When returning from a swim in the ocean, sometimes it seems as though your towel has moved. Of course, it’s just that the water line has shifted.

The natural rise and fall of the ocean at the beach is an excellent demonstration of gravitational forces exerted by the Sun and the Moon. Although the tidal force is small, it is strong enough to pull regularly on the ocean, making an enormous volume of water rise and fall.

What you might not know is that tidal forces from the Sun and Moon also influence the air we breathe and the solid ground we stand on. These effects are referred to as atmospheric and Earth tides.

While we don’t tend to notice Earth and atmospheric tides, they do affect both the land and the world’s largest freshwater resource located underneath our feet: groundwater. This occupies the pores that exist in geological materials such as sand or soil, much like water in a kitchen sponge.

We have developed a method that incorporates tidal influences to monitor our precious groundwater resources without the need for pumping, drilling or coring.

Water beneath our feet

It has been estimated that groundwater makes up 99% of the usable freshwater on Earth. If all of Earth’s groundwater were extracted and pooled across the world’s land surface, it would be enough to create a lake 180 metres deep.

While this sounds like a lot of water, it is important to remember that not all groundwater is available for use. In fact, groundwater is currently mined on a global scale, especially in drier parts of the world, where groundwater underpins human activities during times of drought.

Groundwater extraction can lead to a downward shift in the land surface level (known as “subsidence”), particularly if groundwater is removed from underground zones that contain soft clays. This is a significant global problem, especially in coastal areas, due to urbanisation and associated water demand.

Alternatively, a long wet period with excess rainfall can cause the groundwater to rise up and cause flooding.

Effect of tides on groundwater

Deeper groundwater buried underneath layers of different types of sediments is under great pressure (in groundwater terminology this is called “confined”). The gravity change from Earth tides squeezes the sediment, and therefore changes the pressure of the water in the pores.

The atmospheric tides add to the weight that is sitting on top of the groundwater and cause a change in stress that results in a downward squeezing.

Groundwater at that depth responds to these stress changes, which can be measured as tiny water level fluctuations inside a groundwater borehole.

We have developed a new approach that exploits these tidal influences to calculate important subsurface properties. For example, this can predict how the pressure is lowered when groundwater is pumped, and by how much the land surface would sink as a result of shrinking subsurface material (just like squeezing a kitchen sponge).

The method basically allows accurate calculation of the compressible subsurface properties from the groundwater response to Earth and atmospheric tides.

This development is significant because it will allow analyses of a subsurface water reservoir (called an aquifer) without human-induced stresses such as pumping or taking physical samples of the material through drilling or coring in addition to constructing a borehole.

All that’s needed for this analysis is a roughly 16-day period of continuous measurements of groundwater levels and atmospheric pressure at hourly intervals.

Groundwater levels are routinely recorded as part of water monitoring programs around the world and in Australia, as funded by the Federal Government groundwater NCRIS scheme. Atmospheric pressure is a standard parameter measured by weather stations, such as operated by the Bureau of Meteorology.

The effects of tidal forces on groundwater might be less apparent to us than their effects on the ocean, but they’re just as important. Our new method of understanding the influence of tides on groundwater significantly reduces the effort to predict the response to groundwater pumping and the potential for land subsidence.

This technique can make passive use of existing boreholes and could be applied to the global archive of groundwater levels to inform more sustainable groundwater resource development in the future.

Tokyo, Moscow, Madrid, London, Brussels, and now St Petersburg. These major cities have all suffered attacks on their metro systems. The most recent events in St Petersburg, where a metro bombing killed at least 14 people, remind us of the challenges faced by underground transport systems in keeping people safe during an emergency. This is where engineering and psychology research can come in useful, helping to optimise evacuation procedures using insight into how people behave.

To start with, there are several key ways that evacuating an underground system differs from evacuating a building. Underground environments are often unfamiliar to the evacuees, especially if the evacuation has to start in the tunnels between stations. The system’s enclosed nature also means visibility can rapidly deteriorate from smoke. Tunnels are generally not divided into separate sections to stop smoke spreading, which allows it to rapidly fill all spaces.

This can cause a number of problems when it comes to evacuating passengers. Evacuation slows down when visibility is poor and people cannot fully rely on what they can see to help them get out. Smoke can also obscure signs and other visual instructions, making it difficult for people to locate the closest emergency exit. For this reason, evacuees often rely on alternative senses such as hearing or touch to find their way to safety. This is why auditory alarms and hand rails can be much more useful.

Another reason these kind of guides and information are needed is because people tend to move towards familiar places or people in an emergency. For example, if someone is looking for a way out of a metro system, they may well try to get back to where they came in. But in many instances, closer emergency exits may be available in the tunnels. These exits often lead to safety in a significantly shorter time.

Similarly, people’s attention can narrow to focus on immediate threats rather than analysing all the information available to them, especially when they are under pressure to escape as quickly as possible. This is where social influence can come in. If one person can find a quicker evacuation route, their interaction with other evacuees can help spread this information and help everyone get out quicker.

St Petersburg aftermath. megapolisonline.ru/EPA

At a more fundamental level, the design of the tunnels and trains can lead to significant safety improvements. Experimental research has shown the effectiveness of an evacuation from a metro train depends on the configuration of the train door and the space available after getting out of it. This can include the presence of a height gap between the train doors and the outside floor and narrow spaces for evacuation in the tunnels.

The height gap in particular, which can be up to 1.4 metres, can be a major obstacle during evacuation, slowing down the flow of people out of the train. It may also mean that some evacuees, particularly children and older people, may not be able to evacuate on their own. This height difference can make it even more important that the driver manages to get the train to a station, as the driver in the St Petersburg attack did – despite the fact the bomb went off inside a tunnel. This likely led to a quicker evacuation and less severe consequences.

It’s worth also considering that people are often a lot more rational than you might think in a disaster. Media reports often use the ambiguous word “panic”, suggesting irrational and competitive (anti-social) behaviour. But investigations of disasters have demonstrated that people actually tend to act rationally and in a non-competitive way.

In fact, people often tend to help each other in emergencies, including during metro train evacuations. For example, footage from the St Petersburg bombing shows people trying to help others get out of the attacked trains, and similar altruistic behaviours have been observed in several other disasters. So whatever preparations metro authorities make for disasters, they can consider their passengers to be part of their solution. They need to design the tunnel environment for the people, not the people for the environment.

Statistics is a useful tool for understanding the patterns in the world around us. But our intuition often lets us down when it comes to interpreting those patterns. In this series we look at some of the common mistakes we make and how to avoid them when thinking about statistics, probability and risk.

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You don’t have to wait long to see a headline proclaiming that some food or behaviour is associated with either an increased or a decreased health risk, or often both. How can it be that seemingly rigorous scientific studies can produce opposite conclusions?

Nowadays, researchers can access a wealth of software packages that can readily analyse data and output the results of complex statistical tests. While these are powerful resources, they also open the door to people without a full statistical understanding to misunderstand some of the subtleties within a dataset and to draw wildly incorrect conclusions.

Here are a few common statistical fallacies and paradoxes and how they can lead to results that are counterintuitive and, in many cases, simply wrong.

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Simpson’s paradox

What is it?

This is where trends that appear within different groups disappear when data for those groups are combined. When this happens, the overall trend might even appear to be the opposite of the trends in each group.

One example of this paradox is where a treatment can be detrimental in all groups of patients, yet can appear beneficial overall once the groups are combined.

How does it happen?

This can happen when the sizes of the groups are uneven. A trial with careless (or unscrupulous) selection of the numbers of patients could conclude that a harmful treatment appears beneficial.

Example

Consider the following double blind trial of a proposed medical treatment. A group of 120 patients (split into subgroups of sizes 10, 20, 30 and 60) receive the treatment, and 120 patients (split into subgroups of corresponding sizes 60, 30, 20 and 10) receive no treatment.

The overall results make it look like the treatment was beneficial to patients, with a higher recovery rate for patients with the treatment than for those without it.

The Conversation, CC BY-ND

However, when you drill down into the various groups that made up the cohort in the study, you see in all groups of patients, the recovery rate was 50% higher for patients who had no treatment.

