for tourists’ delectation, putrefied shark
meat will all still strike visitors head-on.
In other ways, though, Iceland’s capital,
Reykjavik, has grown up. The compact city
is both a weekend destination and an
attractive Gateway to the still-wild
hinterland. Many stay a few days in the
capital and jaunt out to the Blue Lagoon,
the world’s only must-see hot mud bath fed
by a geothermal power station.
While Iceland remains wild – Volcanoes,
geysers and raging rivers abound – it is
far more accessible, and B&Bs, boutique
hotels and fashionable farm stays
all abound.
Iceland is a country with its own
national culture, driven by folklore traditions,
a closeness to the land and sea and a
distinctiveness that is shaping its identity.
If you like this…
For another unusual Atlantic destination,
head for the Faroe Islands. Meanwhile,
an entirely different Atlantic island with
a maritime history is Tenerife in the
Canary Islands.
The Blue Lagoon geothermal spa is
just a few miles out of Reykjavik
October 2014 79
edu talk
Dr Saini, Principal of Delhi Public School, R. K. Puram speaks to Moshita Prajapati on the need to
strike a balance between theoretical and practical learning in India
What is the motto of Delhi Public School
R. K. Puram and how is it inculcated into
everyday learning?
Our school motto is Service Before Self and
through this principle, we provide an education
to our students, which fosters development of
their mind intellectually, inculcates the desired
social skills, and educates them on values of
good health. This is achieved through good
teaching skills and promoting a happy teaching
learning environment.
How would you describe the DPS culture?
Every school has a different culture, different
perspective, and a different system of
educating their students. At DPS, we
consider parents as the most important
stakeholders because the child belongs
to them and they dream of a happy and
secure future for their child. In India,
they invest everything for their child’s
education. They play a very significant
role in laying and building a strong
foundation of a beautiful relationship
between the student and the school.
And we as the management of the
school try to synchronise the energy
and synergy between the parents and
the school by promoting unity within diversity,
ensuring solidarity of relationships through
transparency and accountability.
What sets DPS apart from other schools?
To provide an overall educational development
to the students, we have noted and marked
down five essential principles to success, which
we have to follow to reach our desired goals
and destination. They are Passion, Perfection,
Performance, Patience, and Position. These
are an intrinsic part of our DPS culture and we
give equal weightage to the students as per
their ability and capability. My students are
encouraged and supported to not only focus
on academics but also focus on other walks
of life such as sports, music, etc and grow
up as holistic personalities who can take up
multifaceted roles in life. This year, 118 students
from class XII scored 100 % marks in the
80 October 2014
‘I have noticed that
the educational system
abroad is more focused
on practical learning than
theory learning.’
subjects they appeared for! This is a record of a
kind. Our students have secured admissions to
reputed universities abroad and in IITs and IIMs
in the country. They have also won scholarships
or have been granted financial aid to a tune of
`57 crores and `50 lakhs. In sports too, many
former alumni have won awards and recognition
from the Government of India and excelled in
various international sporting events. Jemima
Khan, a young student of ours, who has a
passion for music, has won numerous musical
awards and scholarships. She was invited to
perform at the Commonwealth Youth Orchestra
2014 at Glasgow.
How do you perceive the mind set of Indian
parents when it comes to education?
Every parent wishes for good academic record
and high percentage for their child. But there is
a problem regarding this in India. If you compare
it with the West, parents there want an overall
educational, social, and physical development
for their child. And this becomes evident when
you see their CV. Apart from good grades, the
students have interest in a wide range of extra-
curricular activities that they have taken part
in. So you see the focus in schools abroad is on
studies along with extra-curricular activities.
However in our country, the focus is only on
marks. Now, from a practical point of view, just
having a good mark sheet is not good enough.
Yes, you need those marks for admissions into
universities here, but for an overall development
a lot more is needed. What parents don’t realise
is that you have to give weightage
