In 2011, when scientists at the Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands pinpointed the necessary mutations to make the H5N1 avian flu virus highly contagious, they had to weigh the risks and benefits of their discovery. H5N1—commonly known as the bird flu—first broke out in Hong Kong in 1997. A second major outbreak occurred in Thailand in 2003, and drew international attention to the disease’s lethal potential.

When the virus reemerged in 2003, it killed 346 out of the 587 people infected—nearly 60 per cent. Compared with the well-known Spanish-flu epidemic of 1918, which had a mortality rate between two and three per cent, H5N1 is a microbe with incredibly deadly possibilities.

Fortunately, H5N1 in its natural form cannot cause a pandemic and is not easily transmitted through the air. Although pathogenic inside a human host, the virus can only be transmitted from bird to human. For a pandemic to arise, the virus at hand must be transmissible between humans.

However, in addition to its high mortality rate, the virus has not been widely confronted before by humans–meaning we do not have comprehensive antibodies to protect ourselves from infection.

Therefore, it came as a surprise at the annual meeting of the European Scientific Working Group in Influenza, in Malta, when Ron Fouchier, a Dutch virologist at the Erasmus Medical Centre, reported that he had discovered the mutations necessary in this virus to make it highly contagious.

Fouchier and his team started with the natural form of the H5N1 virus and passed it through ten generations of ferrets. With each generation, the scientists selected the form of the virus that best survived in the hosts and spread it to the next generation. After 10 transmissions, the virus had acquired the necessary mutations to spread from ferret to ferret in the lab. As ferrets have a very similar immune and respiratory system to humans, it is likely that these mutations would also enable this mutated H5N1 to spread from human to human, making it highly contagious.

This experiment caused widespread alarm for multiple reasons. When Fouchier examined the flu cells, he realized that there were only five genetic changes in two of the viruses’ eight genes. What’s more, each mutation had already been found naturally circulating in influenza viruses. Essentially, the data pointed to the possibility that nature could do precisely what Fouchier had done in the lab—all five of these mutations could, at one point, be found together, naturally, in one dangerous H5N1 virus.

More alarming was the fact that this deadly H5N1 virus had been deliberately created in the lab; and, if placed in the wrong hands, could be used as a weapon in biological warfare.

After the release of this experiment, scientists divided into two camps. One camp felt that this information was necessary to mitigate future outbreaks of H5N1. The other camp questioned the importance of this data in terms of providing information to create treatments or diagnoses for such a virus.

Professor Greg Matlashewski, previous Chairman of the department of microbiology and immunology at McGill, and leader of a World Health Organization program to eliminate visceral leishmaniasis from Northern India, Nepal and Bangladesh, sits in the latter camp. He believes that although there is a payoff, it is not big enough with regard to the risk.

“My question is this: if this information is so important scientifically, what have we learned from our previous such experiments?” he said.

According to Matlashewski, few tangible applications arose from reviving the Spanish influenza virus. He therefore questions the logic of performing a second experiment in which another dangerous flu pathogen is created simply for the sake of science.

“Five years ago scientists re-established the Spanish influenza viruses—one of the worst pathogens in human history—and brought it back to life in the lab. What have we learned from that virus, and if we haven’t learned anything practical with respect to diagnosis or treatment of vaccines, then why do it again?”

Although there is some payoff from these experiments, these results could also have been obtained through other methods, if the virus were to emerge again in the population. Scientists could quickly perform genetic sequencing tests on the actual virus, and acquire a similar and more relevant set of information.

For Matlashewski, “the payoff is not enough to do these experiments; these are really potentially dangerous pathogens we are creating.”

At the 2013 International Consumer Electronics Show (ICES) in Las Vegas, Nevada, over 150,000 people watched as companies revealed a new wave of smartphone technology. More than just miniature computers, phones on display at the ICES were designed to be remote controls for the consumer’s life, connecting apps to household appliances and home security systems.

According to The New York Times, consumers responded warmly to the notion of linking their home to their phones, and many large companies have jumped on this technological trend. On Jan. 7, the wireless carrier AT&T announced plans to commercially launch, in March, a smart and secure home automation interface called Digital Life. The product will allow consumers to carry out an array of home-related tasks with their smartphones, including turning down the thermostat, monitoring the house for intruders, and even operating the coffee maker.

