Wales’ current measles outbreak has resurrected a controversy that will not die; a zombie debate that science should have put to rest years ago. Unfortunately, while science trades in evidence, the same cannot always be said of media outlets – often under pressure to produce sensationalist headlines while feigning ignorance of their powerful influence.

The furore all kicked off in 1998 when a paper published by the Lancet suggested a link between the measles mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. The study was jumped on by scaremongering reporters who propelled bowel surgeon Andrew Wakefield to media stardom, hailed by anti-vaccination campaigners as a Galileo-like maverick. Wakefield was lead author of a study that examined 12 autistic children who had apparently developed the condition after their MMR vaccination. His claims that MMR was linked to autism have now been disproven in multiple studies that tried to replicate his methods. Furthermore, the ethics of the study were questioned when the children involved in the research were found to have been subjected to unnecessary and invasive procedures. And perhaps most importantly, it was uncovered in 2004 that the parents of the autistic children were recruited by a lawyer preparing a lawsuit against MMR manufacturers. Wakefield had been paid more than £400,000 to conduct research that could display a correlation between the vaccine and autism. The Lancet’s editor said he believed the paper would have been rejected for bias if peer reviewers have been aware of Wakefield’s financial conflicts of interest.

Now, as a measles epidemic is upon us, despite losing his job and license to practice medicine, Wakefield’s media presence has re-emerged. The Independent recently gave his statement pride of place on the front page of their Saturday paper with the accompanying headline: MMR scaredoctor: “This outbreak proves I was right all along”. The article included a press release of Wakefield’s thoughts on the worst measles outbreak in a decade, inexplicably shifting the blame to the government. At the time, the scare around the MMR vaccine was considerable. Wakefield’s work was covered so prominently in the media that even parents with a scientific background were left agonising over what would be the best decision for their child. UCL Physics Professor Jon Butterworth has written about the anguish he felt, trying to weigh up the evidence when it came to vaccinating his own son in 2003. He said: “In the end, even to a physicist and a chemist, the medical evidence was overwhelming. He got his MMR. But it was hard. The terrible media reporting, and the terrible way the scare was dealt with politically, put parents in a horrible situation.”

If a vastly educated scientist can have misconceptions about a life-saving vaccine, it must have been torturous for less-informed families (without access to scientific literature) that expected to get valid, truthful information from their newspaper of choice. A credible newspaper should know better than to give a high-profile platform to a scientist whose work has been debunked. And while the article does point out that Wakefield’s was discredited and his claims are at best dubious, it does give a prominent proportion of article space to his opinions and so requires a careful read.
Wakefield may have been wrong, his research and opinions may have been biased, but it is lunacy that he is held solely responsible for the panic that has – and continues to – put people in avoidable danger through misinformation. Wakefield didn’t really create this controversy or the recent measles outbreak in Swansea, shameless reporting did.

But that sobering stat isn’t quite the full picture – for it only considers human deaths. While humanity has only been under attack from this immuno-assassin for around 80 years, simian immunodeficiency virus – the viral ‘originator’ of HIV – has been cutting its deadly swathe for some 32,000 years. Consequently the devastation to simian populations is orders of magnitude higher.

But should we even consider this in the same breath as the human cost? Well, yes I think we should. When it comes to the onslaught of pathogens on humankind, we cannot afford to abide by the constraints of species. We can’t sit neatly in our elevated evolutionary position resting on the crutches of modern medicine – for a virus cares not for such arbitrary constructs – if it can infect, it will infect. And as humans, we are the ultimate prize for a pathogen and its ability to spread effectively; we travel, we are social and we are very numerous.

This has been seen time and time again, most notably in recent years is the ability of avian influenza viruses to hop across the species barrier to humans. The latest of which is H7N9 which appears to have to mutated from a strain infecting wild duck species native to China.

The burning question now becomes: “Will this turn into another pandemic?” Certainly the wider public health community are worried ­– a few weeks ago more than 30 international experts gathered at the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations in Rome to discuss this very possibility. At the time of writing, more than 80 people in China have fallen ill and Chinese officials were investigating the possibility that the virus has spread from human to human.

If H7N9 proves to be successful at human infection – what then, can we do? Well the response will centre around animal health expertise, and much will be asked of the scientists in this field. It is far from easy to devise effective ways to sample birds and animals for testing in a country with some 6 billion domestic birds. Especially, say flu experts, as domestic poultry do not seem to have fallen very ill from the latest H7N9 infections, which could lead to a “silent” outbreak in China.

