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Earth

Genome Nobelist: The hard numbers of population growth

By Catherine de Lange

21 July 2010

91av. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Let’s talk population

(Image: Brian Harris/Rex Features)

John Sulston is leading a study into the future and sustainability of global human population

, which you are heading. Why now?

The topic of population is moving up the agenda again. It was very much discussed 40 years ago. Then, with the green revolution, people felt things would be fine because the world population was increasing and everyone wasn’t starving to death as predicted. But now we are facing a whole series of resource limitations. We are also facing the results…

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