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Why Finnish babies sleep in cardboard boxes. Image copyright Milla Kontkanen For 75 years, Finland's expectant mothers have been given a box by the state. It's like a starter kit of clothes, sheets and toys that can even be used as a bed. And some say it helped Finland achieve one of the world's lowest infant mortality rates. It's a tradition that dates back to the 1930s and it's designed to give all children in Finland, no matter what background they're from, an equal start in life. The maternity package - a gift from the government - is available to all expectant mothers. It contains bodysuits, a sleeping bag, outdoor gear, bathing products for the baby, as well as nappies, bedding and a small mattress. With the mattress in the bottom, the box becomes a baby's first bed.

Image copyright Finnish Labour Museum Werstas Mothers have a choice between taking the box, or a cash grant, currently set at 140 euros, but 95% opt for the box as it's worth much more. The tradition dates back to 1938. Contents of the box Not for long. 10 things we didn't know last week. 1. The French had no official word for French kissing… until now. It's "galocher". Find out more (CBS) 2. XXXXXL size is being introduced for men at department store Debenhams, a three-X leap from its former largest size XXL. Find out more (Daily Mail) 3. Find out more 4. More details (New Scientist) 5. More details (Smithsonian Magazine) 6. Find out more (Daily Mail) 7. Find out more (LA Times) 8. 6X8 is the multiplication children get wrong most while 9x12 takes longest. Find out more (Times) 9. Find out more. HIV inner shell structure revealed. Researchers have for the first time unravelled the complex structure of the inner protein shell of HIV.

The US team, reporting in Nature, also worked out exactly how all the components of the shell or 'capsid' fit together at the atomic level. Until now the exact structure had proved elusive because of the capsid's large size and irregular shape. The finding opens the way for new types of drugs, the researchers from the University of Pittsburgh said. It was already known that the capsid, which sits inside the outer membrane of the virus, was a cone-shaped shell made up of protein sub-units in a lattice formation. But because it is huge, asymmetrical and non-uniform, standard techniques for working out the structure had proved ineffective. The team used advanced imaging techniques and a supercomputer to calculate how the 1,300 proteins which make up the cone-shaped capsid fit together. She added that the fast mutation rate of HIV made drug resistance a big problem.

What can we learn from children's writing? 30 May 2013Last updated at 20:45 ET A BBC Radio 2 short story competition aimed at children up to the age of 13 has had 90,000 entries. It's an exercise in creativity but the words they used have also been put into a database which gives us an insight into the way they think. Every one of the 40 million words from the story-writing competition has been collated and analysed by lexicographers at the Oxford University Press, in order to monitor and track children's language. It is the third edition of the 500 Words competition, organised by the Chris Evans Breakfast Show, and the second year the OUP has analysed the entrants. Here are some of the findings. Kids write "mum" more than "dad" Mums may get more mentions but dads are portrayed as action men The most common word of all was "mum" - or some variation of it, such as "mam" or "mar" - with a total of 115,627 mentions.

"Dad" trailed behind, only just scraping into the top 15 most common words, with about half of the mentions of "mum". Brain cells give insight into Down's syndrome. Brain cells have been grown from skin cells of adults with Down's syndrome in research that could shed new light on the condition. US scientists found a reduction in connections among the brain cells and possible faults in genes that protect the body from ageing. The research in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences gives an insight into early brain development. Down's syndrome results from an extra copy of one chromosome. This generally causes some level of learning disability and a range of distinctive physical features. A team led by Anita Bhattacharyya, a neuroscientist at the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, grew brain cells from skin cells of two individuals with Down's syndrome.

This involved reprogramming skin cells to transform them into a type of stem cell that could be turned into any cell in the body. Brain cells were then grown in the lab, providing a way to look at early brain development in Down's syndrome. Terms of endearment: The many languages of love. "Chouchou" is Carla Bruni's term for her husband, the former French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Samantha Cameron was heard on microphone saying "I love you babe" to her man, Prime Minister David Cameron - and Michelle Obama described the most-tweeted picture ever (above) with the words, "That's my honey giving me a hug. " Some terms of endearment can be used in many languages - "baby", "angel" and "sweetheart" for example. But some don't travel as well as you might think.