The Conversation, CC BY-ND

But note that the size and age distribution of each group is different between those who took the treatment and those who didn’t. This is what distorts the numbers. In this case, the treatment group is disproportionately stacked with children, whose recovery rates are typically higher, with or without treatment.

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Base rate fallacy

What is it?

This fallacy occurs when we disregard important information when making a judgement on how likely something is.

If, for example, we hear that someone loves music, we might think it’s more likely they’re a professional musician than an accountant. However, there are many more accountants than there are professional musicians. Here we have neglected that the base rate for the number of accountants is far higher than the number of musicians, so we were unduly swayed by the information that the person likes music.

How does it happen?

The base rate fallacy occurs when the base rate for one option is substantially higher than for another.

Example

Consider testing for a rare medical condition, such as one that affects only 4% (1 in 25) of a population.

Let’s say there is a test for the condition, but it’s not perfect. If someone has the condition, the test will correctly identify them as being ill around 92% of the time. If someone doesn’t have the condition, the test will correctly identify them as being healthy 75% of the time.

So if we test a group of people, and find that over a quarter of them are diagnosed as being ill, we might expect that most of these people really do have the condition. But we’d be wrong.

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In a typical sample of 300 patients, for every 11 people correctly identified as unwell, a further 72 are incorrectly identified as unwell. The Conversation, CC BY-ND

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According to our numbers above, of the 4% of patients who are ill, almost 92% will be correctly diagnosed as ill (that is, about 3.67% of the overall population). But of the 96% of patients who are not ill, 25% will be incorrectly diagnosed as ill (that’s 24% of the overall population).

What this means is that of the approximately 27.67% of the population who are diagnosed as ill, only around 3.67% actually are. So of the people who were diagnosed as ill, only around 13% (that is, 3.67%/27.67%) actually are unwell.

Worryingly, when a famous study asked general practitioners to perform a similar calculation to inform patients of the correct risks associated with mammogram results, just 15% of them did so correctly.

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Will Rogers paradox

What is it?

This occurs when moving something from one group to another raises the average of both groups, even though no values actually increase.

The name comes from the American comedian Will Rogers, who joked that “when the Okies left Oklahoma and moved to California, they raised the average intelligence in both states”.

Former New Zealand Prime Minister Rob Muldoon provided a local variant on the joke in the 1980s, regarding migration from his nation into Australia.

How does it happen?

When a datapoint is reclassified from one group to another, if the point is below the average of the group it is leaving, but above the average of the one it is joining, both groups’ averages will increase.

Example

Consider the case of six patients whose life expectancies (in years) have been assessed as being 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 and 90.

The patients who have life expectancies of 40 and 50 have been diagnosed with a medical condition; the other four have not. This gives an average life expectancy within diagnosed patients of 45 years and within non-diagnosed patients of 75 years.

If an improved diagnostic tool is developed that detects the condition in the patient with the 60-year life expectancy, then the average within both groups rises by 5 years.

The Conversation, CC BY-ND

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Berkson’s paradox

What is it?

Berkson’s paradox can make it look like there’s an association between two independent variables when there isn’t one.

How does it happen?

This happens when we have a set with two independent variables, which means they should be entirely unrelated. But if we only look at a subset of the whole population, it can look like there is a negative trend between the two variables.

This can occur when the subset is not an unbiased sample of the whole population. It has been frequently cited in medical statistics. For example, if patients only present at a clinic with disease A, disease B or both, then even if the two diseases are independent, a negative association between them may be observed.

Example

Consider the case of a school that recruits students based on both academic and sporting ability. Assume that these two skills are totally independent of each other. That is, in the whole population, an excellent sportsperson is just as likely to be strong or weak academically as is someone who’s poor at sport.

If the school admits only students who are excellent academically, excellent at sport or excellent at both, then within this group it would appear that sporting ability is negatively correlated with academic ability.

To illustrate, assume that every potential student is ranked on both academic and sporting ability from 1 to 10. There are an equal proportion of people in each band for each skill. Knowing a person’s band in either skill does not tell you anything about their likely band in the other.

Assume now that the school only admits students who are at band 9 or 10 in at least one of the skills.

If we look at the whole population, the average academic rank of the weakest sportsperson and the best sportsperson are both equal (5.5).

However, within the set of admitted students, the average academic rank of the elite sportsperson is still that of the whole population (5.5), but the average academic rank of the weakest sportsperson is 9.5, wrongly implying a negative correlation between the two abilities.

The Conversation, CC BY-ND

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Multiple comparisons fallacy

What is it?

This is where unexpected trends can occur through random chance alone in a data set with a large number of variables.

How does it happen?

When looking at many variables and mining for trends, it is easy to overlook how many possible trends you are testing. For example, with 1,000 variables, there are almost half a million (1,000×999/2) potential pairs of variables that might appear correlated by pure chance alone.

While each pair is extremely unlikely to look dependent, the chances are that from the half million pairs, quite a few will look dependent.

Example

The Birthday paradox is a classic example of the multiple comparisons fallacy.

In a group of 23 people (assuming each of their birthdays is an independently chosen day of the year with all days equally likely), it is more likely than not that at least two of the group have the same birthday.

People often disbelieve this, recalling that it is rare that they meet someone who shares their own birthday. If you just pick two people, the chance they share a birthday is, of course, low (roughly 1 in 365, which is less than 0.3%).

However, with 23 people there are 253 (23×22/2) pairs of people who might have a common birthday. So by looking across the whole group you are testing to see if any one of these 253 pairings, each of which independently has a 0.3% chance of coinciding, does indeed match. These many possibilities of a pair actually make it statistically very likely for coincidental matches to arise.

For a group of as few as 40 people, it is almost nine times as likely that there is a shared birthday than not.

The probability of no shared birthdays drops as the number of people in a group increases. The Conversation, CC BY-ND

It was Apicius, the Roman gourmand, who came up with the line that “the first taste is with the eyes”. The latest research from the emerging field of gastrophysics shows that he was absolutely right. Our brains evolved to help us find food – and making food look more visually appealing can prime expectations and therefore enhance the taste.

It isn’t just the sight of the food, though – you should see, hear, smell and touch food as well if you are going to make enough of a meal of a dining experience. Here are a few ways in which our senses can conspire to make food more of an experience.

Heston Blumenthal’s Sounds of the Sea seafood dish. Sergio Coimbra, CC BY

Think about the plate

Research shows that we rate food as tasting different depending on the colour of the crockery on which it is served. We conducted an experiment at Ferran Adria’s Alicia Foundation just outside Barcelona a few years ago in which we demonstrated that people would rate a pinkish strawberry mousse as tasting 7% sweeter, 13% more flavourful and 9% more enjoyable when it was served it on a white plate rather than a black plate. Meanwhile, others have demonstrated that we will eat less junk food if it is served from a red plate than from a plate of any other colour.

But it isn’t just the colour of the plate that affects our food behaviour and flavour perception; it is also the shape. Several studies have shown that people rate food as tasting sweeter if it’s served off a round plate than a more angular plate. So, for anyone with a sweet tooth, the recommendation from the gastrophysics lab is that you should save the angular black slate for the cheese.

Think about the cutlery

In order to get the food from the plate to our mouths, most of us use cutlery. But just how much thought have any of us given to the cold smooth hard metal that we put in our mouths several times every day? The latest gastrophysics research shows that food tastes better – and we are willing to pay more for it – if we eat with heavier cutlery. Adding texture to the handle or spoon of the cutlery can also make for a more enjoyable, more stimulating, and definitely a more memorable tasting experience.

It’s results such as these, collected from both the science lab and also from the comments of real diners in restaurants, that help explain the why Heston Blumenthal gave diners a heavy furry-handled spoon to eat the last course of “Counting Sheep” at his Fat Duck restaurant in Bray.

Comfort cutlery? The furry spoon designed to eat Heston Blumenthal’s food. Author provided

It is amazing to see all the new cutlery designs that are being developed. But some chefs in top restaurants – such as the two Michelin-starred Mugaritz in San Sebastian, Spain, and at the Chef’s Table by Kitchen Theory in London – are going even further and putting out dishes that are specifically designed to be eaten with the hands.