Google has also made progress towards integrating smartphones with home appliances. In May 2011, it developed a program known as the Android Open Accessory. Any device designed with this technology has the ability to communicate with Android phones or tablets. Through the program, developers will be able to build a wide range of accessories compatible with any Android phone.

The potential applications of this technology were made clear with a simple but powerful demonstration at Google’s I/O Conference, which brings together thousands of technology developers. The phone was hooked up to an exercise bike and using an app on the Android smartphone, consumers were able to track statistics like number of calories burnt.

The aim behind these technologies is to bring the home, the car, and other accessories under the control of a single device, thereby achieving integration and convenience.

Google has taken this idea a step further, and envisions the entire home as a network of accessories, all of which can be controlled through an Android phone. The home automation project, Android@Home, seeks to connect all appliances via Wi-Fi or an open wireless protocol to your smartphone.

The potential applications of Android@Home seem endless. At its I/O Conference, Google demostrated that with Android@Home, you could link your alarm clock to the lights and stereo in the room. As the alarm time approaches, the lights and stereo gradually increase in brightness and volume—a potential solution for those who struggle with waking up for 8:30 a.m. classes.

Pranay Mistry, the founder of SixthSense, came out with another tool geared towards giving us more electronic control over the home. TeleTouch, a smartphone app, allows consumers to point their smartphones at any appliance, and control it remotely with their touchscreen.

TeleTouch works by using the smartphone’s camera and computer vision to identify what appliance it is pointed at. Using Internet Protocol (IP) codes for these devices, the smartphone could become the control center for every appliance by addressing them wirelessly.

Despite the excitement, skeptics have also found a remote control smartphone for your home to be unnecessary. Would so much control be beneficial? While bringing your home under the control of a single device may seem attractive, it also poses security risks. If your smartphone were lost and unlocked, someone else would have complete control over practically every device inside your home, including alarm systems.

In response, director of business development at Z-Wave Alliance (a consortium of companies that make connected appliances) Bill Scheffler told The New York Times, “It used to be that people would say, ‘Why does anybody want a remote control for a TV if you can get up and change the channel?’ It’s just progress.”

The Tyndall effect is the principle responsible for blue eyes, and also happens to account for the blue colour of the sky. It’s a phenomenon that occurs when light is scattered by “colloid” particles—solid particles of 40-900 nanometers in diameter that float in suspension in a liquid medium.

When white light passes through a medium, it ‘divides’ into different colours. The various colours into which white light splits depend on the frequency of the light. The colour blue results from white light at a much higher frequency and shorter wavelength than the colour red.

Due to the size and nature of colloids, shorter wavelengths of light, such as blue, fail to pass through the dense particles, and are reflected back to the observer. Conversely, light of longer wavelengths, such as red, orange, and yellow, can pass through the object.

The reflection of blue light operates under a similar principle that allows very long wavelengths like radio waves to pass through solid objects, while short wavelengths are stopped and reflected; the size of the particles that make up the wall are so miniscule that metre-long radio waves are unaffected passing through. By the same principle, flour suspended in water will actually appear light blue rather than white.

The human iris consists of three layers. One is made up of microscopic solid particles suspended in a fluid-like layer, with a light-absorbing layer beneath, and a spongy stroma layer between.

Contrary to the popular notion that we have blue pigments in our eyes, we are only able to produce brown and yellow pigments in the iris—the combination of the two manage to make every eye colour we observe through tricks of light.

For instance, more melanin–a light-absorbing pigment–in the iris will cause a greater proportion of light to be absorbed, rather than reflected as ‘backscatter,’ creating the effect of brown or black eyes. This backscattering phenomenon redirects waves of light back out of the eye, affecting shorter wavelengths like blue far more strongly.

For those with blue eyes, melanin is only present in the last of the three layers of the iris. The top two layers are translucent, meaning that little light is absorbed. More light is reflected as backscatter, making the eyes appear blue. In fact, babies often have blue eyes for a short period of time, because their irises have not yet been fully developed. As the particles produced in the stroma get larger as you age, blue eyes in children often turn grey.