Are epidemics inevitable? Disease prevention and control in changing landscapes
Mathematics is key to effective strategies for preventing and controlling infectious diseases such as Bluetongue. Mathematical models can now predict the way animal and plant diseases spread, and where and when future outbreaks may occur, for example, as climate changes.
Can worms unlock the secrets of our mind?
A tiny transparent worm that lives in rotting fruit is helping to unravel how the brain works. Caenorhabditis elegans, C. elegans for short, has a nervous system, gut, muscle, and other tissues similar to humans. The worm reaches maturity in a few days, has 300 offspring and is transparent, making it an ideal research tool.
How do sharks and crabs sense depth? Crabs in space and out of their depth
Crabs and sharks are providing useful models for human systems of balance and orientation. Now it is also known they can sense water depth.
Is it natural? The physics of perception
Human beings find it quite easy to distinguish between, natural and synthetic materials so what processes enable us to make this distinction? How do we so easily know wood from vinyl or cotton from nylon? A unique multidisciplinary team of researchers is trying to find the answer, creating what would be the first predictive model of our perception of naturalness.