On 1st July 2007 the smoke-free law was introduced in England with the aim of protecting employees in their places of work, and the general public in enclosed public places, from the effects of secondhand smoking. These law changes mean that all public transport and work vehicles used by more than one person must now be smoke-free, no smoking signs must be displayed in all smoke-free premises and vehicles, and staff smoking rooms are no longer allowed; staff who want to smoke must go outside. Local councils in England have the responsibility of enforcing the law but it is the legal responsibility of the managers of smoke-free premises and vehicles to make sure people don’t smoke. Individuals can be fined or prosecuted for breaking the law and employers can be fined if they do not display the no-smoking signs or if they allow smoking to continue on their premises

U3b Networks (short for the "Underprivileged three billion" who lack internet access) is a new company in Jersey set up by Greg Wyler, former owner of Rwanda’s national telephone company. He intends to provide cheap, high-speed internet access to remote areas in developing countries, which up to now has been the reserve of developed countries. Mr Wyler plans to charge $500 per megabit per month, compared with the $4,000 charged by existing companies. Mr Wyler has so far raised $40m from investors, but this seems like a risky investment, especially as billions were lost on similar projects a decade ago. So why are they investing in the hope of finding customers in the world’s poorest regions? The reason is that previous projects were over-ambitious and set out to provide global coverage, whereas U3b’s project is far less ambitious and its services will only be available to a ribbon around the equator, covering most developing countries. It will initially use just five satellites circling

For many years the hunt has been on to find an effective way to treat cancerous tumours using physical rather than chemical means. That hunt may now be over with the latest breakthrough made by Dr. Jennifer West at Rice University in Houston, Texas. West has done tests on animals using a non-chemical procedure known as Photothermal Ablation. She injected millions of nanoparticles, which can absorb infrared light, into the animals’ bloodstreams. These particles go straight to the tumours because, unlike healthy tissue, tumours have abnormal blood capillaries that will let them through. A few hours later an optical fibre is inserted into the tumour and a blast of infrared light is passed down the fibre, which heats the particles and effectively cooks the tumour.