Max Perutz science writing award 2009

The Medical Research Council has posted details of the Max Perutz science writing award 2009. Open to MRC-funded PhD students, the award, worth £1000, "has attracted more than a thousand entries since it began 12 years ago".

Winner and runners "will be invited to an awards ceremony in central London on 26 August 2009 and will secure a place on a masterclass with professional writers". The judges include Alok Jha, the Guardian’s science and environment correspondent. Entries have to be in by 29 June 2009.

A stunning year for biology, but what about the physical sciences?

What would your top 10 stories be for 2007? Alok Jha of The Guardian offers his own selection, with a heavy emphasis on the life sciences, 2007: A year of stunning progress in biology.

Those of us who roam mostly on the side of the physical sciences might offer a different list. The one entry in there, on dark matter, differs from many of the life science stories in having little possible application.

The odd thing is that it takes can less time for discoveries in the physical sciences to become useful applications. That is because they don't usually have to go through so many regulatory hoops and clinical trials.