Towards printable solar cells

New perovskite solar cells have achieved an efficiency of 20.1 per cent and can be manufactured at low temperatures, which reduces the cost and expands the number of possible applications.

Big spenders

Worldwide R&D expenditures and other science and technology indicators by ranked country.

Humans fold

An artificial-intelligence program known as Libratus has beaten the world's absolute best human poker players in a 20-day No-Limit Texas Hold'em tournament.

Energy saver

Material can turn sunlight, heat and movement into electricity ... all at once.

Aid or accusation?

The problem of fake data may go far deeper than scientists admit. Now a team of researchers has a controversial plan to root out the perpetrators

Graphene is good for ...?

£120m down, UK.gov finds it's still a long way from commercial potential. Wonder material, not wonder market

Beans mean graphene

A breakthrough by CSIRO-led scientists has made the world’s strongest material more commercially viable, thanks to the humble soybean.

iPhone 7 propels Apple to record-shattering sales

Apple sold 5.4 million Macs and 78.3 million iPhones in the last three months of 2016.

Honey, I shrunk the AFM!

Researchers at The University of Texas at Dallas have created an atomic force microscope on a chip using MEMS.

Churchill saw great opportunity for exploration in the Solar System

“Are we alone in the Universe?” an essay by a lesser known science writer, Winston Churchill, has just been unearthed.

Big chip spending on R&D

Intel spent $12.7bn on R&D in 2016, 22.4% as a percentage of sales.

Small may be vulnerable

Ever worried about your phone or tablet malfunctioning due to cosmic rays and solar flares? Apparently ‘single-event upsets’ caused by particle impact is a known phenomenon but difficult to characterise in terms of related malfunctions. The semiconductor manufacturers are concerned about this problem potentially getting more serious as the size of the transistors in integrated circuits shrink. Time for a lead lined, concrete case for my laptop?

Small may be dangerous

Further evidence emerged last month on the scale of small plastic particulates in the environment with contamination recorded in tens of thousands of organisms and more than 100 species. As well as the breaking down of larger objects, many cosmetic and cleansing products contain plastic microbeads and clothing releases plastic microfibres during washing. A recent study of mussels and oysters concluded that the average European shellfish consumer has an uptake of 6400 small plastics particles per year.

Agnotology is the study of ...?

Retraction Watch probably has enough to do dealing with the sedater pace of scientific publications without delving into the high speed, social media festooned, world of fake news. Recent electoral events have not only increased the interest in this topic but also introduced agnotology to a wider audience. Agnotology is the study of ignorance or lack of knowledge. A wider definition being the study of culturally induced ignorance or doubt, particularly through the dissemination of inaccurate or misleading information. A topic whose time has come?

As Jonathan Swift so aptly wrote back in 1710: “Besides, as the vilest Writer has his Readers, so the greatest Liar has his Believers; and it often happens, that if a Lie be believed only for an Hour, it has done its Work, and there is no farther occasion for it. Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it; so that when Men come to be undeceived, it is too late; the Jest is over, and the Tale has had its Effect…”

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Nerds and scientists

The image of scientists in The Big Bang Theory.