This week's magazine

Table of contents

Leaders

Physics

Quantum theory at 100: Let’s celebrate its power and provocation

Quantum theory started with a bout of hay fever, and went on to transform our view of the universe – but its legacy isn't complete

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News

Technology

AI-powered chilli spray could deter bears without injuring them

A machine controlled by AI that sprays bears with the chilli pepper chemical capsaicin could reduce dangerous confrontations with people

News

Earth

Earth's upper mantle is revealing the deepest effect of human activity

News

Physics

Space could emerge from time

News

Physics

How to make great coffee with fewer beans, according to science

News

Life

No, the dire wolf has not been brought back from extinction

News

Environment

Trees capture toxic fingerprint of gold mining in the Amazon

News

Health

Blood test suggests preeclampsia risk using RNA

News

Life

Rethink of fossils hints dinosaurs still thrived before asteroid hit

News

Space

How long is a day on Uranus? Slightly longer than we thought, it seems

News

Mind

Electrical synapses genetically engineered in mammals for first time

News

Humans

Archaeologists uncover settlement from golden age of ancient Egypt

News

Health

World's first baby born by IVF done almost entirely by a machine

News

Humans

Denisovan fossil from Taiwan gives clue to mysterious ancient humans

News

Environment

Methane-eating bacteria are ready to capture landfill emissions

News

Life

Dolphins are dying from toxic chemicals banned since the 1980s

News

Life

Great white pelicans take a well-deserved break during migration

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Analysis

Environment

Should we give up on recycling plastic?

Globally, only 14 per cent of the plastic we use is recycled – but some countries achieve higher rates and new technologies could change the picture drastically

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Aperture

Life

Images capture the timeless beauty of America's ancient forests

Photographer Mitch Epstein's years-long project highlights the majesty and vulnerability of old growth forests across the US

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Features

Physics

Could the ancient Greeks have invented quantum theory?

There were hints that the world may be quantum long before the development of quantum mechanics in 1925 – could we have come up with this revolutionary theory hundreds or even thousands of years earlier?

Features

Physics

Where exactly does the quantum world end and concrete reality begin?

Features

Environment

Inside the mouth-watering race to master lab-grown chocolate

Features

Physics

Carlo Rovelli on what we get wrong about the origins of quantum theory

Features

Physics

What exactly would a full-scale quantum computer be useful for?

Features

Physics

What does quantum theory really tell us about the nature of reality?

Features

Physics

A timeline of the most important events in quantum mechanics

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Culture

Technology

Inside the outlandish, futuristic dreams of the tech bros

Exposing the origins of the improbable – and at times scary – plans of tech billionaires makes Adam Becker's More Everything Forever a disturbing but important book

Culture

Mind

Why saying no is so hard and what we can do about it

Culture

Comment

New Scientist recommends David de Jong's Nazi Billionaires

Culture

Comment

Black Mirror returns full of delights and disappointments

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More

Physics

Why I still love reckoning with the quantum gravity problem

General relativity is an astonishingly beautiful theory, and grappling with why it disagrees with quantum mechanics is a joy, says Chanda Prescod-Weinstein

Comment

Mathematics

This versatile piece of maths can help you solve all kinds of problems

Regulars

BrainTwister #69: Backward drops

Regulars

Mind

No need to stop the 'brain rot': Modern kids aren't less intelligent

Comment

Tom Gauld on the science of Easter

Regulars

Twisteddoodles has cracked it!

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Regulars

Comment

It's good to have a word describing why going viral is now meaningless

Feedback was pleased to come across journalist Taylor Lorenz's coining of the word "viralflation", as videos with hundreds of millions of hits proliferate across the internet

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Letters

Regulars

The last word