Think about the music

Sound really is the forgotten flavour sense. Enhance the sound of the crunch and people think that crisps taste crisper and fresher. This is the groundbreaking research that got us the IG Nobel Prize for Nutrition back in 2008. However, beyond the sound of the food itself, have you ever wondered why crisps so often come in noisy packets? It turns out that that too is part of “the experience”. Noisier crisp packets also make foods appear crisper – as we showed in research with Heston that was reported in 2011.

However, one of the most intriguing ways in which what we hear affects what we taste relates to the emerging field of sonic seasoning. For it turns out that playing tinkling high-pitched music brings out the sweetness in food and drink, while low-pitched brassy music accentuates bitterness instead. We have now identified the kinds of music that will bring out sourness, spiciness, and even accentuate the creaminess of a chocolate.

It may seem crazy, but the business world really is starting to sit up and listen. For instance, British Airways launched a “sound bite” menu, long-haul meals with matching musical accompaniment back in 2014. Meanwhile, a café in Vietnam just opened playing lots of sweet music to help people reduce their sugar intake.

Think about the lighting

You should also think about the lighting when you eat. Research from the US shows that people who like “strong coffee” drink more of the stuff under bright lighting, while increasing the brightness of the lighting can also nudge people toward ordering spicier chicken wings. In our own research, testing more than 3,000 people, we showed that we could enhance the fruitiness of a red wine (served in a black tasting glass) by around 15% simply by putting on some red lights, rather than regular white, or green lighting instead. Adding some of that sweet music in the background made the effects even more pronounced.

Put all the research together – and you can read about this in my recent book – and what some have been tempted to call “off-the-plate” dining can, I firmly believe, help us all to create more enjoyable, tastier, healthier, and more memorable meals.

It was Apicius, the Roman gourmand, who came up with the line that “the first taste is with the eyes”. The latest research from the emerging field of gastrophysics shows that he was absolutely right. Our brains evolved to help us find food – and making food look more visually appealing can set better expectation and so enhance the taste.

It isn’t just the sight of the food, though – you should see, hear, smell and touch food as well if you are going to make enough of a meal of a dining experience. Here are a few ways in which our senses can conspire to make food more of an experience.

Heston Blumenthal’s Sounds of the Sea seafood dish. Sergio Coimbra, CC BY

Think about the plate

Research shows that we rate food as tasting different depending on the colour of the crockery on which it is served. We conducted an experiment at Ferran Adria’s Alicia Foundation just outside Barcelona a few years ago in which we demonstrated that people would rate a pinkish strawberry mousse as tasting 7% sweeter, 13% more flavourful and 9% more enjoyable when it was served it on a white plate rather than a black plate. Meanwhile, others have demonstrated that we will eat less junk food if it is served from a red plate than from a plate of any other colour.

But it isn’t just the colour of the plate that affects our food behaviour and flavour perception; it is also the shape. Several studies have shown that people rate food as tasting sweeter if it’s served off a round plate than a more angular plate. So, for anyone with a sweet tooth, the recommendation from the gastrophysics lab is that you should save the angular black slate for the cheese.

Think about the cutlery

In order to get the food from the plate to our mouths, most of us use cutlery. But just how much thought have any of us given to the cold smooth hard metal that we put in our mouths several times every day? The latest gastrophysics research shows that food tastes better – and we are willing to pay more for it – if we eat with heavier cutlery. Adding texture to the handle or spoon of the cutlery can also make for a more enjoyable, more stimulating, and definitely a more memorable tasting experience.

It’s results such as these, collected from both the science lab and also from the comments of real diners in restaurants, that help explain the why Heston Blumenthal gave diners a heavy furry-handled spoon to eat the last course of “Counting Sheep” at his Fat Duck restaurant in Bray.

Comfort cutlery? The furry spoon designed to eat Heston Blumenthal’s food. Author provided

It is amazing to see all the new cutlery designs that are being developed. But some chefs in top restaurants – such as the two Michelin-starred Mugaritz in San Sebastian, Spain, and at the Chef’s Table by Kitchen Theory in London – are going even further and putting out dishes that are specifically designed to be eaten with the hands.

Think about the music

Sound really is the forgotten flavour sense. Enhance the sound of the crunch and people think that crisps taste crisper and fresher. This is the groundbreaking research that got us the IG Nobel Prize for Nutrition back in 2008. However, beyond the sound of the food itself, have you ever wondered why crisps so often come in noisy packets? It turns out that that too is part of “the experience”. Noisier crisp packets also make foods appear crisper – as we showed in research with Heston that was reported in 2011.

However, one of the most intriguing ways in which what we hear affects what we taste relates to the emerging field of sonic seasoning. For it turns out that playing tinkling high-pitched music brings out the sweetness in food and drink, while low-pitched brassy music accentuates bitterness instead. We have now identified the kinds of music that will bring out sourness, spiciness, and even accentuate the creaminess of a chocolate.

It may seem crazy, but the business world really is starting to sit up and listen. For instance, British Airways launched a “sound bite” menu, long-haul meals with matching musical accompaniment back in 2014. Meanwhile, a café in Vietnam just opened playing lots of sweet music to help people reduce their sugar intake.

Think about the lighting

You should also think about the lighting when you eat. Research from the US shows that people who like “strong coffee” drink more of the stuff under bright lighting, while increasing the brightness of the lighting can also nudge people toward ordering spicier chicken wings. In our own research, testing more than 3,000 people, we showed that we could enhance the fruitiness of a red wine (served in a black tasting glass) by around 15% simply by putting on some red lights, rather than regular white, or green lighting instead. Adding some of that sweet music in the background made the effects even more pronounced.

Put all the research together – and you can read about this in my recent book – and what some have been tempted to call “off-the-plate” dining can, I firmly believe, help us all to create more enjoyable, tastier, healthier, and more memorable meals.

As Brexit looms, Earth scientists have uncovered evidence of Britain’s original split from mainland Europe. Almost half a million years ago, according to new data, water suddenly started cascading over the narrow strip of land that joined England and France – putting pressure on a chalk bridge.

Researchers show that, as a result, this ridge – a natural dam that separated the North Sea from the English Channel – was catastrophically ruptured hundreds of thousands of years later in a two-stage process, ultimately setting Britain’s insular environment in stone. Their results are reported in Nature Communications.

So where did all the water that caused this geological disaster come from? The scientists, from UK, Belgium and France, base their conclusions on a line of deep plunge pools (basins excavated by intense waterfalls) and a network of channels cut in the sea floor south-west of the ridge line. They deduce that these were first formed some 450,000 years ago as a lake of glacial melt water to the north-east in the North Sea basin (the depression where the north sea sits today, some of which was dry land back then) spilled over into what is today the English Channel.

Strait of Dover map. wikipedia, CC BY-SA

However, exactly why the glacial lake suddenly spilt over remains unknown. One possibility is that part of its ice sheet broke off, causing a surge that prompted the water to flow over. The 33km long land bridge at Dover Strait formed part of an icy landscape at the time. According to the researchers, it looked “more like the frozen tundra in Siberia than the green environment we know today”.

3D view of the seafloor in the 33km wide Dover Strait showing a prominent valley in the central part. Imperial College London/Professor Sanjeev Gupta and Dr Jenny Collier

The loose gravel that fills the seafloor plunge pools was first noticed 50 years ago. Indeed, the channel tunnel had to be rerouted to avoid them during its construction. There has long been speculation that they were associated with the remains of the land bridge that formed an ancient route between UK and Europe – and now we finally have some evidence to back this up.

The plunge pools themselves are huge, drilling down some 100 metres into the solid bedrock and measuring several kilometres across. The waterfalls that formed them are estimated to have been 100 metres high, as we know the land bridge stood high above the surrounding landscape.

Second sudden destruction

It seems Dover Strait may have gone through two breaches. The first one, about 450,000 years ago, was rather modest and formed a smaller channel than the one we see today. But the authors suggest that a second, more catastrophic breach subsequently occurred – possibly hundreds of thousands of year later, irrevocably separating Britain from Europe.

