ZIKA, SEASON 2 It’s back, and more dangerous than ever TYING THE KNOT String theory and loop quantum gravity get hitched PREHISTORIC ANTIBIOTIC Neanderthals knew the medicinal power of mold WEEKLY March11-17,2017 GOOD HYDRATIONS From water to wheatgrass smoothies, what to drink – and what to avoid Can tea prevent Is coffee bad cancer? for you? Does diet soda make you fat? Does juice count as a 5-a-day? No3116 US$6.50 CAN$6.50 10 Do you really need 8 glasses Science and technology news www.newscientist.com 0 70992 30690 9 a day? US jobs in science CAN YOU FEEL IT? Not everybody experiences emotions the same Intellectual stimulation Subscribe and save up to 76% Visit newscientist.com/9667 or call 1-888-822-3242 and quote 9667 FEEDING MINDS FOR 60 YEARS CONTENTS Volume 233 No 3116 This issue online newscientist.com/issue/3116 News Leader 5 Trump’s assault on climate science will not 8 make America great News Fresh Zika threat looms 6 UPFRONT CO2 forecast is worrying. Facebook’s suicide The virus is back prevention tools. China’s secret rocket launch 8 NEWS & TECHNOLOGY and more dangerous Black holes from a huge star. Neanderthals than we thought self-medicated. Robots learn when humans spot mistakes. OCD makes it harder to learn that things are safe. The best exercise to rejuvenate cells. Fuzzy pulsars could reveal UESLEI MARCELINO/REUTERSUESLEI quantum gravity. Brighter skies behind crop boost. Device translates one person’s emotions into another’s movements. App On the cover checks for Parkinson’s in minutes. Foam sucks up oil spills. Artificial embryo grown in 8 Zika, season 2 a dish. Bomb craters full of rare aquatic life 32 It’s back, and more 19 IN BRIEF dangerous than ever Plants with a sense of taste. A Shazam for Good hydrations 28 Tying the knot art. Autoimmune disease link to dementia Loop quantum gravity and From water to string theory get hitched Analysis 9 Prehistoric antibiotic wheatgrass, what to 22 Sea change Plankton can save the ocean, Neanderthals knew the drink and what to avoid but we need to save the plankton medicinal power of mould 24 COMMENT 40 Can you feel it? The sepia-tinged lure of old tech. Not everybody feels Is bringing back extinct species a dead loss? emotions the same way 25 INSIGHT Cover image Guillaume Kurkdjian Why we’re sending billionaires to the moon Aperture Features 26 The perfect fishy grin for crunching up prey 28 Features 28 Tying the knot (see left) Tying the knot 32 Good hydrations (see above left) 40 PEOPLE The unlikely marriage Lisa Feldman Barrett’s gamut of emotions of string theory and loop quantum gravity Culture 44 A tragedy looms? Individualism in the US will reshape the nation’s green thinking 45 Competition 48-hour flash fiction challenge 46 Strange futures What was hippie modernism? DOMENIC BAHMANN Regulars Coming next week… 52 LETTERS More than NASA depended on women What’s up with gravity? 55 CROSSWORD The cosmic force isn’t making sense 56 FEEDBACK Self-confessed liars More than a hound dog 57 THE LAST WORD Grain train What dog personality reveals about us 11 March 2017 | NewScientist | 3 INSTANT EXPERT: THE QUANTUM WORLD SATURDAY MARCH 11, 2017 Six leading quantum experts, one amazing day of discovery. Get to grips with the fascinating world of quantum physics and ask our speakers the questions you’ve always wanted answering. By the end of the day you’ll feel like an expert too. THE BIG THEMES: Learn about quantum computing and how to use quantum physics to power technology. Explore quantum weirdness, quantum gravity and much more. 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To about a carbon tax, despite its whether it be droughts in the CONTACTS nobody’s great surprise, given appalling track record on climate west or storms in the east. Contact us newscientist.com/contact President Trump’s rhetoric to change. Such a tax would impose Trump can ignore this for now. Who’s who date, the White House is said to be rigour on carbon-intensive Given his gilded lifestyle, bluster newscientist.com/people ready to gut the National Oceanic industries – and Exxon thinks it and fondness for “alternative General & media enquiries [email protected] and Atmospheric Administration. would win out in the subsequent facts”, he may be able to keep Editorial According to documents seen competition. But rather than ignoring it indefinitely. Ordinary Tel 781 734 8770 [email protected] by The Washington Post,NOAA– putting pressure on it to act on Americans won’t. A new forecast [email protected] the federal government’s leading its words, Trump has applauded predicts that atmospheric levels [email protected] climate science agency – faces an its recidivist plans to expand its of carbon dioxide will rise by Picture desk Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1268 overall budget cut of 17 per cent. Gulf Coast operations. 