Evidence of life in Earth's oldest rocks

Did life on this planet begin only after a relatively long planetary evolution, until suitable environments emerged that allowed life to gain a toehold, or was the cradle of life ready and rocking when Earth itself was but an infant? An answer may come from a paper online in Nature by Nutman et al. that analysed 3.7-billion-year-old rocks in the Isua Greenstone Belt in Greenland. 

https://doi.org/10.1038/nature19429

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v537/n7621/full/nature19355.html

Remote sensing reflectance anomalies in the ocean

Small spectral differences from the mean remote sensing reflectance (Rrs) of the ocean – anomalies – can provide unique environmental information from ocean color satellite data.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2016.06.002 

How to raise a genius

• Expose children to diverse experiences.
• When a child exhibits strong interests or talents, provide opportunities to develop them.
• Support both intellectual and emotional needs.
• Help children to develop a 'growth mindset' by praising effort, not ability.
• Encourage children to take intellectual risks and to be open to failures that help them learn.
• Beware of labels: being identified as gifted can be an emotional burden.
• Work with teachers to meet your child's needs. Smart students often need more-challenging material, extra support or the freedom to learn at their own pace.
• Have your child's abilities tested. This can support a parent's arguments for more-advanced work, and can reveal issues such as dyslexia, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or social and emotional challenges.

Nature 537, 152–155 (08 September 2016)

https://doi.org/10.1038/537152a

John Dalton, born 250 years ago, illustrated his atomic theory using wooden spheres

The English chemist John Dalton, born 250 years ago, illustrated his atomic theory using wooden spheres (pictured), drilled with holes for pins that enabled them to be linked into clusters. But there are hazards to such mental props. By the 1880s, students were so familiar with the spheres that one (taught by prominent advocate of atomic theory Henry Enfield Roscoe) declared: “Atoms are round bits of wood invented by Mr Dalton.”
Nature 537, 32–33 (01 September 2016)

https://doi.org/10.1038/537032a

Majority of mathematicians hail from just 24 scientific ‘families’

Most of the world’s mathematicians fall into just 24 scientific 'families', one of which dates back to the fifteenth century. The insight comes from an analysis of the Mathematics Genealogy Project (MGP), which aims to connect all mathematicians, living and dead, into family trees on the basis of teacher–pupil lineages, in particular who an individual's doctoral adviser was.

https://doi.org/10.1038/nature.2016.20491

SI unit 'Ampere' will be replaced by a quantum-based measurement unit

Very soon the ampere -- the SI base unit of electrical current -- will take on an entirely new identity, and NIST scientists are at work on an innovative, quantum-based measurement system that will be consistent with the impending change.

http://www.nist.gov/pml/div684/grp02/counting-down-to-the-new-ampere.cfm

Boltzmann: a disordered genius

Born in Vienna on 20 February 1844 during the night between Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday, Boltzmann used to say that this was why his mood could swing so violently from one of great happiness to one of deep depression. It was a tragedy that Boltzmann did not live to experience the glory of his pioneering ideas, for he committed suicide during one such depression in September 1906. 

Ludwig Boltzmann: The Man Who Trusted Atoms Carlo Cercignani
1998 Oxford University Press 348pp