to other aspects of education and
learning in your child’s life because
I firmly believe that true education is
to think intensively and critically. It is
intelligence of the mind and integrity
of character.
As DPS has branches worldwide,
could you offer insights into how
the Indian educational system
differs from other countries?
During many of my international
trips as part of my work, I have
noticed that the educational system abroad
is more focused on practical learning than
theoretical learning. They give equal importance
to both these forms of learning, while here in
India; we give 70% importance to theory and
the remaining 30% to practical learning. In
countries abroad, they are providing them with
opportunities to see a problem first hand and
derive logical solutions to the problem, thereby
developing their mental faculties with practical
skills. Here, our students are not given the
opportunities to solve a problem practically,
so they don’t develop the skill. So if an instance
comes, where our students interact with their
foreign counterparts, they hear of anecdotes
where they are sharing stories of their practical
work, which leads to our students developing
an inferiority complex. So whilst their students
are better at performing in life, ours are only
good in academics.
 games review
Dota 2
PC, Free to play, Valve
ilikewalls.com, gamershonesttruth.com, prowrestlingpowerhouse.com, gamespot.com
F
rom the coin arcades of the 80s to the
present day LAN cafes, gamers have
always been drawn to competitive
formats that pit them against their peers.
Over the years, competitive gaming has
evolved into e-sports, and the biggest
title in this domain is Defense Of The
Ancients 2 (DOTA 2).
A Multiplayer Online Battle Arena
(MOBA) game, DOTA 2 is the successor to
the highly popular Defense of the Ancients,
which began as a fan-made mode for the
game Warcraft III. Developed by Valve, the
premise is deceptively simple: two teams of
five players square off against one another
and attempt to destroy a relic, known as an
Ancient, situated in the opponent’s fortress
across the map.
The game has been described as a
combination of football and chess. Though
the map is always the same, the possibilities
are endless. Players choose their characters
from a roster of over a 100 Heroes, each
with their own unique set of abilities or
spells. Players gain gold and experience by
killing Non Playable Characters, known as
Creeps, to buy items that augment their
skills and gain levels. The map is divided
Team up with upto four
friends to take part in
one of gaming’s most
exciting competitive
experiences in DOTA 2
into two halves, a river serving as a
halfway line, and the approaches to both
team’s bases are protected by fortifica-
tions within their own half.
Co-operating with team-mates is a
must, as all five Heroes need to work
together to defend their base and push
towards the enemy’s. The game ends
only with the destruction of one team’s
Ancient, so it is not unheard of for a
team that is lagging behind in kills to
win a game.
From its original iteration as Defense
of the Ancients to the DOTA 2 of today, it
has always been one of the most popular
titles at gaming cafes and tournaments.
In fact, it’s quite possible that DOTA 2
will bring e-sports the legitimacy its
fans crave. The fourth edition of the
worldwide DOTA 2 championships, The
International, just concluded and its final
match was watched live by an audience
of 10,000, with an online audience of 20
million. No mention of The Interna-
tional 2014 would be complete without
pointing to the prize pool of $10.93
million, with the winning team
receiving $5 million. Not a bad return
for playing videogames all day!
games preview
Cross to the Dark Side
Kings Bounty: Dark Side puts the fun into being
bad, in this PC game that puts players in the
shoes of an irredeemably evil protagonist. This
turn-based RPG boasts of an in-depth
storyline and lots of subtle humour. If you’re
not up to playing nice, give Kings Bounty: Dark
Side a try.
Enter the ring!
WWE 2K15’s international release date has
been confirmed as 31 October, 2014. This
edition of the franchise promises players the
chance to relive epic feuds in WWE’s history
through its Showcase Mode, including the
controversial Triple H vs. Shawn Michaels
story arc of 2002 – 2004.
Killing is my business
In an unlikely
crossover, an
official Assassins
Creed/Monopoly
crossover is
available for fans
of both franchises.
The popular video
game transitions to being a board game, with
the traditional Monopoly pieces being replaced
by easily recognisable characters and
structures from the series.
- Compiled by Dushyant Shekhawat
 in exciting
Solve & W e hampers
chocolat 550 from
worth `

