Liz Bennett
iFest draws political protesters
Israeli festival sparks disagreement
Students left out in cold
'Boiler crisis' at St Annes continues.
Omkar triggers Union poll
Two terms after Krishna Omkar was disqualified from Union elections, the ex-Treasurer is still trying to change the rules that ban him from running.
Keble socialist coup fails
Motion to rename college ‘The Socialist College of Keble’ falls flat at JCR meeting.
Scouts “struggling” on wages
A student-run initiative is pushing for pay of at least £7 per hour for all College workers.
Remote-controlled love song
An Oxford scientist, Professor Gero Miesenböck, has made female flies produce the male courtship song using remote brain control.
The brain control techniques, which Miesenböck pioneered 3 years ago, use a laser to trigger certain actions. The ‘song’, which flies make by vibrating a wing, is never produced by females, so the findings indicate an astonishing similarity in male and female fly brains.
“Anatomically, the differences are so subtle,” Miesenböck told the Telegraph, “How is it that the neural equipment is so similar, but the sexes behave so differently?”
Researchers suggest that fly brains may have a ‘master switch’ that determines male or female behaviour.
Butterfly numbers dwindling
One of Britain’s best loved butterflies, the small tortoiseshell, is under threat according to research which shows how numbers have plummeted by 80% in the last 20 years. Conservationists believe that the sturmia bella fly is to blame, because it lays its larvae inside the caterpillar until it cocoons. Dr Martin Warren, Chief Executive of Butterfly Conservation, told The Daily Mail that he was “deeply concerned”.
Off-syllabus material in Medicine exam
Complaints “may be reviewed during the post examination meeting.”