Today on New Scientist: 9 May 2012

Silicon Valley reaches for the sky

An experimental, entrepreneurial spirit may be just what space exploration needs

Private firm SpaceX gears up to spark next space age

Docking with the ISS would be a first for a commercial craft - and a key milestone for making space flight cheaper and more innovative

Silicon cracks could make a lab-on-a-chip

The next generation of lab-on-a-chip devices could be made out of patterns of cracks rather than with conventional channel-carving techniques

Human brain prosciutto builds up 3D atlas of the mind

Watch how slicing and staining the brain is helping to create the first open access 3D mind atlas in high resolution

Artists join researchers in climate change show

The Carbon 12 exhibition shows artworks alongside the research that inspired them and brings home the diversity of climate change damage

Sweat-sensing bracelet could detect fatal seizures

A device that measures skin conductance could monitor and perhaps even predict when life-threatening seizures are about to strike

The humanity switch: How one gene made us brainier

A single gene may have helped the evolution of our complex brains 2. 5 million years ago, as we were splitting from australopithecines

Researcher death highlights dangers of pathogen work

Richard Din's death from meningitis shows how pathogens can escape the lab - the worry is that experimental H5N1 flu could do the same

Written from the heart: Da Vinci's anatomy

Leonardo da Vinci's secretive musings on the human body are now decipherable in a new iPad app to accompany the exhibition at Buckingham Palace

Supernovae can be casual sippers or violent rippers

Two rival theories for how supernovae form are both right - a finding that will boost the search for mysterious dark energy

Magnetic bacteria create a biological hard drive

Bacteria that produce their own magnetic particles are being harnessed to store data

US conservatives gain upper hand in Twitter politics

US conservatives may now possess an online network that is better organised to spread their message

Thank grandmothers for lower incidence of cancer

If it weren't for caring grandmothers, almost every woman would have a gene that gives them up to an 80 per cent chance of getting breast cancer

When did our ancestors learn to do the right thing?

In Moral Origins, social anthropologist Christopher Boehm charts the history of how we evolved our sense of doing what's right

Belle de Jour casts her forensic eye on sex

The scientist and former call-girl blogger Brooke Magnanti has written a new book that challenges our notions about sexuality

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