puzzle pit
Questions and challenges guaranteed
to give your brain a workout

Crossword NO.23
Across
7 Amjad Ali Khan's forte (5)
8 Certifies, confirms or authenticates (9)
10 One who damages valuable things (6)
11 Told; gave knowledge of (8)
12 Michael _____ : ex-captain of the English
cricket team? (8)
13 Board-game - "loud" anagram (4)
15 Goddess of wealth and prosperity for us
Indians (7)
17 Sri Lanka, Malta, Ireland, et al.? (7)
20 Whisk, agitate (4)
22 2014 Wimbledon Champion (8)
25 Regal, kingly (8)
26 Become loved (6)
27 Competitor or team or horse expected to
win? (9)
28 Aspect or point of view (5)

Down
1 Jaipur is the capital of this state (9)
2 Virtue, excellence or kindness (8) Your Details
3 Units of angular measure (7) Name:
4 Hidden dangers, booby traps (8) Age:
5 Capital of Spain (6)
Address:
6 Victim of Hansen's disease? (5)
9 Conspire or scheme (4)
14 Praiseworthy (9)
16 Authorising delay of payment - "root army" PinCode:
anagram? (8) Tel: Mobile:
18 Evading or sidestepping or dodging (8) School/Institution/Occupation:
19 Teach (7)
21 Vibration; involuntary shaking (6)
Email:
23 Bovine animals (4)
24 Akbar's grandfather (5)
✂

How to enter for the
crossword: Post your entries to BBC
Knowledge Editorial, Crossword No.23
Worldwide Media, The Times of India
Bldg, 4th floor, Dr Dadabhai Navroji Road,
123rf.comx2
country to country. Novices should note Announcing the winner of Solution of crossword NO. 22
that the idea is to fill the white squares with Crossword No. 22
letters to make words determined by the
sometimes cryptic clues to the right. The
numbers after each clue tell you how many

Mumbai 400001 or email bbcknowledge@
wwm.co.in by 10 October 2014.
Entrants must supply their name, address
and phone number.
How it’s done: The puzzle will be
familiar to crossword enthusiasts already,
although the British style may be unusual
as crossword grids vary in appearance from
letters are in the answer. All spellings are Ishaan Semwal, Ghaziabad
UK. Good luck! •
Sanjay Andrew Rajaratnam, Chennai
Terms and conditions: Only •
residents of India are eligible to participate.
Employees of Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. Gaurang Bhatla, New Delhi
are not eligible to participate. The winners •
will be selected in a lucky draw. The Sawri Madkaikar, Mumbai
decision of the judges will be final.
 zl e
Me n s a Puz
Q2
Q 1 Double
Barrell es next?
e d What com
What word ca
n be placed in
of the five w front
ords shown to
each case ano form in 4 9 25 49 121
ther word?

B O O K

L O A D

W O R K

W O R M Q3 Deduction
You are given a 9-letter word. Your job
M A T E is to break up this word into 9 separate
letters and place them on the dashes to
spell a 7-letter word, a 5-letter word,
and a 3-letter word.
You can use each letter only once.

il
Head and Ta the form ENCO U R A G E
Q5 a nswer in
so lv e t h e
to the next part of
the clue e second
Look at
___ D ___ ___ A T ___
d . T h nswer.
a c o m p o und w o r
r t o f t h e next a
of pa
the first ___ M ___ ___ G
answer is
In ___ U ___
___ (Dis similar)
Nothing __
st
utual intere
Basis of m
team
aintenance
Airplane m
ying team
Airplane fl
Q4 Chain word
Private clu
b sign s
Form a continuous pa
th of words from START
ngular thin
g FINISH by connectin to
Just the si g the word parts giv
Way
boxes. There are tw en in the
o parts to each word
A street sig
n
second part of one wo and the
rd is the first part of
You won’t necessarily the next.
need to visit every bo
achieve your aim. x to
Q6 scramb Start MEW LED GER
le SELF HELP
Solve the four an
agrams and move DER LAD UND
ONE
each square to fo one letter to MATE
rm four ordinary
Now arrange the words. MIS BAL HER US
letters marked LOT
an asterisk (*) to with FIT
form the answer BUS HEL HER RING
to the riddle or to
fill in the missing TER MINI MET
words as indicate RIC
d. LIKE Finish

