Odds and quads
These images of monkeys, from around 1840, are magic lantern slides.

These images of monkeys, from around 1840, are magic lantern slides.
A weekly look over the shoulders of our scholar-reviewers

21st-century docs - Cartoonist turns film-maker to create PhD The Movie
A Danish businessman has told a conference of European educators that university managers who resist the profit motive are sticking with a strategy that is “as dead as disco”.
The Scottish government has said that some universities north of the border should merge to avoid “overlaps in provision”.
The government’s rhetoric on the protection of science funding has not been matched by the “alarming” fiscal reality, according to the Campaign for Science and Engineering.
The government has dismissed concerns over the decision to base the UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation in central London.
Investment in higher education in the UK as a share of national wealth dropped further behind the average among industrialised countries even before the current funding reforms, according to an...
Northern Ireland has become the latest of the devolved nations to announce that its universities will charge “rest-of-UK” students up to £9,000 a year – a move that will subsidise lower fees for the...

This year’s rankings will also include a list of the 200 institutions just outside the top 200 – not ranked – but for interest and transparency. Phil Baty reports
A university at the centre of a medical research scandal is being sued by two cancer patients and the families of six deceased patients.

By Elizabeth Murphy, for Inside Higher Ed
Young people are more concerned about tuition fees and debt when thinking about university than they are about employment prospects, a new survey suggests.
Student and academic entrepreneurs need more support in universities because the UK is lagging behind other nations, a conference heard.
The University of St Andrews has joined the University of Edinburgh in offering the most expensive undergraduate courses in the UK for English, Welsh and Northern Irish students.