Australasian Science: Australia's authority on science since 1938
Cover Story
Cover Story
Small Fry
Zakharova_Natalia / iStockphoto
By Anna Kuparinen, Asta Audzijonyte & Elizabeth Fulton
Fish are becoming smaller all over the world as oceans change and catches increase, with even small changes having great consequences for ecosystems and fisheries.
Anna Kuparinen is with the University of Helsinki, and Asta Audzijonyte and Elizabeth Fulton are with CSIRO’s Wealth from Oceans Flagship.
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Sex: Why Does It Have To Be So Complicated?
ltsimage/iStockphoto
By Rob Brooks, Guest Editor
Sex. Three simple letters and a world of complication. How can something so simple, so natural and so very important be so bewilderingly complicated?
Professor Rob Brooks is Director of the Evolution & Ecology Research Centre at the University of New South Wales, and the author of Sex, Genes & Rock 'n' Roll: How Evolution Has Shaped the Modern World (NewSouth). He is Guest Editor of this edition of Australasian Science.
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Hobbit Saga Highlights a Science in Crisis
Homo floresiensis painting by Peter Schouten supplied by the University of Wollongong
By Darren Curnoe
The latest salvo in the ongoing Homo floresiensis battle has placed the science of human evolution in deep conceptual crisis.
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Genomic Testing as a Lifetime Health Resource?
Credit: mrallen/adobe
By Ainsley Newson & David Amor
If lives could be saved by being “forewarned” by a genomic test, should we perform genomic testing of all babies at birth?
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Fertility in the 21st Century
Credit: Clicknique/iStockphoto
By Rebecca Robker & Eileen McLaughlin
Fertility is a diverse field of research that encompasses male and female infertility, pregnancy complications, and environmental and lifestyle influences that can affect the reproductive health not only of future generations but also our native wildlife.
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Survival of the Sexiest
Credit: iordani/Adobe
By Barnaby Dixson & Monica Awasthy
“Survival of the fittest” never applied to beards, so why did they evolve and what role do they play in mate selection in modern society?
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Rock around the Cosmic Clock
Credit: NASA/JPL
By Paul Brook
Astronomers examine pulsar emissions for signs of gravitational waves, but now they believe that an asteroid may have affected the accuracy of one of these “cosmic clocks”.
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Genes that Cuddle in the Cold
By Joshua Mylne
An ingenious experiment has allowed scientists to observe how plant genes move around the nucleus to locations that either stop or stimulate flowering depending on temperature.
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Food Facts & Furphies
More than 50% of Australians are taking some form of vitamins, minerals, complementary or herbal supplements yet the average Australian household spends just $13.70 per week on vegetables and $9.60 on fresh fruit.
By Clare Collins
New diet fads and furphies seem to appear every day. While some of these have a scientific basis, for others the science has changed in response to new discoveries or the science is just not there yet. This special issue of Australasian Science explores the latest evidence for food and nutrition.
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Lies, Damn Lies, and Science
When a component of the numerous 9/11 theories became untenable, it was nevertheless weaved into a larger 9/11 conspiracy. Credit: flickr/ 9/11 photos (CC by 2.0)
By Stephan Lewandowsky, Gilles Gignac & Klaus Oberauer
Conspiratorial thinking is a major element in the rejection of a broad range of scientific findings, from climate change to tobacco, vaccinations, GM foods and the moon landing. But why?
Stephan Lewandowsky is a Winthrop Professor at the University of Western Australia. Gilles Gignac earned his PhD at Swinburne University, and now specialises in statistics and psychometrics. Klaus Oberauer is Professor of Cognitive Psychology at the University of Zurich.
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