BRIOT *
* *
STTNU * *
AELTDM *
*
ERUYHM * *
If your _______ isn’t
open, keep your ____ October 2014 83
— Sue Grafton (4,..,5 ______ shut too.
)
 October 2014 84
Solutions: Q6 Scramble: Words: Orbit, stunt, malted,
rheumy. Answer: If your mind isn’t open,
Q1 Double Barrelled: Case. keep your mouth shut too. — Sue Grafton
123rf.comx3

Q2 Mensa Puzzle: 169. A descending Q7 Hidato:

sequence of the squares of prime numbers.
Q3 Deduction: Educate, Among, Rug.
Q4 Chain Words: Mewled, ledger,
gerund, undone, oneself, selfhelp,
helpmate, matelot, lotus, usher, herbal,
ballad, ladder, dermis, misfit, fitter, termini, Q8 Picture Search: Biscuit, coat, duck,
minibus, bushel, helmet, metric, richer, dumbbell, grenade, horn, jaguar, jam,
herring, ringlike. monitor, opal, ostrich, pea, pear, postman,
Q5 Head & Tail: puck, Spain.
In-common-ground-crew-members- Q9 Enigma Code: Reason, Aerate, Astern,
only-one-way. Ornate, Resent, Stereo, Season.
The Clue: Cause
get started.
is given to help you
clue to the first word
up seven words. The
will be able to make
cracked the code you
letter. When you have descriptive names.
code represents a them you can find? Look out for
Each colour in our in a straight line. See how many of
forward or backwards but always
Q9 Enigma Code
horizontally, vertically or diagonally
16 pictures are hidden either
OUT represented by each of the
In the jumble below, the words
Q8 PICTURE SEARCH
Q7 Hidato
the maze.
IN
Find your way ou
t of
Puzzle Pit
 610k + likes

Knowledge Magazine India

Announcing the winners of Teachers’ Day contest

Knowledge is the greatest gift of all, and to
mark the occasion of Teachers’ Day, our
readers honoured the teachers who gave
them that priceless gift.
 Shruti Kaushik from Shri
Shankaracharya Engineering College, an
easy-going 20 year old engineering student,
credits her teacher Swapna Sahu for being
the only teacher to see her true potential and

s
guide her to fulfilling her ambitions.

o r i e Miss Dubey from Ashok Hall Junior

memntor
School in Kolkata, has left an indelible
impression on fifth standard student Shinjini
Sarkar, who misses her old class teacher now

Me
that they aren’t in the same class anymore.
of my

 17 year old Anushka Bajaj credits his

teacher, Deepak Tandon’s eccentric
demeanour and infectious vivacity with
making Mathematics interesting.
You can read the winner’s letters on our
facebook page from 5 September.
A special mention to the students of TOMOAE
English Primary School, who all participated by

123rf.com
nominating their favourite teachers for the contest.

Knowledge Magazine India

Announcing the winners of #MyCityMyHeritage contest

On our Facebook page, we carried the #MyCityMyHeritage contest
where we asked our fans to send in their responses to questions
about their city. Four winners were selected and each has won an
exciting prize from Printed Noise. Congratulations!

Follow us on: Knowledgemagazineindia KnowledgeMagIND KnowledgeMagind

 Gadgets Watershot for iPhone
Watersport enthusiasts rejoice! The Watershot Hous-
ing for iPhone is your perfect companion, as you go
kayakying, rafting, or scuba diving. Once you are under
the water, the polycarbonate waterproof housing (phone
case) is to be used with the free Watershot App.The app
adds additional features to your phone, such as front
and rear camera use, still and video recording, social
media sharing, and GPS overlaying, till as far below as
195ft. Hurry now, I can hear the water calling!
Price: `11,586 • www.watershot.com

a
Pinhole Camera Solargraphy kit
Kicking it old school style, the Pinhole Camera
celebrates photography in its simplest form. This DIY
piece consists of a film (not included), a box, and a

mixed
very small hole, which lets in light and makes your
exposure. Because there is no lens, the image will be
in focus at all distances, though it is preferable you
take pictures when the sun is at its brightest. Maybe
give your camera phone or digital camera a break
just for this. Price: `674 • www.kikkerland.com

