Today on New Scientist: 24 August 2011
All today's stories on newscientist.com, including: Brain stimulation enhances empathy, civil conflict linked to climate, and a cool brown dwarf
Black hole caught grabbing a starry treat
Mysterious X-ray flares detected by NASA's Swift telescope in March have been traced to a giant black hole in the earliest stages of a meal
Cloud-making: Another human effect on the climate
Compounds released by living organisms such as trees, marine bacteria and livestock have an effect on cloud formation ?- and we might be changing it
First link between climate patterns and civil conflict
The first study to link global climate patterns to the onset of civil wars places El Ni?o on a par with factors like poverty and social exclusion
Empathy enhanced by magnetic stimulation of the brain
Magnetically stimulating the brain might improve symptoms of autism and Asperger's syndrome
Anti-dengue mosquitoes released in Australia
Some 300,000 mosquitoes carrying a bacterium that limits their ability to spread dengue fever have been released in Queensland
Don't have a lab? Now you can crowdsource your science
Think of it as Mechanical Turk for scientists. Two new companies aim to help researchers outsource their experiments and keep track of their labs
RIP shuttle - let's get back to real space exploration
Time to ditch the black armbands and look beyond low Earth orbit again. The shuttle's passing marks the start of an exciting new era, says Daniel Fischer
Learning machines: The education of an animat
It starts off as unformed as any other infant, but this virtual rat's knack for learning could take it a long way - perhaps all the way to Mars
Green Man: Science with the walking wounded
Recreating the gore of bygone wounds, and wandering in the forest on the trail of molecules: science took many shapes at this year's Green Man Festival
Colour me beautiful: photography at the nanoscale
These stunning images from the 2011 FEI Owner Image Contest use colour in inventive ways to transform snapshots from the microscopic world
Born to be Viral: Smell of death freaks out lampreys
Watch how the scent of putrefying carcasses could be used to control destructive populations of lampreys
One world, 8.7 million species, most still unknown
They didn't exactly come in two-by-two, but we now have the best estimate yet of how many species our world supports
Hirsute wetsuit lets swimmers go with the flow
A wetsuit made from a hirsute artificial skin could one day let competition swimmers hone their front crawl
Crittervision: Enter the bat's world of sound
A bat would probably have no trouble imagining how it is to see like a human. For us to imagine their world, though, it is somewhat trickier
Surgeons may be adapting to 'safe' X-ray doses
Cardiologists routinely exposed to "safe" X-ray levels are experiencing changes at the cellular level which might prove beneficial to their health
Coolest brown dwarf discovered
NASA's WISE telescope has discovered 100 "failed stars" near the sun - one is cooler than we are at just 25? C
Metal droplets could put power in your step
A prototype device - embeddable in the sole of a shoe - turns the jiggles of a liquid metal into power for personal electronic devices
5.8 M quake hits US east coast, nuke plants shut down
Shaking from the quake was felt up and down the east coast, but researchers expect only minor damage
skyrim phineas and ferb charlotte nc charlotte nc jessie j jessie j red eye