3D view of an ancient large waterfall in a valley in the central part of Dover Strait. A plunge pool lies at its base. Imperial College London/Professor Sanjeev Gupta and Dr Jenny Collier

This final collapse of the land bridge is marked out by a larger seafloor channel named the Lobourg Channel, which cuts through the earlier structures. This appears to have been carved by a major cataclysmic flood from the North Sea into the English Channel. The timings of the two-stage erosion, including the final destruction of the connecting bridge, are uncertain, but mollusc shells found either side of the breach indicate that it was complete at least 100,000 years ago.

The latest observations are the result of a broad marine geophysics campaign to tackle the problem. Ship-based seismic surveys of the floor of the English Channel have been combined with a type of sonar to provide an astoundingly detailed picture of the sea floor and its sub-surface. Uncertainty remains over the exact timings of each of the events, and researchers have set their sights on drilling into the sea floor to retrieve samples from the plunge pool sediments to determine their precise ages.

The erosion of the land bridge hundreds of thousands of years ago set Britain on its path to becoming an island nation. Subsequent changes in sea level at the end of that ancient ice age further confirmed its insularity, and Britain’s connection to mainland Europe was lost.

Exactly when did human beings start tipping their weapons with poison to hunt prey? This is a question at the forefront of recent archaeological research.

In southern Africa San (or Bushman) hunter-gatherer groups, such as the /Xam of the Western Cape and the Ju/wasi and Hei//om of Namibia, used poisoned arrows for hunting during the 19th and 20th centuries. The origins of this technology, though, may be far older than we thought.

Recently, traces of the poison ricin were found on a 24 000 year-old wooden poison applicator at Border Cave in South Africa’s Lebombo mountains. If this identification is correct it would mean that people in southern Africa were among the first in the world to harness the potential of plant-based poisons.

South Africa has provided plenty of evidence of behaviours that could be attributed to cognitively complex Homo sapiens. This includes early evidence of hafted projectile technology, the selection of aromatic plants for bedding materials), and the use of ochre as an insect repellent.

The early use of poison is one more indicator of an advanced repertoire of behavioural and technological traits that have characterised our species from the earliest times. The problem is that it’s not easy to identify the remnants of ancient poisons. Organic molecules, including those that make up different poisons, degrade over time and seldom resemble their parent compound. For this reason it is often very difficult to accurately identify ancient organic residues.

Now a team of archaeologists and organic chemists from the Universities of the Witwatersrand, Pretoria and Johannesburg has published details of a method that can – with reasonable accuracy – identify plant-based toxins and other unique chemical markers present on archaeological artefacts .

This may allow scientists to infer the presence of toxic plant ingredients applied to ancient weapons. It adds to our growing appreciation of the full complexity of early human populations – in southern Africa as well as in the world.

Testing the method

Anyone who’s watched BBC nature documentaries will recall scenes of small groups of Bushman hunting antelope with their delicate little bows and arrows. This flimsy equipment was able to bring down large game because of poison.

The most well known source of arrow poison in southern Africa is a beetle larva known as Diamphidia. The Diamphidia grub is still used today by traditional hunters living in the Kalahari. The grub is eviscerated between the hunter’s fingers and its entrails applied directly to an arrowhead’s base. The poison, known as diamphotoxin, can bring down a fully-grown giraffe.

But historical records indicate that many other, different plant ingredients were used. The particular ingredients and recipes used to make arrow poison differed between groups and locations.

A recent archaeological discovery at Border Cave (on South Africa’s border with Swaziland), revealed trace amounts of a substance still adhering to a 24 000 year-old wooden poison applicator. This substance was identified as by-products of the poison ricin. Ricin is produced by the castor bean plant, from which castor oil originates. This discovery, though not without its detractors, sparked renewed interest in identifying poison ingredients on archaeological artefacts in various parts of the world.

This is where our research comes in.

Our paper presented the results of a pilot study designed to accurately detect minute amounts of organic compounds from poisonous plants found on archaeological artefacts. We used an analytical technique known as ultra performance liquid chromatography – mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS) – to characterise the organic compounds present in 11 species of poisonous plant found in southern Africa.

To test the reliability of our detection technique and our ability to accurately identify the most likely plant source of identified compounds, we conducted a blind test. Three plant extracts were prepared following a known poison recipe and applied to a modern arrowhead. The plants used in this recipe were known to only one of the authors. Once the poison coating on the arrowhead had dried, a small amount was scraped off and analysed using UPLC-MS.

We were able to identify two of the three plants used in the poison recipe; identification of the third, belonging to the euphorbia taxa, was not definitive.

Finally, a 90-year-old poisoned arrowhead from Namibia was analysed following the same protocol. The results showed that our method can be used tentatively to identify toxins based on comparative overlays with fresh plant material. Furthermore, the method is able to identify non-toxic compounds that may be unique to specific species of plants. This means the plant in question could be identified even in the absence of known toxins.

Opening new doors

Our study’s importance lies in the ability to recognise organic components of ancient plant-based poisons that may be hundreds – or even thousands – of years old. This is particularly impressive in instances where several ingredients were mixed together to prepare an arrow poison and where only minute amounts of this poison survive on the implement.

No historical information exists on the variety of plants used (nor, indeed, the recipes) for arrow poisons in the eastern half of southern Africa. Also, apart from the single discovery at Border Cave, we have no idea when people started using poisons to assist in hunting. Hopefully this new method can help to address both of these issues and build on existing scholarship of Africa’s indigenous knowledge systems.

The Conversation Global’s series, Politics in the Age of Social Media, examines how governments around the world rely on digital tools to exercise power.

Latin American democracy was born with an original sin: income inequality – the highest in the world. Thus it was that the region’s democratic institutions originated in a context of severe social exclusion and poverty.

The US-style Madisonian model of democracy implemented across the region as its prevailing dictatorships ended in the 1980s – characterised by general elections, separation of powers, built-in checks and balances and civil control of the armed forces – did not match most Latin American nations’ cultural identities.

That disconnect left significant gaps in governments’ ability to connect with and serve their people. Though democracy in Latin America is young, these fundamental structural problems have remained unsolved for 30 years, and they partially explain the region’s numerous current socio-political crises, from Brazil and Venezuela to Mexico.

In response, Latin American presidents are inventing new ways to exercise leadership – namely, via social media. By 2014, the region had the world’s highest use of social media use by politicians.

The late Hugo Chávez was an early adopter of Twitter, launching an account in 2010 to combat online opponents. Jorge Silva/Reuters

Fill the vacuum (and the airwaves)

In the crowded Twittersphere, the presidents of Venezuela and Ecuador are standouts – both for their large followings and continuous activity.

Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro, for instance, has over three million followers. His account exhibits his entire presidential platform, daily commitments, and “personal” relationships with constituents, from messages railing against the Organisation of American States to the unveiling of public works.

Ecuador’s Rafael Correa, who in 2014 was the third-most prolific politician on Twitter (after the leaders of Uganda and Rwanda), has a similarly broad audience. Currently, his account is full of opinions on the country’s current presidential election. But an episode of the podcast Radio Ambulante recounts how Correa once trolled an Ecuadorian citizen on Twitter after he posted a critical Facebook comment.

Both Maduro and Correa frequently appear on television reading the tweets they’ve received, mentioning by name – for better or for worse – those who’ve sent them messages. The citizen, who is now also the spectator, in turn feels he has been served, made part of the political game, become visible.

Twitter is not only the purview of the political Left. Conservative former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe used social media while in office, as does the country’s current president, Juan Manuel Santos.

Argentina’s Mauricio Macri is a Snapchat fan; it forms part of his official communications strategy).

The president of Venezuela, trolling a Twitter troll on television.

A governance crisis

Politics is not just about running the government, it’s also about creating opportunities for citizens to realise their aspirations. Because Latin American democracy was, in most cases, rolled out without a robust consultative process, decent education system or a plan to address structural poverty, it’s systematically exclusionary.

The silenced voices of the rural poor, indigenous communities, women and those unable to read, were not heard or considered when creating and implementing public policies. As a result, governments today struggle to respond to the demands of many social sectors.

There are two ways to fill this gap. The first is suppression via the use of force. Though this is fairly common in Latin America, as an official policy it undermines state legitimacy.

