I'll still be writing longer pieces, as an online complement to items that run on the programme. But it's goodbye in this format

Funny, because just a few days ago a colleague decided to check out a blog I wrote on the power of aspirin - before deciding whether or not to buy a tonne of the stuff, to help ward off cancer.

And that got me thinking about other postings, and their unexpected ripple-effect, like the one that prompted an invite to a closed door meeting ahead of the Copenhagen climate conference, and led to interviews with key players.

Then there was the one that prompted contacts from within the UN system to get in touch over how to make the best use of science in warning the world about tsunamis, or nuclear accidents.

And my first pandemic flu blog, which kept people calling with suggestions for fresh lines for the programme.

Others that made a mark include a posting on the death of the campaigner Haydn Lewis, who told the world so much about the plight of haemophiliacs in the UK by being brave enough to make his own story public.

My personal favourites include: bringing together Stephen Hawking, Eels and the Theory of Everything, uncovering the truth behind flammable water in taps on America's east coast.

And the numerous items that didn't quite make it onto Newsnight, but needed telling, like interviews with relatives of Alan Turing - before the surprise official apology from the government over the way their computer pioneer uncle had been treated.

I'll miss all that, Susan

In both cases the fatal brain-wasting disease could have been picked up during surgery.

At Queen's Hospital in Romford in Essex, 21 brain surgery patients have received letters.

A further 38 patients in Wales were told on Saturday they had been put at risk.

Self employed builder, Paul Davey who attended the hospital in Romford said: "Worry just runs away with you doesn't it, the what ifs, there's no treatment, no cures, so if it comes - that's it.

"When you show people the letter... well its like well it's only a small chance, but imagine if your name was on the letter. It's alright when it's someone else's name."

Mr Davey received a letter from his hospital telling him that the mother of a patient who had an operation in the same operating theatre had developed an inherited form of CJD.

That patient had then been tested, and found to be carrying a gene that meant she too could go on to develop the disease.

The letter said his risk was thought to be extremely small, but that he should protect public health by not donating blood, organs or tissues.

"If the chances were that small why did they send the letter? I'd be better not knowing. You can't tell someone that they can't give blood or visit a dentist and then tell them it's not serious," Mr Davey told the BBC's Newsnight programme.

The other incident was at a hospital in Wales. In this case, Public Health Wales is not revealing the name of the hospital, nor the type of surgery involved.

In both situations, the hospitals say they followed normal practices to clean, disinfect and sterilise the surgical instruments involved.

One of the UK's leading experts on prion diseases, Professor John Collinge, said such incidents are not uncommon.

He said the risk to patients from contaminated surgical instruments was believed to be small but is not yet quantified. He thought more could be done to stop this happening at all.

His team has developed an effective prion deactivation soak, a bit like a biological washing powder, and even has a commercial partner, but the substance is not being used in hospitals.

"I am surprised this hasn't been picked up," Prof Collinge told Newsnight. "It's concerning as a clinician to hear that patients are continuing to be notified they might have been exposed to contaminated instruments when we thought several years ago this problem was solved...

"Clearly it takes time to change practice in hospitals but I am concerned this hasn't been taken up more speedily."

Conservative MP, Sir Paul Beresford, is seeking an adjournment debate on the issue on Wednesday. He is concerned about a lack of action by the Department of Health and whether worries about extra cost might explain why these technologies were not in use.

"I think if the hospitals were under pressure and the cleaner was provided at a commercially viable cost - which I think would be low if they had a huge market ie every single hospital in the country - then the costs would be lower.

"The other side of cost is prevention - prevention of having these absolutely mortified people getting these horrendous notices saying they are at risk.

"I want the DoH to go back to the commercial firms and give them the light to go ahead by explaining to them that they intend them to have the commercial market - that will inspire them to do the final tests and changes to make it more viable for the hospitals to use."

CJD is one of a group of so-called prion diseases. Unlike viruses and bacteria, prions are extremely hardy, and cannot be destroyed by normal decontamination methods, such as autoclaving of surgical instruments.

Newsnight has discovered that in the aftermath of the BSE, or "mad cow", incident in the UK, several research teams produced prion deactivation techniques.