2.5 parts per million in 2017 (see Display advertising Its basic science arm, the Office In the time warp that is Trump’s page 7). This week, we report both Tel 781 734 8770 [email protected] of Oceanic and Atmospheric White House, the environment is the mystery of solar brightening Recruitment advertising Research, will lose more than a across the US corn belt (see Tel 781 734 8770 “Trump has cast himself [email protected] quarter of its funds. The money page 12) and worrying ways in as a modern King Canute, Newsstand will be diverted to the military, on which climate change is affecting Tel 212 237 7987 which the US already spends far whose wishful thinking oceans (see page 22). This is the Distributed by Time/Warner Retail Sales and Marketing, 260 Cherry Hill more than any other country. can hold back nature” kind of vital research Trump and Road, Parsippany, NJ 07054 Some in the Trump camp claim his cronies think does not matter. Syndication Tribune Content Agency they are not opposed to climate the enemy of commerce. On his One Twitter account parodying Tel 800 637 4082 science, just to the“politicised” first day in office, Trump signed a Trump has medieval king Donaeld [email protected] version of it now practised by death warrant for Barack Obama’s the Unready railing against a rival: New Scientist Live Tel +44 (0) 20 7611 1273 NOAA and other agencies. This Climate Action Plan, which would “Canute. What a loser. Can’t even [email protected] is nonsense. Climate science has have seen the US lead on efforts to hold back the sea. It’s just water. © 2017 Reed Business been politicised only by those slow and adapt to climate change. We’re going to be so tough on the Information Ltd, England. who deny its findings in the The Environmental Protection sea. Canute was too soft. Sad.” New Scientist ISSN 0262 4079 is published weekly except for the last service of an antiquated model Agency is facing even steeper cuts The real Donald has cast week in December by Reed Business Information Ltd, England. of US enterprise – one in which than NOAA – up to 40 per cent of himself as a latter-day King New Scientist (Online) ISSN 2059 5387 success depends on corporate its research budget (see page 6). Canute, deluding himself that he New Scientist at Reed Business freedom to trash the commons. And a raft of measures seek to is able to hold back the forces of Information 360 Park Avenue South, 12th floor, New York, NY 10010. Most of the world recognises remove the EPA’s ability to keep nature with an executive order. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and other mailing offices that cleaning up industry is not US air and water clean. Except, of course, that Canute was Postmaster: Send address changes only morally responsible, but In this, Trump is going against actually a wise ruler who wanted to New Scientist, PO Box 3806, Chesterfield, MO 63006-9953, USA. commercially sound too. Even the will of most Americans, few of to show his followers that he Registered at the Post Office as a ExxonMobil, from whose corner whom voted for more pollution. didn’t have dominion over nature. newspaper and printed in USA by Fry Communications Inc, office Trump plucked Rex And he is going against their best The chances that Trump is doing Mechanicsburg, PA 17055 Tillerson to be his secretary of interests, too. Much of the US is the same? Zero. Sad indeed. ■ 11 March 2017 | NewScientist | 5 UPFRONT NOAA US budget cuts THE first draft of President Trump’s 90 per cent of weather forecasting proposed budget is heavy on cuts to data and is facing a 22 per cent cut.