The other option is to create new mechanisms for state-society relations. Latin American leaders, then, are using social media to engage with the electorate because their democratic institutions – fragile and insufficient – are not able to effectively receive, process and address citizen demands.

This direct communication redefines the governor-governed relationship, creating an imagined social interaction in which the political leader is “bound” to his subject by virtue of recognising a tweet. With Twitter, the ordinary person may believe that she has sent a message directly to a person in power, informing them of something they did not know. She may feel less anonymous, more emboldened and capable of navigating the complexities of government bureaucracy.

But Twitter engagement is not (re)constructing republic-style citizenship in Latin America. Rather, it is building an artificial relationship derived from the notion that power dynamics between citizens and politicians have been eliminated.

Direct digital interlocution with a president creates what Polish sociologist and philosopher Zygmunt Bauman would call a false sense of community.

Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s president, greets fans (citizens) before his regular radio show, ‘In Contact with Maduro’. Reuters

This process also implies clientelism, turning presidents into patrons and citizens into clients. Most Tweets and Facebook messages to Latin American leaders are petitions or requests – people asking the all-powerful leader to fix problems with public services or provide financial assistance.

Perverse mechanisms, broken system

The problem is that the way this works undermines the legitimate mechanisms of government. Making the masses dependent on digital communication with a specific leader leaves existing institutional dynamics and control mechanisms entirely out of the process.

When a crime is reported to the president, what role have the courts? When the president learns that a sewer is leaking, who tells the municipal government? The internet enables dialogue and personalises discourse, but it does not in itself have the capacity to resolve people’s problems.

Social media as a political mechanism also carries other risks for governance. The excess of information transiting on social media and the difficulty of verifying its validity can distort public opinion and, according to research, negatively affect the ability of decision-makers to assess challenges.

We must also consider that decision makers (like many of us) tend to hear what they want to and ignore the rest. So beyond their administration’s principle concerns, leaders may be interested in how many people follow them, but not necessarily in fixing what ails their followers.

Hence, Maduro can seemingly overlook the fact that thousands of Venezuelans are fleeing the country. At the end of the day, his virtual audience remains intact and his TV show still beams out to millions of viewers every Sunday.

Latin America’s #Twitterpoliticking trend might be an entertaining curiosity if it didn’t so clearly reveal the fundamental weakness of the region’s democracies. This failing stems from political systems founded on inequality, social exclusion, illiteracy and elitism. And it’s not something social media can fix.

As I write this on-site at the Australian Astronomical Observatory, home for the next three nights to the BBC/ABC Stargazing Live show, I’m struck by the number of scientists working hard to explain their science to the nation. They’re taking significant time away from their research, sitting in freezing conditions and working incredibly hard to make the science understandable.

Why? Because it matters.

Science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) are undoubtedly key skill sets for jobs of the future, although the oft-quoted statistic that 75% of the fastest growing occupations rely on these skills needs further research to verify (the citation trail ultimately links to a 2007 US Dept of Education study that doesn’t even mention this).

Yet what is undeniable is that STEM enrolment rates in Australian schools continue to decline, with 50% of NSW high school certificate graduating with no science from school at all. In terms of achievement on international metrics, Australia has stagnated over the past two decades.

Regardless of the job numbers, we need STEM-aware citizens to be able to make informed decisions in a world where science and technology present great challenges and opportunities.

Trying to arrest decline in STEM literacy will take efforts in the education sector, both at school and university, but also as a society. Changing millions of minds requires traditional outreach as well as social media efforts on an epic scale. That’s why shows like Stargazing Live, Todd Sampson’s Life on the Line, and – for those podcasters out there – Cosmic Vertigo, are so important. They make STEM cool.

Science explained differently. Shows like Todd Sampson’s ‘Life on the Line’ help make STEM cool by exploring science and the fundamental laws of physics in an experiential manner.

Making science accessible, and approachable, is also fundamental to the success of that science. Publicly funded research has to let the boss – that is, the taxpayer – see what’s being done with those funds.

Furthermore, the public should know what the latest research has to say on mass coral bleaching, the threats to public health from avoiding vaccination and of course the dangers but also benefits of genetically modifying crops. Research that isn’t immediately applicable to our lives can, through the shear beauty and inspiration of say exploring the cosmos, certainly enrich it.

Minds aren’t changed overnight, even over three nights with Stargazing, but taking science out of the lab and into the mainstream is something worth tuning in for.

The idea of a new planet, the so-called Planet 9, has captured the attention of scientists and the public alike. Likewise, the debate about Pluto’s planetary status inspires support of its new-found “dwarf planet” title in some, but the passionate voices of hearty displeasure in its demotion by others.

The essence of both these topics presents scientists with a unique opportunity – to understand a fundamental, scientific aspect of our Solar System while at the same engaging with a very willing public, eager to understand and contribute.

The possible existence of Planet 9 takes us to the far edges of the Solar System, way beyond the orbit of Neptune to a region known as the Kuiper belt. And citizen scientists can go there too, by joining the Planet 9 search and Stargazing Live.

Why we think Planet 9 exists

Pluto was kicked out of the planet club because it failed one of the definitions of a planet – it had not cleared its path around the Sun. In other words, Pluto is not its own boss.

However, Pluto is not the only dwarf planet – four other confirmed dwarf planets exist, along with multiple candidate and potential dwarf planets, including the notorious Eris, aka “Pluto Killer”. These all lurk in the outer edges of our Solar System, and have been discovered in recent times.

The location and movement of dwarf planets in the Kuiper belt cannot be explained by the objects we know in our Solar System – there must be something else we have not seen. This is where the idea of Planet 9 began, in 2014.

Most of the known Kuiper belt objects tend to lie on one side of the Solar System with orbit at an incline to the plane of our Solar System (where the planets lie). Scientists have theorised that a source of gravity exists, causing this inclined orbit phenomenon – Planet 9. Even new discoveries, objects discovered after the prediction of Planet 9 such as 2015 RR245, also seem to fit within the proposed existence of Planet 9.

The search for Planet 9

Still in 2017, we know very little about Planet 9.

In order for Planet 9 to affect the dynamics of the Kuiper Belt, it must exert enough gravitational influence over these objects. This implies either a small object close in the Solar System, or a more massive object further out. This range of possible existence means it can be anything from an object ten times the mass and four times the radius of Earth, to a “Super-Earth” – objects we regularly find around other star systems.

A comparison of Earth to a Super-Earth, one of the options for Planet 9. NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (SSC)

The chance to do something no human has done in more than 150 years – discover a new planet – has captured the enthusiasm of astronomers across the world. Since the clear prediction of Planet 9 was first made in 2016, a massive effort has been undertaken to find (or refine) where and what Planet 9 may be.

Astronomers are able to predict the sorts of physical measurements Planet 9 would have. For example, it is proposed to be far out, between 300 and 900AU (300-900 times the distance the Earth is from the Sun), and to appear to be 100-1,000 times fainter in an image than Pluto.

Modern astronomy has been revolutionised by all-sky surveys, such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS). These surveys digitally cover the sky, cataloguing billions of objects that astronomers can use for their science.

These surveys means that the sky has been searched in great detail before the Planet 9 prediction. However, one fatal flaw exists – the lack of coverage in the Southern Hemisphere.

SkyMapper – The Southern Sky Survey

SkyMapper is a 1.35 metre telescope based at the Australian National University’s Siding Spring Observatory, and is being used to conduct the first digital survey of the entire southern sky – the same sky that has not been combed over for Planet 9.

SkyMapper was designed to fill this void, starting the Southern Sky Survey in 2013. However, it was built with a feature that makes it perfect for finding Planet 9 – repeatedly imaging the same patches of sky.

By imaging an area of sky multiple times, we can detect things that move or change – things like Planet 9. But it would mean looking through hundreds of thousands of images.

SkyMapper with the Milky Way above. Jamie Gilbert, ANU, Author provided

Citizen science to find Planet 9

Sifting through hundreds of thousands of images is a tedious task. A computer algorithm could be written to sift through the images, flagging potential objects for further investigation. However, with the huge parameter space of how and what Planet 9 is, it does not compare to the efficiency of humans.

