READING IS FUN

  MAKING TIME FOR SCIENCE   Chronobiology might sound a little futuristic – like something from a science fiction novel, perhaps – but it’s actually a field of study that concerns one of the oldest processes life on this planet has ever known: short-term rhythms of time and their effect on flora and fauna. This can take many forms. Marine life, for example, is influenced by tidal patterns. Animals tend to be active or inactive depending on the position of the sun or moon. Numerous creatures, humans included, are largely diurnal – that is, they like to come out during the hours of sunlight. Nocturnal animals, such as bats and possums, prefer to forage by night. A third group are known as crepuscular: they thrive in the low-light of dawn and dusk and remain inactive at other hours. When it comes to humans, chronobiologists are interested in what is known as the circadian rhythm. This is the complete cycle our bodies are naturally geared to undergo within the passage of a twenty-...

  MAKING THE MOST OF TRENDS Experts from Harvard Business School give advice to managers Most managers can identify the major trends of the day. But it the course of conducting research in a number of industries and working directly with companies, we have discovered that managers often fail to recognize the less obvious but profound ways these trends are influencing consumers’ aspirations, attitudes, and behaviors. This is especially true of trends that managers view as peripheral to their core markets. Many ignore trends in their innovation strategies or adopt a wait-and-see approach and let competitors take the lead. At a minimum, such responses mean missed profit opportunities. At the extreme, they can jeopardize a company by ceding to rivals the opportunity to transform the industry. The purpose of this article is twofold: to spur managers to think more expansively about how trends could engender new value propositions in their core markets, and to provide some high-level advi...

  Oxytocin The positive and negative effects of the chemical known as the ‘love hormone’ A Oxytocin is a chemical, a hormone produced in the pituitary gland in the brain. It was through various studies focusing on animals that scientists first became aware of the influence of oxytocin. They discovered that it helps reinforce the bonds between prairie voles, which mate for life, and triggers the motherly behaviour that sheep show towards their newborn lambs. It is also released by women in childbirth, strengthening the attachment between mother and baby. Few chemicals have as positive a reputation as oxytocin, which is sometimes referred to as the ‘love hormone’. One sniff of it can, it is claimed, make a person more trusting, empathetic, generous and cooperative. It is time, however, to revise this wholly optimistic view. A new wave of studies has shown that its effects vary greatly depending on the person and the circumstances, and it can impact on our social interactions for wors...

  Bringing cinnamon to Europe Cinnamon is a sweet, fragrant spice produced from the inner bark of trees of the genus Cinnamomum, which is native to the Indian sub-continent. It was known in biblical times, and is mentioned in several books of the Bible, both as an ingredient that was mixed with oils for anointing people’s bodies, and also as a token indicating friendship among lovers and friends. In ancient Rome, mourners attending funerals burnt cinnamon to create a pleasant scent. Most often, however, the spice found its primary use as an additive to food and drink. In the Middle Ages, Europeans who could afford the spice used it to flavor food, particularly meat, and to impress those around them with their ability to purchase an expensive condiment from the ‘exotic’ East. At a banquet, a host would offer guests a plate with various spices piled upon it as a sign of the wealth at his or her disposal. Cinnamon was also reported to have health benefits, and was thought to cure vari...

  Changing Lives with a Stranger What would it be like to live somebody else's life for a day? A Mandie Currie, a zoo-keeper, spent the day in the offices of the magazine Marie Claire. 'Choosing what to wear for my day at Marie Claire was tricky because normally I wear a uniform at work. First I went to a still-life photo studio, then to press previews, all before lunch. The zoo is such a tranquil, peaceful place - and here I was rushing around when I could be sitting quietly giving an animal a cuddle. Some of the members of the fashion team seemed quite stressed - my job doesn't really get pressurised. At a fashion shoot in the afternoon, it made me laugh to think that I'd usually be cleaning out cages or handling rats. I'm fascinated to see how magazines work, but I really enjoy my job at the zoo so I'll stay put.' B Alice Cutler, a fashion assistant at Marie Claire, spent the day at London Zoo. 'I arrived at the zoo in my leather boots and dark blue t...

  IN THEIR NATURAL HABITAT What keeps film-makers Amanda Barrett and Owen Newman away from their home comforts for months on end? The search for the perfect shot. Of all the creatures to be found in the jungles and plains of East Africa, two of the hardest to track down must surely be producer Amanda Barrett and cameraman Owen Newman. Their present habitat, the Ngorongoro Crater, has been lashed by six months of almost continuous rain, giving rise to a number of unforeseen problems.  Newman explained that they had to invest in an expensive piece of equipment so that whenever one of their vehicles gets stuck in the mud, Amanda can pull him back to safety.   His working partnership with the talented producer has created some of TV's finest wildlife films, such as their amazing and well-received film on leopards. Even while this film of one of Africa's shyest cats was being shown, the pair were already back where they belong - this time trailing that equally shy animal, the ...

 We always went to Ireland in June. Ever since the four of us began to go on holidays together we had spent the first fortnight of the month at Glencorn Lodge in County Antrim. It’s a large house by the sea, not far from the village of Ardbeag. The English couple who bought the house, the Malseeds, have had to add to the building, but everything has been done most discreetly.  It was Strafe who found Glencorn for us. He’d come across an advertisement in the days when the Malseeds still felt the need to advertise. ‘How about this?’ he said one evening and read out the details. We had gone away together the summer before, to a hotel that had been recommended by friends, but it hadn’t been a success because the food was so appalling.  The four of us have been playing cards together for ages, Dekko, Strafe, Cynthia and myself. They call me Milly, though strictly speaking my name is Dorothy Milson. Dekko picked up his nickname at school, Dekko Deacon sounding rather good, I su...

