Today's news

Funding crisis deepens
Academics fear 50 per cent target is doomed as the Department for Education and Skills looks at cost. (The Guardian)

Clash of egos shakes world of physics
Stephen Hawking, Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge University, was accused yesterday of receiving instant credibility because of his celebrity status. His accuser was a mild-mannered retired scientist, Peter Higgs, a particle physicist, formerly of Edinburgh University. (The Independent)

The bones of Boney’s army
Thousands of corpses of the foot-soldiers who perished in Napoleon’s disastrous 1812 retreat from Moscow have been unearthed by Lithuanian archaeologists. (The Guardian)

Girl to have tracking device implanted
Danielle Duval, 11, is to become the first child in Britain to have a microchip tracking device implanted in her arm so that she can be traced at all times. Her parents decided to act after the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. The device will be implanted by Kevin Warwick, professor of cybernetics at Reading University. (The Times, The Guardian)

Wine halves risk of heart attack
Men who drink wine every day after suffering a heart attack have the risk of suffering another one cut by half, according to Dr Michael de Lorgeril of the Joseph Fourier University, Grenoble, France. (The Daily Telegraph)

Down the US route
Sheldon Rothblatt asks whether UK higher education can learn anything from the US. (The Guardian)

Poly genesis
Have the new universities lost their way since they emerged from the old polytechnics? (The Guardian)

Why exclusive does not mean best
Vice-chancellor of the Open University Brenda Gourley writes (The Independent)

The killer instinct
The liberal belief that violence is learnt from our environment is wrong. We are all innately aggressive, says Steven Pinker, professor of psychology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. (The Times)

Quick fix for hernias
A new technique for hernia repair can be carried out under local anaesthetic, thanks to pioneering work by Professor Andrew Kingsnorth of the NHS’s special hernia centre in Plymouth, Devon. (The Times)

Youngsters get less exercise than elderly
The lure of TV, computer games and the internet has left a generation of children getting less exercise than pensioners. Many are ferried to school and around their neighbourhoods by parents anxious about their safety, said Dr Kimberly Fisher of the Institute for Social and Economic Research. (The Daily Mail)

Is ecstasy harmful?
Scientists struggle to provide an answer. (The Independent)

Forget everything you know
Will Self on philosopher John Grey (The Independent)