Citizen science – the relative new field pioneered by groups like Zooniverse which has bridged the gap between scientific research and public engagement – is the answer. Citizen science recruits interested people to contribute to real science questions, like finding Planet 9.

By making the data accessible, members of the public with relatively no background and no special equipment (other than a computer) can participate in finding Planet 9.

With the launch of planet9search.org, members of the public have sifted through nearly 120,000 images in under three days – a task that would take one PhD student working continuously 4 years to do.

An example of an image in this project is provided below.

SkyMapper image of the southern sky. The red, blue, and green dots denote an object that has moved over multiple images – the exact thing citizen scientists have been asked to find. Brad Tucker, Author provided

Engaging the public for help

There have only been two times in human history that a planet has been discovered – Uranus in 1781 by William Herschel, and Neptune in 1846.

In fact, the discovery of Neptune followed a very similar path as that underway with Planet 9. Urbain Le Verrier showed in 1845 that the irregularities in Uranus’ orbit could be explained by an object like Neptune – both in its location and mass. Upon hearing this news, a massive search was undertaken, with the discovery of Neptune coming just a year later.

Astronomy has clashed head on with the public in the past. Galileo, the founder of modern astronomy, not only revolutionised our idea of the Solar System and the Universe, but did so in the face of harsh backlash of society and the Catholic Church.

Now, the public has a hunger for astronomy that is unmatched in other areas of science. And it’s an opportunity we, as scientists, must embrace.

Involving the public means we can show the scientific process in action. We can show that sometimes not having a result means we are testing the hypothesis, informing it, and then refining it – the essence of science. We can share the triumphs and tribulations. We can share the knowledge.

In the end, maybe we will share the discovery of a new planet in our Solar System, Planet 9.

We’ve tested another nine of the latest smartphones from Blackberry, HTC, Huawei, OnePlus and Samsung – and found Best Buys that deliver excellent quality.

The best of the bunch earns an excellent 79% test score. This smartphone handles the basics with ease – it lets you have clear phone conversations, and speeds through tasks with minimum of delay. Plus, it manages more than 13.5 hours of web browsing before running out of battery, making it one of the very best for this test.

On the other hand, one of the least impressive struggles to minimise background noise if you’re making a phone call in a busy environment, making your catch-ups harder to follow. Plus if you play music through this phone’s supplied headphones, it sounds thin and lacklustre.

We put all smartphones through the exact same in-depth tests to help you choose the best model. Head to our mobile phone reviews to discover the victors and the also-rans.

Latest mobile phones on test

Samsung Galaxy A3 (2017) vs Samsung Galaxy A5 (2017)

Samsung doesn’t just produce high-end, pricey smartphones like the Galaxy S7. It also makes more affordable models, like the 2017 versions of the Galaxy A3 and A5.

The Galaxy A3 (2017) costs £279 and has a 4.7-inch touchscreen. We’re really impressed that this phone is water-resistant, a feature usually found on more expensive phones. It has the highest IP68 rating – which means it should survive a thirty-minute dunk in 1.5 metres of water.

The Galaxy A5 (2017) is a tad more expensive, at £359. It has more storage space than the A3 (32GB vs 16GB), and a larger 5.2-inch touchscreen. Plus it has a more impressive camera spec, with 16Mp rear and front cameras, compared to the A3’s 13Mp rear and 8Mp front snappers. The A5 (2017) is also IP68 resistant and features fast-charging.

Read our full review of the Samsung Galaxy A3 (2017) and Samsung Galaxy A5 (2017) to find out whether they’re the best next mobile phone for you.

OnePlus 3T

You’ll have likely seen adverts for the OnePlus 3T, along with the ‘Never Settle’ slogan. It has a full aluminium body for an expensive feel, and 16Mp rear and front-facing cameras. This phone also has gesture controls, which means you can draw a specific shape on screen (even when it’s locked) for quick access to things like the camera or LED flash.

It costs around £400 – is it worth the cash? Find out in our full OnePlus 3T review.

New Huawei smartphones, including the Honor 6X

Chinese brand Huawei has been gaining ground in the mobile phone landscape, with mid-range phones that offer premium features.

One of those is the Huawei Honor 6X, which costs just £215. We like that it feels more expensive than it actually is, thanks to its brushed aluminium back. It also has a fingerprint scanner and dual rear cameras, which Huawei claims take beautiful photos. This was a claim we enjoyed assessing in our Huawei Honor 6X review.

Even cheaper is the Huawei P8 Lite 2017, which costs £180. It has a dual-Sim card slot, which basically means you can have two phone numbers on the same device – useful if you want to separate business from pleasure calls. This Huawei P8 Lite also runs on Android Nougat, the latest version of Google’s operating system. Find out whether it’s any good by reading our full Huawei P8 Lite 2017 review.

Find out more about this brand’s smartphones with our Huawei mobile phone reviews.

Blackberry DTEK60

It’s easy to associate Blackberry mobile phones with physical keyboards, but the brand has gone touchscreen with the DTEK60. It has a large 5.5-inch display, and it runs on the Android operating system – so is potentially a good choice for Blackberry fans who want a bit more choice with apps and customisation.

Find out whether it’s worth your time and money by heading to our full Blackberry DTEK60 review.

HTC One A9s

You’ll pay around £250 to buy the HTC One A9s sim-free. It has a fingerprint scanner built into the touch-sensitive home button, for fast unlocking. Features such as fingerprint scanners used to be the preserve of top-of-the-range smartphones, but they’re now found on several mid-range options.

Head to our full HTC One A9s review to discover how its quality stacks up against pricier alternatives.

Mobile phones to watch out for in 2017

Samsung is due to announce its highly-anticipated new S-series phone on 29 March 2017. All rumours point to a very premium and expensive phone – and we’re looking forward to the launch. Keep your eyes peeled for our coverage.

We’re also expecting the imminent release of the LG G6, announced at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2017. It has a whopping 5.7-inch display, but LG claims it will still fit comfortably in one hand thanks to narrow bezels and a 18:9 screen ratio, meaning it’s twice as long as it is wide. Most other smartphones follow a 16:9 formula.

For more on the latest mobile phones, check out our video from this year’s MWC to discover the biggest releases of the event – including the rebirth of 2000’s Nokia 3310.

The best brands from a host of sectors, including supermarkets, manufacturers, banks and retailers, have been announced today in advance of the upcoming 2017 Which? Awards.

The Which? Awards publicly recognise and reward the very best brands that consistently get it right for UK consumers. The winners will be revealed at a ceremony in London on 17 May.

The awards will see big household names go head to head with smaller, challenger brands in categories such as Which? Retailer of the Year, where John Lewis and Apple are up against the likes of newcomer allbeauty and audio specialist Richer Sounds. It’s a similar picture in the Which? Computing & Mobile Brand of the Year where Which? Awards newcomer Huawei faces market-leaders Lenovo and Apple.

Best and worst high street shops – discover how retailers were rated by thousands of shoppers in our annual survey

For the prestigious Which? Supermarket of the Year award, the discounters are again challenging their high-end rivals, with Aldi, Lidl and Iceland competing against Marks & Spencer and Waitrose for the title.

The full shortlist includes:

• Which? Banking Brand of the Year 2017: First Direct; Nationwide; TSB


• Which? Insurance Provider of the Year 2017: John Lewis Financial Services; LV=; M&S Bank; NFU Mutual


• Which? Supermarket of the Year 2017: Aldi; Iceland; Lidl; Marks & Spencer; Waitrose


• Which? Computing & Mobile Brand of the Year 2017: Apple; Huawei; Lenovo


• Which? Sound & Vision Brand of the Year 2017: Fujifilm; Panasonic; Samsung


• Which? Home Appliance Brand of the Year 2017: Bosch; LG; Miele; Samsung; Siemens


• Which? Telecom Services Provider of the Year 2017: Giffgaff; Utility Warehouse; Zen Internet


• Which? Retailer of the Year 2017: allbeauty; Apple; John Lewis; Richer Sounds; Toolstation


• Which? Travel Brand of the Year 2017: Inntravel; Premier Inn; Regent Seven Seas; Riviera Travel; Trailfinders


• Which? Trusted Trader of the Year 2017: Homeglaze Home Improvements Ltd; Justin Bucknell Electrical Ltd; Proclene Ltd; Finesse Windows Ltd

The Which? Awards are unlike others because they are completely independent. A company can’t nominate itself and the shortlist is chosen by our experts based on research, testing, Which? endorsements (such as Best Buy and Recommended Provider status) and feedback from Which? members and the general public throughout the year.

