Scientists in Switzerland made a sponge from cheesemaking waste that captures gold from discarded electronics — after dissolving metal parts from 20 old computer motherboards, they recovered enough to melt into a 22-carat gold nugget
All known life uses 4 DNA letters; UC San Diego showed an existing bacterial enzyme can accurately read and transcribe 8, doubling the genetic alphabet with synthetic letters
Slime mould has no brain, no neurons and no central control, yet when scientists placed food at 36 locations matching cities around Tokyo, it grew a network strikingly similar to the rail system — with comparable efficiency, cost and resilience