At the beginning of 2011, the next Oxford International symposium on archeoastronomy will take place at Lima, in Peru. It is the first time when this event is to be held in South America.

Scientists at the University of Bath, UK, say that nose scanning showed good potential for use as a biometric tool, with a good recognition rate and a faster rate of image processing than with conventional techniques.

University of Michigan researchers have "sonified" the solar wind data that's usually represented visually, as numbers or graphs. They have created a musical representation of the data gathered by NASA's Advanced Composition Explorer satellite.

The International Year of Astronomy 2009/Mani Bhaumik Prize for Excellence in Astronomy Education and Public Outreach has been awarded to From Earth to the Universe (FETTU). This award recognises FETTU’s important contribution in improving public awareness of astronomical achievements, and in stimulating the use of astronomy for the promotion of scientific education and culture in 2009.

Learning nouns and verbs activate different regions of the brain. The scientists observed this using brain images taken using functional magnetic resonance, according to an article published in the journal Neuroimage.

Within the Solar System, surfaces of the atmosphere less bodies are strongly influenced by factors often associated with the expression "space weathering" (*). Recent scientific evidence has shown that the aging process surface due to space weather has a very strong momentum (of the order of one million years) relative to the age of the solar system (about 4.5 billion years).

"Science and journalism - friend or foe?" gathered at the British Council's genuine friends of knowledge. They represent many fields including media, IT, architecture, education, psychology, theology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, engineering, linguistics and climate. The story of the event continues now with the second part, and this precedes the one dedicated to few of the email questions and aspects addressed by friends of the Science Newspaper.

The celebration of the International Year of Astronomy 2009 involved 148 countries, a number that confirms that the IYA2009 network is the largest ever in science. Activities and events from these participating nations paint a picture of professional and amateur astronomers bringing the Universe down to Earth through countless projects, opening the eyes of the public to the wonders above.

Although we do not have instruments to measure the degree of boredom or the properties of time, one thing is for certain: the science cafe on the relationship between science and journalism lasted two hours. Two times more than the initial planned programme. The topics, the discussions between participants and video dialogues with partners from UK, Greece and Romania seem to have dilated time. In a pleasant way and for all those who were or wished to be present at this event. That's because we have received email requests from young researchers and science communicators from abroad.

University Open Days is one of the news that caught the attention of participants at the 2009 edition of the European Week of Regions and Cities that took place in Brussels, Belgium, between 5-8 October. Open Days 2009's motto was "Global Challenges, European Responses" and attracted thousands of national and regional policymakers, experts and representatives from business, civil society and academia. Discussions focused around four main topics but the pride of place was the perspectives that can offer creativity and innovation. That's because the field of RDI (Research, Development and Innovation) is a matter of high priority for European regions. These were the topics that we addressed in a discussion with Luc Van den Brande, Committee of the Regions' (CoR) President.