Peter Vicary-Smith, Which? chief executive said:

‘Consumers should be at the heart of every business. Brands that deliver excellent products and services for their customers deserve to be recognised and rewarded.

‘This year’s shortlist reflects those businesses that strive to meet consumers’ expectations and go above and beyond to respond to their needs.’

Samsung is expected to announce the Galaxy S8 smartphone on 29 March 2017. All rumours point to a high-end smartphone with an eye-watering price tag.

We’ll be at the official launch, to bring you our exclusive first impressions of the new smartphone. We can’t wait to see how it compares to its predecessor, the S7 – and to find out how it fares in our tough tests.

For now, we’ve rounded up the key rumours about the S8’s design and specs, to give you a flavour of what you can expect. Read on to find out whether it’s a phone worth getting excited about.

Looking for a mobile phone right now? Head straight to our mobile phone reviews to make the best choice with your cash.

Samsung Galaxy S8 – design

Many expect the Galaxy S8 to have a huge 5.8-inch display. This would be noticeably larger than the S7’s 5.1 incher, though due to a thin bezel the phone shouldn’t be much bigger in physical size.

We’re also expecting a curved screen, which is being dubbed an ‘infinity display’, and it’s rumoured that there’ll be no physical home button on the S8 – rather, it will be on-screen. This means that the fingerprint scanner may be located on the rear of the phone for fast unlocking. This is paired with reports that the new phone will feature an iris scanner, so you’ll be able to unlock your phone and confirm mobile payments with your eyes.

Similar to the LG G6, the Galaxy S8 is anticipated to be just more than twice as long as it is wide, with an 18.5:9 aspect ratio. LG said that this helps make the G6 easier to hold in one hand – so we’re waiting to see whether Samsung makes a similar promise.

We’d be very surprised if the S8 didn’t match its predecessor’s IP68 rating. IP68 means that a phone can survive thirty minutes of immersion into 1.5 metres of water – handy for those of us with memories of thoughtlessly dropping a phone down the toilet.

Samsung Galaxy S8 – camera and battery

We reckon we’ll see a 12Mp camera on the back of the S8, with an f/1.7 aperture. Aperture relates to how much light the camera lens lets in – the smaller the aperture number, the more light, and so the better the image quality. F/1.7 is quite small, so the S8 should take good photos.

The front-facing camera may well be 8Mp – an increase from 5Mp on the S7. Our tests will reveal whether the S8 takes clearer and more flattering selfies as a result.

It’s believed that the S8 will have a 3000mAh battery, the same as in the S7. However, it’s not necessarily true that the battery life on the S7 and S8 will be identical – battery life depends on more than just battery size. When we send the S8 to our test lab, we’ll be assessing how long it lasts to figure out exactly how it stacks up against its rivals.

Samsung Galaxy S8 – processor

We’re hoping to see the Snapdragon 835 processor in the S8. This is the latest chip from Qualcomm, and should help things tick along nicely.

Manufacturers often talk about the latest processors doing things faster than their predecessors. We don’t really doubt that claim – but we care more about what it means in real life. When we send the S8 to our test lab, we’ll be examining just how quickly it powers through everyday tasks – and whether you’ll notice much change from the S7.

Samsung Galaxy S8 – Bixby voice assistant

A seemingly confirmed feature of the Samsung Galaxy S8 is the Bixby voice assistant. This is a new voice assistant launched by Samsung, which focuses heavily on being easy to use.

Many of us are aware of voice assistants on phones that you can use to make calls, send texts, search for recipes etc., through systems like Alexa, Cortana, Google Assistant and Siri. Samsung says that Bixby will be different, because it’s based on the philosophy that machines should learn from and adapt to us – rather than the other way around.

According to Samsung, Bixby will support almost everything that you can do on the phone via touch, as opposed to a select few tasks. Plus, it will be context-savvy to help you find the information you need more quickly and easily.

Samsung claims that the new voice assistant can take direction even if you provide incomplete information. This means that you shouldn’t need to remember exactly what you need to say – the gist should be enough to get you by.

It seems that Samsung will make Bixby a more central element of the phone than what you find on many other smartphones, allegedly with a physical Bixby button on the side so you’ll be able to access it with just one press. We have mixed feelings about voice assistants, but will keep an open mind when we look at how useful this actually is in our in-depth tests.

Samsung Galaxy S8 – price and release date

When the Galaxy S7 was launched, it cost around £569 to buy sim-free. It’s possible that the Galaxy S8 will be similarly priced – though some rumours suggest it could set you back by around £700.

As outlined above, Samsung is anticipated to announce the Galaxy S8 on 29 March 2017. But the actual release date will be later than this.

You can expect to find the Galaxy S8 on shelves by around 21 April. We’ll be buying it as soon as it’s on sale, to send it straight to our test lab – and will bring you our extensive results shortly afterwards.

It’s worth waiting for our fully tested review before splashing out. With the S8 set to be among the priciest smartphones you can buy, you’ll want to make sure you’re getting your money’s worth.

The Samsung Galaxy S8 is finally here. We reveal what you can expect from the upcoming flagship, and bring you all of our live coverage from the Unpacked event.

Samsung chose Here East in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park for its grand unveiling in London – a building dedicated to technology and innovation that’s almost entirely covered in glass. How appropriate. Arriving to a throng of excited journalists and Samsung spokespeople, the anticipation was palpable – the long wait was finally about to be over.

We were led to our seats in a room dominated by subtle blue light, large screens, and the expectant but prescient murmurings of attendees – after months of endless leaks and unconfirmed rumours, would Samsung finally be able to deliver the goods?

It has to. After the flammable Galaxy Note 7 debacle, a new hero was needed to not only steady the ship, but deliver enough innovation to justify the hype. As the South Korean company’s new flagship, the S8 should be that phone – but there’s a lot of weight on its curved metal shoulders.

Below we lift the curtain with our live video from the event, all the key features and our live blog, so you can follow all of the announcements as they happened.

Best Buy smartphones – our highest rated handsets

Were the rumours true?

Rumour	True or false?
The S8 will have a 5.8-inch screen	True
It won’t have a physical home button	True
The screen will have a 18.5:9 aspect ratio	True
The fingerprint sensor will be on the back	True
It will have an iris scanner	True
Samsung will stick with a 12Mp rear camera	True
But the front facing camera will get a bump to 8Mp	True
It will have a 3,000mAh battery	True
It will have 6GB of Ram	No, only 4GB

What’s new on the Galaxy S8 and S8+?

The screen

Samsung had a lot to say about the screen and with good reason. It’s got no bezel, so the curved glass runs seamlessly from the left edge to right edge of the handset. It’s one piece of glass, which means the home button is hidden under the screen. The resolution is 2960×1440, which is more than high enough for a screen this size.

Colour has been improved, too. The screen has earned a HDR Premium badge, the first mobile phone to do it. That means that when you stream a film or TV show on your S8 you’ll be watching it more closely to the way the director envisaged.

The camera

Not much has changed on the camera. It’s still 12Mp, but the new multi-frame processor will boost brightness. The front-facing camera has received some attention. It’s now 8Mp and has automatic face detection – because what else would you be taking a selfie of?

Bixby

Samsung’s personal assistant was the most interesting new feature and it’s one we already knew about. It’s Samsung’s answer to Google Assistant, but with a focus on context. Bixby always knows what’s going on on the screen, so when you ask it to do something it can relate that to what you are doing on your phone. If you want to share an image with a friend, for example, you can just say “Share it with Michael” – Bixby will know that you’re talking about the picture because that’s what’s on screen.

