KCSU reaffirms ‘unique’ ban on drinking societies

The President of King's College Student Union (KCSU) yesterday circulated an email to all King's students to reaffirm their "unique" policy on exclusive societies within College, in reference to "a small minority of students" recently becoming involved with an exclusive College drinking society. This announcement reminded students that the KCSU constitution "stands against any society that encourages prejudice" and stated that exclusive drinking societies "damage the unity and exclusiveness" in the King's community because "individuals are singled" as being the "right kind of person" for a society which is "off limits to others". It also warned against encouraging "lad culture" and causing "individuals [to] feel unsafe" in College. The President further described the emergence of this kind of society as "relatively new" at King's, and expressed "sad[ness] to see this kind of culture attempting to pervade the College".

86 per cent of University high-earners are male

A Freedom of Information request submitted by Varsity has revealed that, of the 118 members of staff that were paid £140,000 or over in the financial year ended 31st July 2016, 16 were women.

In comparison with the last financial year, this year's figures show that the number of women in this high-earning group has increased by 2.7 per cent, having increased from 11. However, of the 17 individuals that are now earning over £140,000 in comparison with the last financial year, 70 per cent were men.

Cambridge student creates Sunlight-bouncing robot

Diva Tommei, a Cambridge PhD student and entrepreneur, has invented a robot that reflects light to enable rooms to be naturally illuminated. The size and shape of a beachball, the light-bot, which is named Lucy – after the Latin word lux, a unit of illuminance – contains a solar-tracking mirror and uses sensors and algorithms to reflect sun rays in the right direction. Owners of Lucy can place her in a sunny location and aim the reflected light in the direction they desire, and the bot will keep the space lit with the strength of 13 lightbulbs, which is enough to fill the space of a small apartment. Solenica, Tommei's company, describes Lucy as "[moving] sunlight from where it's wasted to where it's needed. Lucy is a daylighting system that will let you turn off the artificial lights and see the world with sunlight."

The device, which costs £162, also aims to help people with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), which affects two million people in Britain alone.

Council approves expansion proposal to create 3,500 jobs

Over 3,500 jobs are set to be created and 75,000m2 of land developed at the Cambridge Biomedical Campus after proposals for expansion from joint developers Liberty Property Trust and Countryside were approved by Cambridge City Council.

Plans for the additional 23 acres of land, shaped by a 'landscape first' approach and with extensive consultation and community engagement, will incorporate state-of-the-art research and development facilities as well as a new clinical space for Cambridge University Hospitals.

This approach aims to maximise the quality of new open spaces and to promote connectivity and communication across the campus. Managing Director of Liberty Property Trust Andrew Blevins described the approval of the proposals as "a significant stage in the evolution of the campus", stating that "the economic success of the city has taken a giant step forward" as a result of its existence.

Rodents sing like ‘jet engines’

New research co-authored at the University and published in the journal Current Biology has found that mice, rats and other rodents have a mechanism similar to those seen in the engines of supersonic jets.

This is how they are able to produce ultrasonic songs that humans cannot hear, which they use to court one another for mating and to defend territory.

These songs have often been used to study communication disorders in humans, such as stuttering.

The results of this research might help scientists in the development of more effective animal models which could be used for studying human speech disorders.