bag iRing
Remember the scene from Minority Report, where Tom Cruise is
wearing gesture control gloves to gather intel on where the next
murder is going to take place? Well, here is a baby step towards
making gesture control devices part of mainstream technology. The
iRing consists of two rings – shaped like a triangle and rectangle
respectively, which when worn and moved in gestured controlled
recognised actions whilst in front of an iOS device’s camera, allows
the system to output music or MIDI control messages to
compatible apps. Take notes of the visible gestures the next time
you are invited to a musical performance directed by a musical
conductor. It might inspire you to compose your musical piece.
Price: `1,633 • www.ikmultimedia.com
 Knox Music Jet
Everyone knows that apart from showering, the
shower cubicle is the place for thinking and
singing. Leave the thinking aside and exercise
your vocal chords by installing the Knox Music
Jet. This Bluetooth enabled showerhead music/
phone speaker when linked to your mobile’s
music player, will bring music to ears as you
simultaneously clean them. Also, incoming calls
will be forwarded to your showerhead. One
charge lasts for 10 hours of music or a really
long phone conversation. The choice is yours.
Price: `2,697 • www.amazon.com

s57 series bravia tv

Size notwithstanding, the Sony Bravia
S57 series of portable TVs packs a wal-
lop of entertainment. Weighing in at just
5.4kg and a slim 19” LCD screen, the
TV comes with a detachable handle and
a discreet stand. Hang it on the wall,
place it on the table or carry it from
room to room as you catch up on your
favourite TV show. Apart from viewing
shows, the TV when synced with a
compatible device also doubles up as a
photo album and a music player.
Price: `20,708 • www.sony.com

Perlexus Epic

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ikmultimedia.com X2, sothatscool.com, interest.com, existingthroughpixels.wordpress.com
Up for a challenge that is crazy, fun, and
requires some twisting and turning on your
part? If yes, then pick up the Perlexus Epic, a
3D ball in a maze puzzle game. Players have to
manipulate the direction of the small metal ball
inside the transparent enclosed sphere through an
intricate maze composed of 100 steps along narrow plastic tracks. Though
seemingly easy, it involves twisting and turning the sphere; the obstacle
levels of varying difficulty make it a puzzle that you will be obsessed with
for hours. Fun! Price: `2,962 • www.amazon.in

Pocketstrings
The Pocketstrings is apt for beginners and
experts who want to practice their chords
anywhere and anytime without making too
loud a noise. This portable and durable
product when slid open reveals the neck of
the guitar with real strings and frets. Begin
your practice and train yourself for chord
progressions and changes and pretty soon
you will have real calluses on your fingers.
Once you are done, slide the Pocketstrings
shut and place it back in your pocket.
Price: `1,836 • www.pocketstrings.com
Fujiflim Instax Instant
smartphone printer
Isn’t a printed photo so much more fun to
see than a digital one? 16 seconds is all it
takes for the portable Fujifilm’s Instax
Instant smartphone printer to print an
image you have just clicked from your
android or iOs smartphone or selected
one from your gallery. The printer is
compatible with an app downloaded from
either iTunes or Play Store. It requires two
CR2 lithium batteries and uses INSTAX
Mini Instant Film and prints approximately
100 prints per set. Say cheese!
Price: `12,199 • www.fujifilm.com