Bixby will synchronise with your life and calendar. It knows where you are and can see through your camera, which adds to Bixby’s smarts. It can tell you about your local area, recommend restaurants and local landmarks – as well as provide translations. Using the camera, Bixby can even buy things online if you take a picture of it.

Unfortunately it only works with a select few Samsung apps for now. These include gallery, camera and contacts.

What about inside the phone?

Samsung made a lot of noise about its new 10 nanometre processor. It’s an industry first and, of course, it’s Samsung fastest, most efficient chip yet. There’s also 4GB of Ram in the phone. We hoped for six, but there’s no doubt that this phone will be quick.

The battery seems a little small at 3000mAh, but if Samsung’s claims of efficient chips are to be believed then it won’t matter too much that the S8’s battery can’t match the 4000mAh ones we’ve been seeing in other Android smartphones. As for storage, both handsets are 64GB and you’ll be able to use microSD cards up to 256GB.

New levels of security

If you like the idea of being a secret agent then the first thing you’ll want to do with your S8 is activate the iris scanner. Phone unlocking can also be done with facial recognition, your fingerprint and, if you’re feeling old-fashioned, a pattern or pin number.

When can you buy it, and for how much?

The Samsung Galaxy S8 will be released on April 28 and you can preorder it now. The S8 will cost you a hefty £689, while the S8+ will set you back £779. Both handsets will be available in three colours: midnight black, arctic silver and orchid grey. If you pre-order before April 19 you’ll get it eight days early.

What else did Samsung show off?

It wasn’t all about the S8 at the event, Samsung also found the time to introduce an update to the Gear 360 camera, the Gear VR headset and a totally new product, Samsung Dex.

Gear 360

The updated 360 degree camera is much smaller than the original. So much so that it looks like it could easily slot into someones pocket whereas the original was much more bulbous. It shoots in 4K and you can use it to live-stream.

Gear VR

The headset itself is the same as the one introduced last year, but now it has a new accessory in the shape of a Bluetooth motion controller. It looks a bit like the one Google introduced with its Daydream VR and it will let you interact with games and software in new ways. Previously, control was done by tapping the side of the headset.

Speaking of games and software, Samsung is partnering with Oculus to bulk out its VR software library.

Samsung Dex

Ever wish your smartphone could be a PC? No, neither have we, but with a Samsung Dex dock you can get a desktop version of your phone onto any connected monitor. You still have access to all your Android apps, but you now you get full mouse and keyboard support. All the processing is being done by the phone and since you’re working on the S8 all the edited documents, presentations and pictures you’ve been working on will be there when you take your phone out of the dock.

Samsung Galaxy S8 live launch blog

If you missed our life coverage you can read it all here.

17:04 – That’s it for the live blog. Thanks for sticking with us. You’ll get information on price, colours and availability just as soon as we get it and we’ll have a first look video live on this page later on. Good evening everyone.

17:00 – DJ Koh is back for a sign off. He’s taken his jacket off – it must be hot in New York. The S8 is a ‘Gateway to mobile life’ according to Mr Koh presumably referring to Dex and the Gear VR, which both use the S8. One more video to see us home. An ostrich has popped a Gear VR headset on and we’ve got Rocket Man by Elton John. The ostrich is trying to fly now, it’s inspired by what it’s seeing on the headset (a video of fighter jets). Come on little ostrich, you can do it. It’s flying! We’re just seen some speedy evolution, folks.

16:54 – Samsung Dex makes your phone into a computer. Slot your phone into a dock and you’ll get access to a desktop using your phone on a connected monitor. There’s a full suite of apps available including Microsoft Office and Android apps that you have installed on your phone. There’s full keyboard and mouse support. The demo really stresses how much you can use it like a standard PC and it’s that powerful 10NM processor that makes it all possible.

16:48 – We’re getting some information on Samsung’s other mobile devices now. The S8 will work with the Gear VR and there’s a new motion-sensing Bluetooth controller. No more tapping the side of the headset.

Oculus is making VR games and you’ll be able to relive scenes from Ghost in the Shell movie in VR. More lifestyle apps, too as well as live streaming of UFC matches and the X Games.

Gear 360 is getting some air time, too. There’s a new smaller version that looks easier to hold and it shoots in 4K. It actually looks like you could fit it in a pocket and you can live-stream from it, too. Facebook Live, brace yourself.

We’ve got some lovely examples of the Gear 360 in action. It’s a live-stream of Tom who is standing motionless. Technical problems!

Hurray, don’t worry, he’s awake and he’s excited about the new Gear 360. So are we, Tom, so are we.

16:43 – Looks like we’re getting some launch details. The S8 and S8+ will be available on April 28 a week behind the US.

The phone will come bundled with “top of the line” AKG headphones. Samsung bought that company recently if you remember?

16:41 – Samsung Connect sounds like Apple Homekit. It’s an app you can use to control your smart home devices. Samsung wants Bixby to work with Samsung Connect so you can control smart devices with your voice. Samsung already has the SmartThings app. Maybe Connect won’t require any first party Samsung devices to work?

16:37 – And now we’re talking about Bixby. Samsung’s version of Google Assistant is voice controlled and Bixby contextualises what you say by recognising what’s on the screen. According to Samsung this lets you move between voice and touch seamlessly. Bixby can help you search for local restaurants and translate things for you, too. Bixby won’t be available in the UK at launch

You can use Bixby with apps. Ask it to play certain songs or set up a reminder of when a new album is available. It can set contextual reminders, too. For example, it won’t remind you of what you need from your local supermarket until you arrive at the store.

16:36 –  A new app, Samsung Pass, lets you log on to your favourite sites with an iris or fingerprint scan.

16:35 – Iris scanner and face recognition can be used to unlock your phone. The latter doesn’t require any button presses just pulls up your homescreen automatically.

Fingerprint sensor is on the back of the phone and don’t worry, you can still use a pattern or standard password.

16:30 – Samsung’s new 10 nanometre (NM) processor is it’s fastest ever and it’s more efficient. Wireless charging is still a thing and it’s faster. The new dock allows you to lay it flat or prop up your phone.

The 8-point battery check is back. Mr Notton is stressing safety. Samsung doesn’t need another immolating phone.

16:25 – On to the camera now. Multi-frame processing takes multiple images, which boost brightness. You’ll never miss that perfect shot apparently. The S8 has the same dual-sensor as the Galaxy S7.

Front-facing camera is now 8Mp and it automatically detects your face because what else would be taking a selfie of?

S8, like the S7 is IP68, which means it’s dust-proof and waterproof to a depth of 1.5 metres.

16:21 – New larger screen has a Mobile HDR Premium badge, which means what you see on the screen matches the Director’s vision. Home button is now under the display and it’s pressure sensitive just like a normal button.

16:17 – Mark Notton takes the stage. He’s talking about how smartphone screens haven’t changed in years. Until now! The curved Infinity Display on the two phones has no visible bezel. S8 is 5.8-inch, S8+ is 6.2-inch. Samsung has made the internal components smaller to allow for the bezel-free screen. Hopefully that doesn’t mean a smaller battery.

16:15 – That’s it from Mr Koh, for now. We’re back to a video. Galaxy S7 morphing into an S8, parts breaking off reveal the new curved device. S8 and S8+ confirmed. We’ve got a curved back and display. There’s no home button in sight, but we still have volume and power switch on the side. They’re a pair of stunners.

16:10 – New phone has ‘Infinity Display’, iris scanner and facial recognition unlock feature. Hopefully infinity display means no bezel.

16:08 – Mr Koh acknowledges a tough year for Samsung as he hails the consistent innovation of mobile phones in a ‘New era of design’. Quality, safety and craftsmanship are Samsung aims for its products.

16:04 – After a video giving a few glimpses of the phone in action DJ Koh President of Samsung Mobile takes the stage. Mr Koh wants a London pint, too bad he’s in New York

16:00 – And we’re off. Everyone has taken their seats and Samsung is ready to wow us. Will the rumours be true? Will Samsung bring up its extensive battery tests again? Will you need to remortgage your house to afford an S8? Let’s find out.

15:50 – Good afternoon everyone. It’s launch day for the Samsung Galaxy S8 and hopefully there will be some surprises in store after the many, many leaks.