So then, the challenge then is set – but are animal health scientists up to the job? See All Creatures Great and Small to find out how advances in technology have armed them very well for the task in hand…

  “We’ve found something new!”

“Oh, no you haven’t…”

“Oh, yes we have!”

The scientific pursuit is seldom presented as pantomime, but it’s no secret that scientists don’t always agree with each other. Rarely has this comparison been so apt than in the debate about Lake Vostok – the largest subglacial lake yet discovered in Antarctica which may (or may not) be home to never-before-discovered microbial life. Different researchers are currently making totally contradictory claims about bacteria found in the samples from the lake. Who will turn out to be correct is currently anyone’s guess…

This is an intriguing tale of a lost water world, trapped under ice for maybe 25 million years. A world where sunlight cannot penetrate, where oxygen levels are intolerably high and where pressures stretch to over 300 times that of the surface. Anything that could survive in these extreme and hostile conditions would have had to evolve unique survival adaptations to endure the cold, dark waters. And it’s for exactly that reason that for the last 60 years, teams of scientists have been determined to discover if extremophilic unknown life does lie beneath. 

I’ve been following the story of Lake Vostok with great interest since February last year when the team were finally able to drill down into the lake and acquire water samples, marking a sensational day for science. In October, results of the first samples of surface water disappointingly revealed no life and we had to wait with baited breath for the analysis of further samples taken from deeper waters.

Excitingly last month, news broke that the team of researchers studying the samples had identified seven species of bacteria that didn’t correspond to any known bacteria. The Associated Press reported that “a new form of microbial life has been found” in the lake and that “the unidentified and unclassified bacterium has no relation to any of the existing bacterial types.”

Unfortunately, like many over-hyped pronouncements, this turned out to be a little premature…

Later that week, Vladimir Korolev, the head of St Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute – the lab analysing the samples – put an end to this excitement, cautioning that a new type of bacteria had probably not been discovered, and it was likely just contamination from kerosene used in the drilling fluid to prevent the water hole from freezing over that had produced these misleading results.

“We found certain specimens, although not many. All of them were contaminants,” Korolev said in a quote, thoroughly killing everyone’s buzz.

“They really need to stop playing around with frozen lake water bathed in kerosene and get a clean bulk water sample,” quipped a rival researcher.

So far, so disappointing… But then, a few days later, determined not to be undermined, the original researchers refuted Korolev’s claim, insisting that they had found new life in the lake and that they had taken steps to rule out potential contamination.

“We are very sure that what we have found is an unclassified native microbe,” lead researcher Sergery Bulat told Nature. “It seems to belong to a division of uncultured environmental bacteria that haven’t been determined yet.”

It sounds like everyone’s more than a little confused.  It makes me think that this scientific squabble is actually a good argument for the peer review system.

Last month I wrote a feature detailing some of the problems with the time-consuming process that scientific papers are subjected to before they can be published in journals, but this case suggests peer review does have a fundamental place in the pursuit of truth. Press releases are difficult to trust if the information hasn’t yet gone through this process, so you can essentially say whatever you like in them, potentially misleading the public. It’s easy to understand why science might be over-hyped when marketing is king in our modern world and researchers rely on public money for funding. But as this situation reveals, making scientific pronouncements which are basically pure speculation prior to peer review can be problematic.

The story of life’s potential in Lake Vostok is not over yet. Fresh water samples will arrive in May to be analysed, which will perhaps clear this matter up. But it’s apparent that we will have to be a little more patient in order to find out once and for all if unknown life exists in the lake that time forgot.

Yet at the tail end of last month a collective smile, albeit tentative, began to creep across their faces. Peculiar then, that the thing which provoked such a response is the same thing that could well render many of the theories proposed by these scientists worthy only of the bin.

A map tracing the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation – the “oldest light” in the sky – has been produced by Europe’s Planck Surveyor satellite. In higher resolution than ever before it reveals evidence that at once supports current big bang theory and yet highlights how little we know.

Assembled from 15 months’ worth of data, this rather beautiful map shows minute variations in the temperature of the microwave light which bathes the universe. It is this which forms the fingerprint of what happened a millionth of a billionth, of a billionth, of a billionth of a second after the big bang. And it has already shown that the universe is not only older than previously thought, but that there is more matter and less dark energy contained within it.

