Today’s physics news: Friday 13 August 2010

University cuts at 35%
Vice-chancellors have been warned by Sir Gus O’Donnell, the Cabinet Secretary, that funding may be slashed by 35 per cent over the next five years.

Daily Telegraph

Daily Mail

Royal Institution scales back Christmas lectures
The Royal Institution is scaling down its popular Christmas lecture series for the first time in nearly 200 years to save on costs.

Guardian

Silk metamaterial created by scientists in step towards invisibility
Researchers from Boston University and Tufts University have developed a silk-based metamaterial that can manipulate the direction of everything between radio and infrared ‘light’.

Daily Telegraph

Home computers find rare pulsar
The Einstein @ Home volunteer-computing project has made its first discovery – a rare isolated pulsar with a very low magnetic field, thought to be created when a massive star collapses.

BBC

Nature