Today's news

Oxford beats Cambridge to top Times table
Oxford tops the annual Times university league table for the first time today, pipping Cambridge by a mere three points out of 1,000. Cambridge had headed the ranking throughout the league table’s first nine years of publication. Imperial College, London, came third.
(The Times)

Watchdogs to stop future exams fiascos
Troubleshooters will be sent into examination boards to avoid a repeat of the bungles that left thousands of pupils facing unsolvable questions and delayed results last year. New powers will be given to the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority so that it can intervene in the running of a board as soon as it suspects maladministration.
(The Times, The Independent)

Health crisis looms as life expectancy soars
Western governments are drastically underestimating how long their citizens are likely to live, an oversight that threatens to put strains on the health, welfare and pensions systems of the developed world far more serious than previously envisaged, scientists warn today. The scientists, James Vaupel of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany, and Jim Oeppen of Cambridge University’s Group for the History of Population and Social Structure, say in the journal Science that there is every reason to think that life expectancy will go on increasing indefinitely.
(The Guardian, The Times, Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph, The Independent)

No payout for adult learning programme firms
The government has ruled out paying compensation to training companies financially “devastated” by the collapse of its £260 million Individual Learning Accounts scheme.
(Financial Times)

You boys will be the death of me!
Scientists have proved what mothers always knew – having sons takes years off a woman’s life. Each male child shortens the life of his mother by 34 weeks, according to a study led by Samuli Helle of the University of Turku in Finland and reported in Science magazine. However, each daughter increased it by 23 weeks.
(Daily Mail, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Financial Times)

Mothers ‘bulwark against drugs’
Children who have close relationships with their mothers are far less likely to get involved in drug or alcohol abuse, a study claims. But international researchers, led by child psychiatrist Paul McArdle at Newcastle University, also found that good parenting, traditionally regarded as a barrier that can protect youngsters from drug culture, was being undermined in cities where recreational drugs were freely available.
(The Guardian, Daily Telegraph, Daily Mirror)

The pole-dancing girl from William’s campus
She is studying the same subject as Prince William at St Andrew’s University. But second-year Emily Kiefer’s choice of extracurricular activity is a world away from her history of art course… pole dancing.
(Daily Mail)

Death of atomic physicist who played folk banjo
John Hasted, one of Britain’s leading physicists, award-winning banjo player and an unsung hero of the English folksong revival, has died aged 81.
(The Independent)

Leading US archaeologist dies
The leading American archaeologist of the second half of the 20th century, Gordon Willey, has died of heart failure aged 89. He was renowned for his innovative and superbly documented research at numerous Maya sites in Belize, Guatemala and Honduras from the 1950s into the 1970s.
(The Guardian)

Florida anthrax was derived from military strain
Genetic fingerprints of the anthrax used in last year’s terrorist attack in Florida have proved that it was derived from a strain developed for US military research. The first full-genome analysis was performed by the Institute for Genome Research in Rockville, Maryland, US.
(The Times, Financial Times)

How the tyranny of AS levels can stunt academic growth
While the principle of AS levels is admirable, the reality is relentless assessment in the atmosphere of a workhouse.
(Daily Telegraph)

Airbags ‘far less effective’ at saving lives than seat belts
Air bags are far less effective than seat belts at preventing the deaths of motorists in road traffic accidents, according to a study led by Peter Cummings at the School of Public Health and Community Medicine at the University of Washington. The research is published in the British Medical Journal.
(The Independent)

Speech recognition researcher dies
Bill Ainsworth, among the first researchers to work with automatic speech recognition by computers, has died aged 62. His work was also instrumental in the development of cochlear implants.

Report may prompt new mobile phone health fears
Mobile phone shields offer consumers varying protection from potentially harmful radiation, a government-commissioned report will say today.
(Financial Times)

21 university students die in bus crash
A bus full of university students crashed off a country road in south-east Brazil yesterday killing 21 University of Franca students and injuring 21.
(The Independent)

Butterfly’s secret of success
The cabbage white butterfly has become an agricultural pest across North America since its accidental introduction from Europe in the 19th century. Now researcher Thomas Eisner and colleagues at Cornell University have discovered the secret of its success: cabbage white caterpillars make their own insect repellent.
(Financial Times)

Save us from perfection
As science enables us to overcome pain, disability and even stupidity, we are in danger of abolishing human nature, says Francis Fukuyama in his new book.
(The Times)

DVT hits all ages
Nearly half of the air passengers who have died from blood clots after flights were in their 20s, 30s and 40s, a study by the Aviation Health Institute has reported. This suggests doctors may have been wrong to warn that the elderly are most at risk from deep-vein thrombosis.
(Daily Mail, Daily Mirror)

Ice giant crumbles
An Antarctic ice shelf ten times the size of Manhattan has crashed into the sea south of New Zealand, scientists said yesterday.
(Daily Mirror)