HOW TO MAKE A TORNADO

More Heath Robinson than Albert Einstein, the book investigates everything from what it's like to die to exploding trousers and recycled urine. Who on earth would burn off their beard with a laser, produce a fireproof umbrella that doubles as a parachute, replace police sniffer dogs with gerbils or celebrate Mozart's bicentenary with inventing a musical bra? A playful collection told with fantastically dry humour drawn from the archives of New Scientist magazine which has been avidly read for over 50 years. Science tells us grand things about the universe - how fast light travels, why stones fall to earth, but scientific endeavour goes far beyond these obvious foundations. Some fields we don't often hear about because they are so specialised and turn out to be dead ends, yet researchers have given hallucinogenic drugs to blind people, tried to weigh the soul as it departs the body, and planned to blast a new Panama Canal with atomic weapons. Real scientific breakthroughs sometimes come out of the most surprising and unpromising work. This book is about the margins of science, not the research down tried-and-tested routes, but some of its zanier and more brilliant by-ways. 220 page paperback.