New Scientist Australian Edition

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New Scientist Australian Edition

The climate moment • This is a historic opportunity to secure humanity’s future. We must seize it

Three million deaths • As the world passes a grim milestone, Michael Le Page explores the pandemic’s trajectory and the reasons to hope the worst will soon be over

What is the true death toll?

Sputnik V vaccine goes global • Non-Western vaccines are serious players in the global effort against covid-19, but we need more transparent data, reports Graham Lawton

Mix-and-match vaccines for a boost?

Distress after killings • Reports of US police killings harm Black people’s mental health

Electric bicycle balances itself even when turning

First helicopter flight on another planet takes off

Elephant trunk robot has a mind of its own

‘Lost’ coffee plant can resist climate change

Facebook wants to use AI to find drug combos

Is this the earliest alphabet? • Carvings found in clay suggest the alphabet may be 500 years older than we thought

Colour-changing beetle inspires efficient algorithm

Untouched nature was almost as rare 12,000 years ago as it is now

Microwave weapon makes short work of drone swarms

A way to predict the strength of the next Asian monsoon

Will the EU save us from AI dystopia? • The increased use of artificial intelligence risks the rise of algorithmic discrimination, but proposed EU laws aim to help, says Matthew Sparkes

Choosing what we eat can help avert water scarcity

Lonesome life takes toll on wasp’s brain

Billions of T. rex lived and died in dino era

Really brief

New, lighter form of uranium made in lab

Less than 3 per cent of land habitats still in pristine state

Secrets of the sex change dragons

The science of grief • Lockdown is affecting how millions of people grieve. We should be mindful of that when restrictions ease, says Dean Burnett

The curious case of the Renaissance watermelon • Many crops have changed over the years through cultivation, but that doesn’t mean they have become less nutritious, writes James Wong

Your letters

Fire and ice

The great succulent sting • Plant poaching to feed a mysterious black market makes a fascinating documentary, finds Katie Smith-Wong

Building a robofuture • As social robots edge closer, a thoughtful book suggests we would do well to see them as animals, says Vijaysree Venkatraman

Don’t miss

Total exposure • Chaos Walking is set on a planet that human settlers have called New World. But it is an off-kilter place: women have been wiped out and men have been altered so that their thoughts are audible and visible, says Simon Ings

Climate change: NOW or never • “Make or break” is hardly hyperbole for the climate negotiations due to reach their climax in November in Glasgow, UK. At the COP26 meeting, nations will have a last chance to really rev up the stuttering motor of climate action and come good on commitments made in Paris in 2015 to limit global warming to a “safe” level of 1.5°C. The facts aren’t waiting. Global temperature has already risen by more than 1°C. Melting ice caps, rising sea levels and weather extremes from hurricanes to heatwaves are already showing us some of what a warmed world looks like. Meanwhile, the latest...