Study in China

It will come as a relief to those who failed to shine when taking an IQ test. After conducting the largest ever study of intelligence, researchers have found that far from indicating how clever you are, IQ testing is actually rather ‘meaningless’. In a bid to investigate the value of IQ, scientists asked more than 100,000 participants to complete 12 tests that required planning, reasoning, memory and attention. Researchers say that traditional IQ tests simply do not work as they cannot measure every aspect of intelligence - and said their findings are a 'wake up call' for schools, universities and others that use the tests They also filled in a survey on their background. They discovered that far from being down to one single factor, what is commonly regarded as intelligence is influenced by three different elements - short-term memory, reasoning, and verbal ability. But being good at one of these factors does not mean you are going to be equally g...

A Chinese spacecraft has carried out a deep space fly-by on an asteroid four and a half million miles away from the Earth. The Chang'e-2 probe successfully conducted the mission to scan the surface of the asteroid Toutatis . It happened on December 13 at 16.30om Beijing Time, the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense announced today. Scroll down for video The Chinese space probe flew got around two miles away from the asteroid Toutatis, officials said At 2.7 miles long and 1.5 miles wide, astronomers say it is considered a potentially hazardous asteroid because it makes repeated passes by the Earth, about every four years. In comparison, the asteroid that is thought to have destroyed the dinosaurs was approximately 10 km (6 miles) wide. The flyby was the first time an unmanned spacecraft launched from Earth has taken such a close viewing of the asteroid, named after a Celtic god. China followed in the footsteps of the...

A year-long mission to learn what lies beneath the lunar surface will culminate next week with Nasa crashing a pair of small robotic science probes into the moon. The twin Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory, or GRAIL, spacecraft will plunge into a mountain near the moon's north pole, a site selected to avoid hitting any of the Apollo or other lunar relics. The impacts, which are not expected to be visible from Earth, will take place about 20 seconds apart at 10.28pm UK time on Monday. 'They're going to be completely blown apart,' GRAIL project manager David Lehman, with Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, told reporters on a conference call. Crash landing site: The map shows the region where the twin spacecraft of NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory mission will impact on Monday Almost out of fuel and currently flying just 7 miles above the lunar surface, the probes will make a final steering ma...

They say it won't happen, at least not on Friday, but in the event the Mayan prophecy of the end of the world is right, scientists have foretold a raft of bloody and catastrophic fates for us all. Dark comets, famine, super-volcanoes, catastrophic climate change, and a plague of cancers are just some of the ends that could fulfill the prophecy. Astrophysicist Professor Jocelyn Bell Burnell, who discovered pulsars, believes the most likely disaster that could pencil Doomsday into Friday's diary is a black comet. Scroll down for video A dark comet slamming into the earth could be as destructive as the asteroid that killed off the dinosaurs Such an end would match that of the dinosaurs who after walking the planet for about 165 million years - homo sapiens has been around for a mere 200,000 years - were killed off by a 10km asteroid or comet that slammed into the planet. Professor Bell Burnell believes if the world as we know it is to end on December ...

She was said to have cancelled all engagements this month so she could rest and recover from the bout of severe morning sickness that left her hospitalised. But there are some events that not even a convalescing Duchess of Cambridge can get out of - Firm commitments, you might say. The Duchess, who is less than 12 weeks pregnant, was seen today arriving at Buckingham Palace today to enjoy a pre-Christmas lunch with other members of the Royal family. Glowing: A smiling Duchess left the lunch with Prince William having arrived separately from her husband Road to recovery: After being ill recently, the pregnant Duchess' beaming smile suggests she enjoyed her lunch at the palace Pre-Christmas celebration: Prince Charles and wife Camilla are driven home in the rain Heading home: Princess Eugenie was one of the first to leave after the two-hour lunch Fortunately she seems to have put the worst of her illness behind her and looked in go...

David Cameron’s plans to allow large extensions in back gardens could set neighbour against neighbour and blight entire districts, MPs said last night. The controversial proposals, announced in September, would allow 26-foot extensions to be built without planning permission. The three-year relaxation of existing rules was designed to boost the construction industry by removing barriers which dissuade people from extending their homes. Neighbourly disputes: David Cameron could set neighbour against neighbour by planning to allow large extensions in back gardens (file picture) But the Commons communities and local government select committee said there was no evidence that the new rules would boost construction. The MPs also said ministers had ignored the ‘social and environmental’ impact of the changes, such as the increased likelihood of neighbour disputes and the chance that streets could be rendered ugly by a rash of new extensions. They say it means th...

This is President Obama as we have never seen him before - caught unaware as he walks out of the Oval Office by none other than Spider-Man - or at least a very mini version of Spider-Man. The intimate photograph taken by White House photographer Pete Souza shows the President joking around with one of this staffer's children, who - dressed up as the super hero - pretends to shoot a spider web at Obama - who in turn reacts by pretending he is caught up in the imaginary trap. It is just one of the many behind-the-scenes pictures Mr Souza takes every year which show a more down-to-earth and touching side of the man who has just been named as TIME's Person of the Year for 2012. It is the second time he has had the honor in four years. Gotcha: President Barack Obama pretends to be caught in Spider-Man's web as he greets the son of a White House staffer in the Outer Oval Office in October Other pictures released by Souza, some of which have been seen b...