Compiled by Moshita Prajapati

 inside the pages
On the Shelf
The Kaurava Empire Vol. 1 –
Abhimanyu and the Conquest of
the Chakravyuha
Author Jason Quinn and Illustrator Sachin
Nagar - Campfire Graphic Novels, ` 250
A modern re-telling of the epic Mahabharata, the
novel chronicles the event leading upto battle
between two teenage warriors, Pandav Prince
Abhimanyu and Kaurava Prince Durmashana. As
the Kaurava’s unleash the Chakravyuha upon the
Pandavas at Kurukshetra, a fierce battle ensues
between Abhimanyu and Durmashana, as each
strives on to win the war for their family.
The Bookman’s Tale:
A Novel of Obsession
Charlie Lovett - Bloomsbury Publishing, ` 298
Following the death of his wife, antique bookseller
Peter Byerly relocates to the village of Hay-on-
Wye, where he opens his own bookshop, selling
and collecting antique books. He chances upon a
book from which tumbles out a picture of a young
Victorian woman, who bears a striking resemble
to his dead wife Amanda. Piqued and confused,
he starts on an incredible journey to discover the
origins of the picture.
goodreads.com X2, penguinbooksindia.com, flipkart.com, bookmandi.com
123RF.com X2, Wikia.com X3, wikipedia x3, yolasite.com, campfire.co.in,
Four: A Divergent Story
Collection
Veronica Roth -
HarperCollins Children’s Books, ` 1,102
An extension of the popular young adult series
Divergent, author Veronica Roth brings out Four,
which revolves around Tobias ‘Four’ Eaton, the
principal male character from the trilogy. Written
from his perspective, the series serves as a
prequel to events covered in Divergent trilogy and
chronicles Four’s life, his psychology and
character development, his choices (why he
chose to join Dauntless) before he met Tris.
All Four Stars
Tara Dairman - Putnam Publishing Group, ` 1,040
Who doesn’t love food? More so if you love to
cook? Gladys Gatsby loves to cook, and not just
your average grilled cheese sandwich. No, she
enjoys creating gourmet dishes! When she enters
an essay contest in her school, it accidently lands
her a position as a restaurant critic at the New
York Daily Standard! She is overjoyed, but what
they don’t know is that she is all of 11 years old!
Read to find out how she manages to keep her
dream job whilst balancing school.
The Wild Wisdom Quiz Book
WWF - Penguins Book India, ` 199
Illustrated, full of trivia and mind-boggling facts,
and packed with 500 questions, this book is
compiled from the Wild Wisdom Quiz held
every year by WWF. It is spilt into seven broad
chapters Plants, Fish, Arthropods and Annelids,
Amphibians and Reptiles, Mammals, Birds and
Potpourri, with questions at the beginning and
snippets about the animal kingdom to complete
each chapter.
Indian Mammals:
A Field Guide
Vivek Menon - ` 850, Hachette India
Did you know there are 400 species of mammals
in India? And in this comprehensive field-ready
and illustrated guide by India’s renowned wildlife
conservationist, Vivek Menon doesn’t miss single
mammal information for any amateur or
professional wildlife enthusiast. The
encyclopaedic book includes picture of different
mammals, how to identify them, distribution
maps, directions on where to observe the species
and also folklore associated with them in different
regions of the country.
 Question of
Fictional Characters the Month
We  To Hate Literary character you identify with?

Dolores Umbridge
from Harry Potter series
The vilest of characters to come out from the Harry Potter series, Dolores
Umbridge is pure evil because she can and probably does actually exist in
real life. Abusing the power your position affords for personal gains,
discriminating against individuals/creatures who are different, letting a few
suffer for the betterment of the society, and being content with letting
your sycophants run the system with threats and intimidation does not
really make you reach the top of the popular list.

Joffery Baratheon from Game of Thrones

There is nothing likeable about King Joffery Baratheon. He is whiny,
sadistic, cruel, murderous, arrogant, tyrannical, insufferable and The literary character I identify
terrifying in equal measure, a nuisance, rude, creepy, torturer, tactless,
with is Hermione Granger. I am a
petulant… need I add more?
little impatient like her when it
Isabella Swan from Twilight comes to answering questions in
Every independent woman’s nightmare, Bella Swan supposedly set the class especially if I know the
feminism back a few decades. Portrayed as a 2 dimensional character, she answer. I know how good it is to be
doesn’t evolve throughout the trilogy. She is either mooning over Edward or studying beyond your level. As she
moping over his absence in her life. Her loquacious soliloquies over the
is called intelligent in the books
beauty of Edward and her guilt for choosing Edward over her family make
her the most boring character in fictional history. and earns points for her house
through exams and test, I do the
Uriah Heep from David Copperfield Same.And finally, just as she is
An unassuming villainous name didn’t stop Uriah Heep from appearing in discriminated for being a mudblood,
this list. Dickens portrayed the moneylender without eyebrows, eyelashes, I am discriminated for not liking
and eyes of reddish brown signifying him to the Devil. A slimy pernicious
creature, reeking of insincerity, he was the stereotypical ‘yes man’ who
sports. This makes her my favorite
robs you blind, while claiming to help you. character who I identify with.