There are other anomalies with current thinking as well. An asymmetry in temperature fluctuations – such that the southern hemisphere is warmer than the north suggests unknown complexity, as does a surprising cold spot ostentatiously peering out from the oval map.

All this perhaps explains the cosmologists’ delight. The map has confirmed much of what they suspected, but shows there are many mysteries still to solve. In trying to explain the nuances of this remarkable new map I suspect many of them will begin to uncover novel and exciting physics.

But looking skyward is not the only way to understand universal origins – a careful look to the sub-atomic world can be just as revealing. Indeed to understand a mystery as grand as the origin of the universe, evidence from both ends of this scale spectrum will be required. On p26 we introduce a major particle player in the race to discover the intricacies of the origins of the universe.

Self-confessed music snobs may find the latest findings from the University of Melbourne a little disappointing.

Researchers there have determined that our appreciation of music is not based on natural ability or our personality, but by learning and exposure. This suggests that individuals could develop a penchant for anything, from Johann Sebastian Bach to Justin Bieber, provided they were frequently acquainted with the music. Though the latter is something I struggle to agree with, considering our chronic exposure to bland, formulaic pop and my own aversion it.

In the Australian study, 66 volunteers with a range of musical training were tested on their ability to hear combinations of notes to determine if they found the chords familiar or pleasing. The researchers discovered that people need to be familiar with sounds created by combinations of notes before they can hear the individual notes. If they weren’t used to hearing the chords played to them, they were likely to find the sound dissonant or unpleasant.

“Our study overturns centuries of theories that physical properties of the ear determine what we find appealing. It shows that musical harmony can be learnt and it is a matter of training the brain to hear the sounds,” said Associate Professor Neil McLachlan from the Music Mind and Wellbeing Centre – an initiative that aims to understand the relationship between our brains and music.

To confirm their findings, the study authors trained 19 non-musicians to find the pitches of a random selection of western chords.  Over ten short sessions of training, the participants’ ability to hear notes improved rapidly and they reported that the chords they had learnt sounded more pleasant, regardless of the combinations of notes used.

“This highlights the importance of training the brain to like particular variations of combinations of sounds like those found in jazz or rock,” said Associate Professor of Psychology Sarah Wilson, concluding that our taste in music is down to nurture, not nature.

The contemporary psychological view, and a much sexier one than the Melbourne’s study of familiarity, is that our musical preferences are manifestations of explicit psychological traits, possibly in interaction with specific situational experiences, needs or constraints. People seek musical environments that reinforce and reflect their personalities, attitudes and emotions.

One disadvantage of the Australian study is that it only looked at one element of music without considering other attributes such as tempo, rhythm and dynamics or the types of instruments featured. Conversely, a study from Brazil published in the New Journal of Physics revealed how people are attracted to certain rhythmic patterns in a song, rather than its melody. It would be interesting to see results from a study that considers more than one musical dimension.

Additionally, perhaps the researchers should have used neural imaging in the study to determine if brain activity correlated with the participants’ ratings of the chords. Previous studies with positron emission tomography (PET) studies have found that the hippocampus actives during music considered ‘pleasant’ and the parahippocampul gyrus, which is implicated in emotion processing has been found to activate during dissonant music (Kolesch et al. 2006).

I suppose the Melbourne’s study findings are hardly astounding when you consider taste in music tends to differ culturally and historically. If you never step out of the homogenous, auto-tuned pop bubble that dominates our radios, adverts and shop floors, anything that does not fit in that category might sound downright unappealing. So perhaps this study should encourage those who stick to what they know to seek out types of music that they may have once dismissed, in the hope of finding a wealth of meaning that Bieber alone cannot convey.

Neil McLachlan, David Marco, Maria Light, Sarah Wilson. Consonance and Pitch. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 2013; DOI: 10.1037/a0030830

In the last episode of the BBC’s otherwise excellent series Africa, narrator Sir David Attenborough suggested that some parts of the continent had become 3.5^oC hotter in the last 20 years. If, like me, the dulcet tones of Attenborough happened on this occasion to be on in the background whilst you desperately tried to get your three year-old ready for bed, then you to would have had your attention, well, not so much grabbed as physically assaulted by this statement.

