Fossil find hints at life of one of our earliest mammalian forebears.

A mouse-sized fossil from 125 million years ago is the earliest known member of the mammal group that includes humans, say researchers.

The animal is a primitive example of today’s dominant mammals. “It’s at the very root of this diverse and incredibly important group,” says palaeontologist Zhe-Xi Luo of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh 1 .

The mammal, Eomaia sc

Even a conventional mobile phone user demands more functions and better performance of his mobile phone in the smallest possible space. The mobile phone should also be easy to use, reliable and inexpensive. In order to meet these demands, more data and functions than before must be packed into the circuit boards of mobile phones in the future.

The researchers at the Helsinki University of Technology have met this challenge by developing a new type of production method for electronics, a so-c

Limp lettuce and wilting roses could be a thing of the past, following the identification of a key plant gene by University scientists. The discovery could also improve food shelf life, and help speed up reforestation programmes. Plant scientists Professor Meyer and Dr Elena Zubko have identified the plant gene which produces a specific type of hormones (cytokinins) to counteract ageing, and control shoot production. By enhancing the gene to overproduce cytokinins, they saw dramatic results: a cut pl

Leading international medical experts have visited the University of Kent at Canterbury (UKC) to make final preparations for transferring a revolutionary technology of diagnostic eye examination equipment to Asahikawa Medical College in Japan.

Susumu Oshima and Toshio Murata from Nidek Japan (Nidek is the largest ophthalmic instrument company in Japan) spent four days at UKC with Professor David Jackson, Dr Adrian Podoleanu and Dr John Rogers who have achieved international reputation for

“Formulas from 1948 were being used.”

Monthly evaporation models, important for water management, can be improved by studying the dispersion of rain for each month. This is one of the conclusions in the research project of Marieke de Groen. She will defend her thesis on Monday the 29th of April. De Groen: “The subject was neglected for a long time. The monthly models contained formulas from 1948.”

Our main source of food – the agriculture sector – is very dependant on the we

Thirty years after Apollo 16’s lunar module, Orion, landed at the western edge of the Descartes Mountains on 21 April 1972, there is still much that we don’t know about the Moon. For instance, how was it created? And what role did it play in the formation and evolution of Earth?

We may be closer to answering those, and many other questions, thanks to ESA’s mission to the Moon, known as SMART-1. Due to be launched early in 2003, the main purpose of the SMART-1 mission is to flight-test the n