freelance science journalist and author
From BBC Future, 10 November 2015: It used to be called ‘Chinese Restaurant Syndrome’: a collection of symptoms such as headache, nausea and a strange numbness that certain people seem to suffer after a meal of Chinese food, which went beyond the usual queasiness and self-loathing at having eaten one too many barbecued pork buns. … Continue reading Is MSG as bad as it’s made out to be?
From ABC Science, 20 November 2015: Even if we all ate the same meal, everyone would metabolise it differently, according to a new study that suggests that there is no such thing as one-size-fits-all dietary advice. Rather diets should be tailored to an individual’s gut microbiome, or combination of gut bacteria, Israeli scientists said. The … Continue reading Diets should be personally tailored to your gut microbiome, study says
From ABC Science, 4 November 2015: Moods, both positive and negative, may actually serve an evolutionary purpose in helping us to have more realistic expectations. Researchers have used mathematical modelling to show that our mood may be a subconscious way for us to keep track of the availability of rewards in our environment, and to … Continue reading Moods may have an evolutionary purpose
Am I a science journalist or a science communicator? It might seem like a pointless question to ask, but as someone whose day-to-day living kinda of revolves around this issue, it’s actually quite important. Contemplating this led me to realise that I actually don’t really know what the point of difference is between a science … Continue reading The demise of science journalism and rise of science communication?
From ABC News in Science, 13 October 2015: The trick to multi-tasking may be training our brain to ‘divide and conquer’ each task separately, Australian researchers have found. In one of the largest studies of its kind, Professor Paul Dux and Dr Kelly Garner from the University of Queensland’s School of Psychology used real-time brain … Continue reading Training the brain to ‘divide and conquer’ may be the secret to multi-tasking
From ABC News in Science, 15 October 2015: Modern humans may have occupied southern China at least 30,000 years earlier than previously thought. Archaeologists have found 47 Homo sapiens teeth closely resembling our own, dated from 80,000-120,000 years old, in a cave in Hunan province, according to a letter published today in Nature. The discovery … Continue reading Ancient teeth point to earliest modern humans in southern China
From ABC News in Science, 23 October 2015: The microbe responsible for the Black Death plagues was infecting Bronze Age humans more than 3,000 years earlier than the pandemics it is most notorious for. Early forms of the bacteria, Yersinia pestis, have been found in Bronze Age human teeth up to 5,000 years old, according … Continue reading Black Death plague pathogen thousands of years older than first thought
From BBC Future, 2 September 2015: Those of us who enjoy the occasional glass of beer or wine would dearly love to believe that we’re doing our bodies a service. Any study suggesting a glass or two a day can keep the doctor away is greeted with disproportionate enthusiasm by the media and general public. … Continue reading Is alcohol actually bad for you?
From ABC Science, 26 August 2015: Apart from being home to the only known forms of life in the universe, our Milky Way galaxy isn’t all that unique. It’s a typical large spiral galaxy, between 100,000 and 180,000 light years wide and containing between 200 billion and 400 billion stars. The Milky Way has four … Continue reading What would the Milky Way galaxy look like from across the universe?
From ABC Science Online, 19 August 2015: It may hurt your brain to think about it, but it seems that the answer is likely to be yes, or at least the numbers are roughly in the same ballpark. Astronomers actually set out to answer this question about a decade ago. It’s a tricky problem to … Continue reading Are there more stars in the universe than grains of sand on Earth?
Bianca Nogrady 