In the delicate balance of global climate change – where whole island nations can be swallowed by the subtlest of temperature hikes – 3.5^oC is an enormous change in just 20 years. Were the BBC absolutely sure they were correct here? Well, sadly not. So much so that in the repeat of the episode the offending statement was removed.

How the ‘fact’ in question came to the fore when the producers were putting together the script for the voiceover is uncertain. The BBC claim the source was a report written and compiled by Oxfam and the New Economics Foundation, who in turn cite a Christian Aid report as the source. Wherever it came from, it appears to be wholly inaccurate. Indeed several experts have picked apart why this is so on Leo Hickman’s environmental blog on the Guardian web site.

But my main concern is this – whilst the horsemeat scandal was indeed worrying, in dominating the headlines it at least reminded the public of the vital role food testing laboratories play in a secure food chain.  This imposter however seems to serve only to stoke an already mired controversy. When dealing with a subject such as climate change, upon which controversy still has a firm grip, facts are very valuable indeed. As with any valuable commodity, soon enough fakes will begin to appear. Fakes that will at best fog the window of truth slightly, and at worse completely undermine our understanding of the reality of a situation. In the case of climate change – dangerously so.

Climate change has proved, indeed is proving, difficult enough to understand even with accurate data – so the presence of even one rouge piece of mis-information can do tremendous damage. For the climate change deniers this will likely be the perfect grist to their mill, just another example of the liberal media bending the truth to their world view. Let us hope that the next time the BBC want to make an impact with science, they check their sources very carefully indeed.

Select a respected journal, open it at any article and marvel at the evidence of careful planning and precision of a research group’s experiment. Scientists are a bunch of super-careful, highly-organised pedants, or so the stereotype goes. Recently however, social media set out to change this convention and pull back the curtain on research.
Thousands of researchers took to Twitter to engage in a revealing commentary about what life is really like in the laboratory in a way that a science journalist could never communicate as effectively.
#Overlyhonestmethods was the trending hashtag used to convey incidents in experiments that would certainly not be included in a paper’s methods section, with hilarious results.

A neuroscientist called Dr Leigh kicked off the conversation by tweeting an insight into the incubation times she’d listed in the method section of her paper:

incubation lasted three days because this is how long the undergrad forgot the experiment in the fridge #overlyhonestmethods

— dr leigh (@dr_leigh) January 7, 2013

she tweeted. The tag soon went viral and rather more reasons were rapidly given for otherwise inexplicable experimental reaction times:

…the chemicals were combined & stirred by hand for 2 hours by our project students as they were getting on our nerves #overlyhonestmethods

— Simon Leigh (@Simonleighuk) January 8, 2013

@Simonleighuk wryly stated.

Others were brutally honest about why sample sizes may be different between various test groups.

we didn’t test as many clams as oysters because we’re pretty sure someone found the samples and ate them #overlyhonestmethods

— Amy Freitag (@bgrassbluecrab) January 8, 2013

@bgrassbluecrab sardonically revealed. Some of my favourite tweets revealed the delicious silliness of scientific pursuit:

We wanted to see what would happen if we did X, just for fun. Great explosion! We came up with the hypothesis later. #overlyhonestmethods

— Bora Zivkovic (@BoraZ) January 8, 2013

admitted Bora Zivkovic (@BoraZ) of Scientific American.

There was no plan – we just tried stuff we thought would be interesting until something interesting happened #OverlyHonestMethods

— Russell Garwood (@RussellGarwood) January 9, 2013

@russelgarwood tweeted. While others expressed their frustration at the things they’d had to do to manipulate the peer-review system:

we didn’t read half of the papers we cite because they are behind a paywall #overlyhonestmethods #OA

— Sylvain Deville (@devillesylvain) January 8, 2013

@devillesylvain owned up.

There should have been more experiments but our funding ran out but we published it anyway. #overlyhonestmethods

— Mags Lum (@ScientistMags) January 8, 2013

revealed @ScientistMags

So, some would probably call a few of these confessions a little concerning. These disclosures would certainly never be published in peer-reviewed journal articles, but I’d argue that they should be…
The hashtag served to illuminate the occasionally inaccessible world of scientific research. It highlighted the fact that scientists are humans, stamping on the notion that one has to be perfect to succeed.