  Favourite places A Bruce I don't like landscapes which are completely untamed. It's the human element which is important to me. It's the same when I travel abroad. Lovely villages with old temples attract me, not empty deserts. When I was eight, I went away to school in England and on Saturdays I would cycle to the village of Lastingham in its lovely valley. Cycling was a release from school. I loved exploring the bleak hilltops, the sheltered valleys and old villages. Coming from Scotland myself, I found the landscape familiar yet different and I still go back there today. I used to describe my adventures in my private diary. In a way, that was my first attempt at travel writing, at which I subsequently made my name. B Sophia There is a miniature railway that goes from Hythe to Dungeness, run by amateurs. I always travel first class as it doesn't cost much more than the regular fare. The scenery is not spectacular. The train moves across Romney Marsh with its sheep, ...

  Trying to get published? If you are wondering where to send your story, our expert Margaret Stubbs is here with the advice you need. Readers of this magazine often write in saying, 'I have written this story/book. Can you please tell me who to send it to?' One of the first things they need to know is that they should be researching their markets and finding out about publishers as well as practising their writing skills. Turning words into a saleable commodity takes a good deal of knowledge about the 'writing game'. Whatever kind of writing you do, you need to develop a knowledge of the markets you are aiming at.  There are several ways of doing this, but the best one is simply by reading everything relevant you can lay your hands on.   Use your local library and go round the local bookshops and newsagents. Reading widely will always give you the best guide to what kinds of writing publishers are actually accepting at any given time. As time goes on, this knowledge mu...

  Finding a good flat in Dublin at a price you could afford was like finding gold in the gold rush. The best way was by personal contact: if you knew someone who knew someone who was leaving a place, that often worked. But if, like Jo, you had only just arrived in Dublin, there was no chance of any personal contact, nobody to tell you that their bedsit would be vacant at the end of the month. No,  it  was a matter of staying in a hostel and searching. For Jo, Dublin was a very big blank spot. She really felt she was stepping into the unknown when she got on the train to go and work there. She didn't ask herself why she was going there in the first place. It had been assumed by everyone she went around with at school that she would go. Who would stay in a one-horse town, the back of beyond, the end of the world, the sticks? That's all she had heard for years. They were all going to get out, escape, see some life, get some living in, have a real kind of existence, and some ...

Dedicated to their sports  Four young sports stars talk about their lives.  A. Darius (runner)  I've always been sporty. I played a bit of everything at one time, but I was best at football and athletics. When I was 14, I had a trial fora professional football club, but eventually I opted to go down the athletics route instead. My biggest moment came when I got to compete for my country in the youth team and got a medal. It didn't result in much media attention, though, which was a shame. I'd been hoping some sponsorship would come out of it, because the training doesn't come cheap. I train at home all winter and then go away for three weeks, usually Florida, before the season starts. It's good fun - there are great athletics facilities there and the nightlife's great too. You've got to be really disciplined, though. If friends ask me to go out the night before training, I have to say no. I wish I didn't, but dedication pays in this sport. The main goal ...

Onto a winner  Two brothers are finding that their childhood game is very good for business.  Dave and Norm Lagasse, two bushy-bearded brothers in their forties, are sitting in their modest home in Santa Fe in New Mexico. USA, and reliving their childhood. In front of them lies a wooden board covered in round plastic pieces. They are playing the ancient game of pichenotte, one which, they insist, is unlike any other.  Their grandfather, Lucien Rajotte, a grocer originally from Quebec, Canada, brought the game into the USA and introduced it to his family. It wasn’t long before, on just about every weekend and holiday. the family were playing the game and, as Dave says, ‘having the best time ever’. Eventually, the family moved to New Mexico.  But Grandpa's pichenotte board, which he'd made out of wodden food crates, was not forgotten and they continued to play regularly.  If visitors dropped by they were often fascinated, for the game was completely unknown in sou...

  On the very last day of a bad year, I was leaning against a pillar in the Baltimore railway station, waiting to catch the 10.10 to Philadelphia. There were a lot more people waiting than I had expected. That airy, light, clean, polished feeling I generally got in the station had been lost. Elderly couples with matching luggage stuffed the benches, and swarms of college kids littered the floor with their bags.  A grey-haired man was walking around speaking to different strangers one by one. Well-off, you could tell: tanned skin, nice sweater, soft, beige carcoat. He went up to a woman sitting alone and asked her a question. Then he came over to a girl standing near me. She had long blond hair, and I had been thinking I wouldn´t mind talking to her myself. The man said, ‘Would you by any chance be travelling to Philadelphia?’  ‘Well, northbound, yes,’ she said.  ‘But to Philadelphia?’  ‘No, New York, bu...

  My line of work A Lisa - Exhibition Programmes Organiser, Science Museum I'm responsible for putting temporary exhibitions together. This includes planning and designing the exhibition and promoting it. I have to read up about the subject of the exhibition beforehand and then talk to important people in the area so that I can establish the main themes and aims of the exhibition, and plan what objects and pictures should be displayed. I have to make sure the public can understand the thinking behind the exhibition, which means planning interactive displays, workshops and theatre. I also have to bring in engineers and electricians to make sure the final display is not dangerous to visitors. Before the exhibition opens, I help design and write the brochures and leaflets that we'll use to tell people about it. B Janet - Teacher of London Taxi Drivers The first thing I do when I get here at 7.30 a.m. is check the accounts. Then I see what new maps and documents need to be produced...