If you call a French person "honey" ("miel") he or she may take it as a unflattering comparison with a sticky mess. And how would you react if someone called you a cauliflower, a flea, or a baby elephant? 1. Petit chou "Chou" (cabbage) is the French equivalent of "sweetheart". 2. Chuchuzinho "Chuchu" is the word for "squash" - but strangely similar to the French "chouchou". 3. Tamago gata no kao In Japan, women are frequently called "an egg with eyes" by those who love them. 4. Terron de azucar 5. Buah hatiku 6. Ma puce 7. 8. Neuron growth in children 'leaves no room for memories' The reason we struggle to recall memories from our early childhood is down to high levels of neuron production during the first years of life, say Canadian researchers.

The formation of new brain cells increases the capacity for learning but also clears the mind of old memories. This could be behind the absence of long-term memory events from early childhood, known as infantile amnesia. The findings were presented to the Canadian Association of Neuroscience. Neurogenesis, or the formation of new neurons in the hippocampus - a region of the brain known to be important for learning and remembering, reaches its peak before and after birth. It then declines steadily during childhood and adulthood.

Dr Paul Frankland and Dr Sheena Josselyn, from the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto and the University of Toronto, wanted to find out how the process of new neuron generation impacted on memory storage. They carried out their research on younger and older mice in the lab. Centuries-old frozen plants revived. Plants that were frozen during the "Little Ice Age" centuries ago have been observed sprouting new growth, scientists say. Samples of 400-year-old plants known as bryophytes have flourished under laboratory conditions. Researchers say this back-from-the-dead trick has implications for how ecosystems recover from the planet's cyclic long periods of ice coverage. The findings appear in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. They come from a group from the University of Alberta, who were exploring an area around the Teardrop Glacier, high in the Canadian Arctic.

The glaciers in the region have been receding at rates that have sharply accelerated since 2004, at about 3-4m per year. That is exposing land that has not seen light of day since the so-called Little Ice Age, a widespread climatic cooling that ran roughly from AD 1550 to AD 1850. "It's a whole world of what's coming out from underneath the glaciers that really needs to be studied," Dr La Farge said. Late spring: 10 consequences of the late spring. The UK is on track for its coldest spring in more than 30 years and there are consequences - some rather unexpected. It's cold, it's raining, it's sunny, it's snowing, it's cold, it's raining and so on. That just about sums up the UK's weather over the past few months. Early figures from the Met Office show spring is on course to have been the coldest in the UK since 1979. The late spring has had knock-on effects - both expected and unexpected. 1.

An apple bonanza. "I have never seen apple blossom like it," says Chris Creed, horticulture adviser at environmental consultancy ADAS. Different varieties of apple tree are also blossoming together. 2. Usually, different tree pollen is released in succession, starting with the alder in January. "Hay fever sufferers could be badly affected," warns the National Pollen and Aerobiology Research Unit. 3. They have been the "standout performers" in footwear over the last few months, according to the British Retail Consortium (BRC). 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

Science & Environment - Ten species named after famous people. Every year, somewhere between 15,000 and 25,000 new species of animal are discovered, so how do scientists come up with original names for them? Not surprisingly, some seek inspiration in the world of popular culture, as witnessed recently when a scientist discovered a fossil of an extinct creature with scissor-like claws, and named it Kooteninchela deppi in honour of – you guessed it – Edward Scissorhands star Johnny Depp. It’s not simply a matter of randomly attaching any name to a new species you think you may have discovered in the field or a museum.

Your findings have to be accepted for publication in a scientific journal for you to give it a name – but once that’s done it lasts forever. Naming species after celebrities is a very good way to draw attention to your finding. Some are a tribute, like the small crustacean parasite named after reggae legend Bob Marley. Here, we list some of the weird and wonderful species named after famous... and infamous people. 10 super cute animals that are also total cannibals. Birds do it. Bees do it. Even educated fleas do it. Let’s do it. Let’s eat our young? 1. True story, you guys: When we were kids, my sister and I had these gerbils, Moon Unit and Dweezil. Neither of us have any idea what became of Moon Unit and Dweezil. 2. Here, have some nightmares! I really hope that Japanese lady that wants to give birth to a shark and then eat it does not go with this particular breed.

*Ok fine, Sand Tiger Sharks are not necessarily cuddly and adorable, but cuddly and adorable is kind of new to me, so just bear with me here, ok? 3. This little piggy went to market, this little piggy stayed home, this little piggy had roast beef, and this little piggy was eaten by it’s mother. Approximately 5% of first time pig moms will indulge in “savaging”– an overt aggression towards their young, often involving cannibalistic infanticide. 4. AW! 5. Sea squirts don’t eat their young. 6. 7. The whole female praying mantis eating the head of her mate after banging is mostly a myth. 8.