I think people would be more likely to read papers or listen to presentations that include amusing anecdotes. Who doesn’t love a good story? I understand things more readily when they’ve been communicated effectively and memorably and I highly doubt that I am alone in this. I believe humour goes a long way, where appropriate, and there’s no reason some scientists should have to forego the funny and replace it with PowerPoint slides consisting of essays of jargon.

Humanising science is something I wholeheartedly agree with. A previous occupation as a researcher in a pharmaceutical company very nearly put me off the notion of science altogether. With most of my laboratory time being taken up filling in paperwork than actually doing the experiments, I began to feel disenchanted with what I’d assumed would be a creative, innovative process. Instead, I filled in numerous forms and log books for every piece of equipment I’d so much as looked at. Writing down the serial numbers of everything from pipettes to cell media bottles and berated if I so much as stepped into the lab without the correct colour lab coat made me feel almost oppressed. I left that job with significantly lower self-esteem; convinced that science would never be for me, that all laboratories operated in this way and that I was never going to be the perfect scientist specimen the career required.

This is why I think this social media trend became the perfect science communication example. Yes, sometimes science is undertaken somewhat slap dashed and haphazardly and perhaps people make mistakes and cut corners because of the intense pressure to publish papers as often as possible. But this event showed that science is real, funny and creative and showcased the lighter side of a field that can be downright alienating for those that don’t consider themselves scientifically-minded.

Let us not forget that many of the experiments that have led to some of our most successful developments have been those that didn’t turn out, or weren’t performed the way they were planned. Accidental experiments have brought us penicillin, plastic, x-rays and microwaves – to name but a few examples. Imagine how different our world would be if ‘mistakes’ were eliminated from laboratories.

Two companies – Deep Space Industries and Planetary Resources – are busily planning how best to extract resources from asteroids. Both say they are creating a trillion-dollar industry based on the extraction of chemical components of fuel and minerals such as platinum and gold out of the rocks.

Deep Space Industries favour a fleet of asteroid-prospecting spacecraft which it will send out into the Solar System to hunt for resources. The company would then launch bigger spacecraft for round-trip visits that bring back samples. Planetary Resources have a similar model – the first step of which is to put a series of telescopes in orbit to locate potential resource rich targets.

And if this sounds to you a little too much like science fiction then it’ll come as no surprise to learn that one of the founders of Planetary Resources is none other than film director James Cameron. But is this really a new era – is it any different from space tourism or the satellite industry?  All rely on profit. ­

Well yes, I rather think it is. For those industries the asset is space its self – either the wonderment it induces in civilians willing to pay hefty fares to experience it, or the properties and convenience of orbit. Travelling through space in order to harvest and remove resources contained within it is altogether different. And, despite many valid fears and criticisms of industrialising space, if we want to expand our horizons beyond the Earth-bound, then I think not only is it a good thing, it is a vital one. After all, we have never truly pushed back any frontiers without a powerful economic imperative – the spice routes, the gold rush – the history of exploration is the history of trade.

From camels hauling Arabian silk and spices, to maritime routes being forged to allow the transport of bulk commodities – all were driven by economics. And all allowed – indeed demanded – the formation of colonies to service these new and exotic outposts.

And so by making the first moves to retrieve a product from space are we in essence making the first realistic moves at colonising space? History, as they say, will be the judge – but I’d wager that like so many other things in human history, money will be the biggest lubrication of all – even when it comes to colonising space.

Microgravity can wreak havoc with one’s bone density, vision and cardiovascular health. Not to mention the psychological effects that long-term space travel might induce, which may prove even harder for these men to endure. A one way trip to the Red Planet is expected to take around seven to nine months so it’s vital that scientists ensure that humans can endure the harsh conditions of space for long periods of time.

While my first thoughts on hearing of the mission turned to how well the astronauts will cope with the potential medical problems, cabin fever, and frustration of being away from their families, I realise that many would instead question the absurdity of investing so much time, money and effort into getting humans to Mars. Just what exactly is the point?

A notable yet unlikely critic of Red Planet exploration is daredevil space jumper, Felix Baumgartner. Baumgartner risked his life on behalf of caffeinated beverage Red Bull to become the first person to break the sound barrier without vehicular power on his sky jump in October. He reportedly told the Telegraph: “People should decide ‘are you willing to spend all this money to go to Mars?’ I think the average person on the ground would never spend that amount of money – they have to spend it on something that makes sense, and this is definitely saving our planet.”

