Nasa has taken another giant leap towards uncovering the origins of the universe – launching a new space telescope on a mission to explore the building blocks of existence.

The US space agency's Spherex – the Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer – will survey hundreds of millions of galaxies and "their combined cosmic glow" to give scientists new "insights into the universe's evolution since the Big Bang", said The Independent.

How does Spherex work?
Spherex will spend two years orbiting Earth from a distance of just over 400 miles (650km), collecting imagery of galaxies and stars. Its camera uses near-infrared wavelengths and splits incoming light into 120 colours, rather like "a prism creating a rainbow from a sunray", said The Times. This technique, known as spectroscopy, will help scientists work out the "chemical footprint" of each object and its distance, "indicating when in the universe's history it was formed".

What is Spherex looking for?
The $488 million (£377 million) telescope will help us "answer fundamental questions", said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, Nasa's acting head of astrophysics. "How does the universe work? How did we get here within that universe, and are we alone?"

Mapping the universe in this way will also shed light on the physics of a cosmic phenomenon called "inflation" – or "what sparked the universe to increase in size by a trillion-trillionfold nearly instantaneously after the Big Bang", said CNN.

Spherex will also search for hidden reserves of water, carbon dioxide and other life-sustaining molecules frozen within the clouds of gas and dust in which new planets and stars form.

Is there anything else out there?
Packed alongside Spherex on the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launch was Nasa's $150 million (£116 million) Punch, or Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere – a "constellation of four suitcase-sized satellites designed to study our Sun", said Space.com.

The four satellites will work together to take 3D images of the Sun's corona to discover the origins of solar wind, and track its journey across the solar system. Scientists hope data captured by Punch will help them more accurately predict these events. "Punch is going to revolutionise our physical understanding of space weather events and how they propagate through the inner heliosphere on the way to Earth," said Craig DeForest, Punch's principal investigator.

Britain is falling out of love with Chinese restaurants, according to data that shows our consumption of their fare has more than halved since 2007.

Since the first Chinese restaurant in the UK opened in Glasshouse Street, off Piccadilly Circus, in 1908, Chinese food has "always been popular in the UK", said The Telegraph – "until recently".

In 2008, the average person ate 15g of Chinese food a week outside the home, according to government data. But that dropped to 12g by 2014 and to 10g by 2018. And consumption failed to bounce back after the pandemic, stalling at 7g in 2023. The Canton-style food that Chinese restaurants have traditionally served in the UK is "truly dying", Gordon Chong of the British Chinese Society told The Telegraph.

Bad press
Chinese restaurants and takeaways have had to contend with "harmful, stereotypical fear-mongering headlines" and "constant bad press" linking Chinese food to "serious health warnings", said Angela Hui, whose parents owned a Chinese takeaway in Wales, on Vice.

The "meteoric rise" of food-ordering apps has also seen smaller, independent businesses "getting left behind", particularly those run by generations who opened restaurants and takeaways in the 1980s and 1990s. Younger generations are increasingly reluctant to take over the family businesses amid soaring rents, rising costs and changing consumer tastes. Instead, second-generation Chinese Britons are increasingly focused on "getting into professional work", Chong told The Telegraph.

Regional success
Although traditional Canton-style "British Chinese" food is on the decline, there is growing interest in regional cuisines, particularly those from Shenzhen and the northern regions of China.

Hungry Brits are "being more adventurous" and "enjoying great dishes" such as xiao long bao and dim sum, Joe Groves, head of consumer communications at Deliveroo, told Vice, and demand for regional Chinese food like "Sichuan, Xi'an and Hunan cuisine" is on the rise.

When enjoying days out, there's no need to leave your hound at home. From splashing around at a lido to exploring the River Thames by boat, these dog-friendly activities will keep you – and your pet – entertained.

Boat trip along the River Thames
London's GoBoat has a "charming" collection of self-drive picnic boats that are ideal for a dog-friendly day out, said Secret London. Each boat comfortably seats up to six people, with four-legged companions also "more than welcome" on board. Pile in and while away an afternoon sailing through "leafy" Kingston or "tranquil" Little Venice.

Festival for dog lovers
If you're "obsessed" with canines, a day out at Dogfest is a must, said The i Paper. The festival is packed with activities, from hay-bale racing to agility courses and training sessions with expert behaviourists. There's also a "vast" collection of stalls brimming with "items you never knew you needed for your dog", and a light-hearted dog show that is open to everyone. This year, you can find Dogfest at a handful of locations across the UK, including Ragley Hall, Warwickshire, from 10 to 11 May, and Knebworth House, Hertfordshire, from 7 to 8 June.

Dip at a dog-friendly lido
Lidos across the UK have enjoyed a "quiet resurgence" in recent years, said The Telegraph, and now "your dog can get in on the action too". For one day every October or November, Jubilee Pool in Penzance lets "dogs dive into its waters" to splash about before the pool is cleaned. A word of warning: it isn't heated, so bring your wetsuit for a "bracing swim" with your pooch.

In an age of open hostility, Terry Pratchett's militant decency is more urgent than ever
Marc Burrows for Indy Voices
Ten years have passed since Terry Pratchett's death, but his fantasy books still remind us of the "weirdness, cruelty and everyday brilliance of humanity", writes Marc Burrows. Readers responded not because his stories "were set in a flat world carried through space by a turtle but because they were achingly, and often ridiculously, human". At his core was a "finely tuned sense of injustice that powered his best work", and "now more than ever", we need that.

Cowardly killers must not be allowed to shirk sentencing
Sean O'Neill in The Times
At a murder trial, only after a conviction is secured "does the focus really turn to the person whose life has been violently ended", when the victim impact statement is read, writes Sean O'Neill. This week, crossbow killer Kyle Clifford "followed the example of other cowardly killers" who "shirk this moment of reckoning" and stayed in his cell for the reading. "If they refuse to come to court" then the court should "come to them".

Why I'm against IVF, as an IVF Baby
Olivia Wrafter for The Critic
"No one has a right to have children," writes Olivia Wrafter, but "for proponents of IVF", that "doesn't seem to factor into the equation". The "whole premise" of IVF is that "the adult's wants" are "the sole decision-making factor in this process" and "the only ethical consideration". I'm "deeply uncomfortable with the fact that I was conceived through IVF", because "being conceived in a test tube, rather than my mother's uterus, is spiritually unmooring".