In this episode:
Humans are notable for their cooperation and display far more altruistic behaviour than other animals, but exactly why this behaviour evolved has been a puzzle. But in a new paper, the two leading theories have been put the test with a model and a real-life experiment. They find that actually neither theory on its own leads to cooperation but a combination is required for humans to help one another.
Research article: Efferson et al.
News and Views: Why reciprocity is common in humans but rare in other animals
The discovery of an ancient stone wall hidden underwater, and the fun that apes have teasing one another.
Research Highlight: Great ‘Stone Age’ wall discovered in Baltic Sea
Research Highlight: What a tease! Great apes pull hair and poke each other for fun
Optical discs, like CDs and DVDs, are an attractive option for long-term data storage, but these discs are limited by their small capacity. Now though, a team has overcome a limitation of conventional disc writing to produce optical discs capable of storing petabits of data, significantly more than the largest available hard disk. The researchers behind the work think their new discs could one day replace the energy-hungry hard disks used in giant data centres, making long-term storage more sustainable.
Research Article: Zhao et al.
20:10 Briefing ChatThe famous fossil that turned out to be a fraud, and why researchers are making hybrid ‘meat-rice’.
Ars Technica: It’s a fake: Mysterious 280 million-year-old fossil is mostly just black paint
Nature News: Introducing meat–rice: grain with added muscles beefs up protein
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Audio long read: Why loneliness is bad for your health
How gliding marsupials got their 'wings'
Living on Mars would probably suck — here's why
Keys, wallet, phone: the neuroscience behind working memory
The 'ghost roads' driving tropical deforestation
Audio long read: Why are so many young people getting cancer? What the data say
Pregnancy's effect on 'biological' age, polite birds, and the carbon cost of home-grown veg
How climate change is affecting global timekeeping
AI hears hidden X factor in zebra finch love songs
Killer whales have menopause. Now scientists think they know why
These tiny fish combine electric pulses to probe the environment
Could this one-time ‘epigenetic’ treatment control cholesterol?
Audio long read: Chimpanzees are dying from our colds — these scientists are trying to save them
How whales sing without drowning, an anatomical mystery solved
Smoking changes your immune system, even years after quitting
Why we need to rethink how we talk about cancer
Cancer's power harnessed — lymphoma mutations supercharge T cells
Cervical cancer could be eliminated: here's how
Ancient DNA solves the mystery of who made a set of stone tools
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