Baumgartner is not alone in his opinions. When only a government budget (and therefore taxpayers) can supply NASA with the funds it needs to enable state-of-the-art space experiments, such as the NASA’s largest Mars mission so far: the $2.5 billion Curiosity Rover that landed on the Red Planet in July, the situation is fundamentally political. The current economic crisis may leave people resentful of financing pie-in-the sky research with uncertain benefits. When there is a global food shortage, poverty, HIV, malaria and other unresolved suffering in the world, many would argue that spending such an immense amount on space travel is impractical and self-indulgent.

A passion for science, investigation and knowledge and a dislike of considering the economic viability before an avenue can be explored may render me somewhat biased but I’m struggling to agree with the sceptics.

While undoubtedly expensive, NASA’s budget actually only accounts for 0.8% of America’s total federal expenditures. For example, the federal government spends over 20 times as much money on defence as it does on Space research.

A common complaint about space science is that is has no benefits for this planet and that it has few useful applications. But utilising space technologies has changed our world beyond recognition. Consider the many inventions that we would never possess were it not for the Space Race. Since 1976, about 1400 documented NASA inventions have benefited industry, improved quality of life and created jobs around the world. These range from medical inventions such as dialysis machines, and CAT and MRI scanners to fire-fighter safety equipment to air and water purification. Satellites orbiting the Earth allow us to broadcast to and converse with people all over the world… Who knows what the future applications of this mission may have?

On a more morbid note, exploring other planets may prove very helpful if we encounter real problems with our own. Stephen Hawking notably said: “I don’t think the human race will survive the next thousand years, unless we spread into space. There are too many accidents that can befall life on a single planet. But I’m an optimist. We will reach out to the stars.”

Even if a doomsday virus or asteroid does not pose a threat to our planet for millennia, it cannot be denied that Earth is becoming increasingly overpopulated. Yes, Felix Baumgartner is right in that of course we should be looking at preserving Earth, but colonising other planets or space travel may one day be the only option for the continuation of our species.

Finally, the least directly useful but possibly most important defence of all for space science is that exploring the unknown and advancing our knowledge is a fundamental human characteristic. Space science has immense power to inspire each and every one of us which is arguably something far more valuable than money.  Since the beginning of time, humans have looked up to the sky in wide-eyed wonder, asked questions about the great beyond and philosophised about our place in the universe.  With advancing technologies that allow us to image our universe in ways never previously imagined, space cannot fail to stimulate us, regardless of our background.  We are driven to find out what lies beyond our planet because it’s fascinating, the quest for knowledge exciting.  Space research is also undoubtedly a great inspiration for children to study science.

Consequently, if these men are willing to embark on what may well be a rather unpleasant year, but will likely advance our knowledge in ways we may not have even considered yet, I cannot help but support the mission. Let’s embark on closing the boundary between our planet and the rest of the universe.

The talks held in Doha at the end of last year ended in the way that all the climate summits before it have ended – in disappointment. Whilst some think-tanks and talking heads have exclaimed the outcomes of the meeting to be ‘game changing’ in truth they have done little, if anything, to reduce emissions.

I’m not indifferent to the often insurmountable differences that arise when seeking multinational agreement – especially on a topic such as climate change – but the world’s consistently delayed response will cost us dearly.

Past Climate summits seem to allow only for progress that many would describe as glacial – a cutting irony given one of the consequences of the failure to take action is the speeding up of glacial destruction. As climate change diplomacy is slowing, glaciers are actually speeding up – at some point the analogy will have to be reversed with particularly immobile glaciers being described as ‘UN-like’.

Words are vitally important – diplomacy has little else – but after all the vast reams of documentation, and all the tentative accords that climate change summits generate, action must surely follow. And whilst steps have been taken – few would argue they have been numerous or large enough to stop anthropomorphic climate change.

Indeed, it is now entirely possible that by the time a workable, effective way of reducing fossil fuel based emissions is reached – a new energy production paradigm may have taken shape. As for what shape will that be – well there are, of course, a gamut of potential new energy sources but to my mind the most promising surely has to be power generated by nuclear fusion.

But how close are we to manipulating the electromagnetic and nuclear forces that stand in the way of commercial fusion? Well, check out P22/ Solving the Fusion Puzzle and you’ll find out that we are closer than you might think…