Miss Havisham from Great Expectations - By Kavya Chopra, age 10, from
Jilted by her lover on their wedding day, Miss Havisham is a scorned New Delhi
woman. Instead of getting over her lover, she directs her energy into
consciously conditioning her ward Estelle to eschew love, emotional
bonding, and attachment making her a cold and heartless woman.
Effectively ruining and complicating her budding and romantic
relationship with Pip.
Did H
The children from Willy Wonka and the e Say
Chocolate factory
Caulif That!
Veruca Salt is a spoiled and petulant English girl who demands the
lower ?
trained squirrel as a pet, Violet Beauregarde’s incessant gum chewing is
but ca is not
colleg bbage withhing
obnoxious and annoying, Mike Teevee is rude to his mother and just wants to play
video games and Agustus Gloop, a boy who loved to eat everything and anything in front
of his eyes without asking for permission first. No wonder Charlie Bucket was deemed
e edu
cation a
the only likeable one in this group.
- Ma
rk Tw
a
.
in
Reader’s Reviews
Recently I read The Alchemist which is Tangiers and further, paying heed to the
a simple and short parable written by omens and surmounting obstacles along
Paulo Coelho. The Alchemist is the story the way. Paulo Coelho’s story is an
of Santiago, a shepherd boy content to inspirational parable. It is an
wander through the Spanish fields and unforgettable story about the essential
towns with his flock until a recurring wisdom of listening to our hearts and,
dream about finding his treasure at the above all follow our dreams. This book
pyramids of Egypt rousts him from makes your heart smile and reminds you
complacency. In trying to understand his to always follow your dreams.
This book is
dream, Santiago encounters a wise old a must read.
man called Melchizedek, the King of
Salem, who sets the boy off to find the - By Mehul Gupta, age 13, from Modern
treasure. He crosses from Spain into Delhi Public School
 in focus
Inventive and doggedly
dedicated; Yu the Great
was the first to discover how
to tame the raging floods
of the mighty Yangtze River
and assist agriculture,
catapulting mankind forward
Yu the Great on the march of progress
Legacy
Yu the Great was an ancient Chinese ruler
who engineered the first system of canals
known to man in order to contain the raging
floods of the China’s rivers, including the
Yangtze, the Wei River, and the Yellow River.
This triumph over nature paved the way for
early civilisations to exploit irrigation for the
purpose of agriculture, freeing humanity
from the uncertainties of existence as
foraging tribes.
Yu’s father, Gun, had earlier been tasked
to contain the floods that were triggered
by torrential rains, but his system of
damming and blocking the flow of water
proved to be ineffective. After Gun’s failure Yu’s greatest feat was coaxing the Yangtze River
and consequently his execution, Yu was through the Mount Longmen and into the sea
selected by the local ruler Shun to continue
his father’s work. Instead of following Gun’s
approach, Yu tried the method of digging
canals to divert the flow of water and Did you know
dredging the riverbeds. It took Yu 13 years • One of his greatest undertakings was cutting a way for the waters of the river to flow freely
to accomplish the task, but after years of through Mount Longmen, a geographical obstruction to its course.
hard labour, he succeeded in controlling
wikipediacommons x 2

the floodwaters. His work won him great
acclaim amongst the Chinese people, and
Shun selected Yu to be his successor to rule
after him. Yu’s historical achievements won
him a place in Chinese folklore, and he is
regarded as one of the Three Sage Kings of
ancient China.
• Yu ushered in the era of dynastic rule in China, by appointing his son Qi to succeed him as ruler
and start the Xia Dynasty. Before him, rulers were selected by their predecessor on basis of
ability to rule, and not their parentage.
• The Yu Mausoleum, outside Shaoxing City, was built in his honour and was a place of
pilgrimage and ceremony for the rulers of Imperial China.
• There are an estimated 600,000,000 acres of irrigated land worldwide today, all made possible
by the efforts of Yu the Great.

90 October 2014
SCIENCE • HISTORY • NATURE • FOR THE CURIOUS MIND