dubious pill: During recent lab experiments, aspirin and other anti-inflammatory drugs injected in newborn rats changed their sexual behaviour later in life. The drugs interfered with their brain's sex-specific development. "Our findings suggest the drugs may have a similar effect in humans,' say researchers from the University of Maryland, USA.

Melissa Hines, an expert in the neural basis of sexual behaviour at the UK-based City University, however points out that hormonal changes associated with stress have been linked to changes in the sexual behaviour of rats' offspring, but the same changes have not been observed in humans.

changing history: After a gap of 120 years, geologists have added a new period in their calendar of Earth's history: the Ediacaran period. It begins at the end of the last ice age of the