The human form of BSE, or variant CJD, is another of these prion diseases. The research groups had even teamed up with commercial companies, keen to develop these decontamination products.

Professor Collinge's team worked with Dupont. Another was a spin out from Edinburgh University, and a third emerged from the government-sponsored Health Protection Agency (HPA). But all three products seem to have quietly disappeared before they could be proved in a hospital setting.

Edinburgh University told Newsnight: "It is believed that end users would only be prepared to adopt (our method) if legally required to do so."

The HPA said there was "no incentive for hospitals to use it. We did the research and development, but we don't set the policy". They referred us to the Department of Health.

Professor Collinge added: "The DoH doesn't now give central diktats to NHS trusts... it is frustrating things don't seem to be joined up.

"We spend a lot of money on ensuring bloods are safe as possible in this country but we seem to be doing relatively little with surgical instruments, and that doesn't seem entirely logical."

The DoH said technologies to improve hospital infection control go to its Rapid Review Panel (RRP).

The product from Professor Collinge's group was deemed to have potential, but he was told that more work was needed in a clinical setting.

The company was given advice on how to improve the application in September 2010 and it's now up to the manufacturer to decide whether to take it further.

Dupont says it made a business decision to withdraw its prion deactivator some time ago, and doesn't want to comment further.

His funeral is today.

Harry was in touch with the BBC for many years, and Newsnight interviewed him back in 2008, when we were working on a film on novel technologies for capturing carbon. You can see the website interview with Harry and Newsnight film here.

Harry had a colourful life. He worked as a television cameraman, filming some of the most notable events and people of the last century, including Mother Teresa when she was relatively unknown and the World Cup of 1966.

After filming the UK nuclear tests in the Monte Bello Islands in Australia and seeing fellow crew members apparently suffer from what they believed to be radiation poisoning, Harry became interested in unconventional ideas on nutrition.

His view of the world, and our use of resources, began to change when he filmed a documentary called One Man's Hunger on poverty in northern India. He saw great promise in growing algae as a source of food, and many mainstream scientists now agree with him.

One group, the FREdome Visionary Trust based in Hertfordshire, is securing start-up funding for a demonstration project along the lines of Harry's thinking.

This uses sewage waste - sent by tanker to arid coastlines, instead of being dumped at sea - to reclaim land and grow algae and other crops as a source of food, fuel and fertiliser, as well as trees to create the required moist microclimate.

The founder of the project, Greg Peachey, has been invited by the Arab Water Forum to talk on desert reclamation at their annual congress later this year.

Harry spent much of his time building up a substantial store of 35 years worth of research materials on this subject, now stored in a barn in Suffolk.

This archive is looking for a home, without which the material it contains will most likely be destroyed. Anyone interested?

They have been seeking compensation ever since to adequately reflect their ordeal. In particular they've been seeking parity with payments made in the Republic of Ireland, as recommended by an independent inquiry into this issue two years ago, led by Lord Archer of Sandwell.

You can see the first Newsnight item on this issue from April 17 2007, and more recently on 19 March last 2010, filmed before campaigner and haemophiliac, Haydn Lewis, died.

The government today announced the results of its review of payments to those affected.

Much of this will be welcomed by campaigners and affected families. An apology on behalf of this government and earlier administrations, free prescriptions, counselling and improved payments in the form of lump sums worth tens of thousands of pounds are all acknowledged as overdue across the political spectrum.

Those affected will also welcome moves to make sure that people infected with Hepatitis C and those infected with HIV receive near equality in payments.

But, today's announcement will not satisfy everyone, particularly on the issue of parity with Ireland.

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley was at pains to make clear that the money he plans to pay out does not reflect liability: "We are recognising the harm and distress that has occurred, and making ex-gratia payments..."

He sees this as an important distinction with the situation in Ireland, where payments to some individuals have reached £1m. This government, in common with earlier administrations, has refused to assess compensation on the same basis, arguing that the Irish blood transfusion service was found to be at fault, and that this is not the case in the UK.

One long-standing campaigner, Carol Grayson, reacted angrily to this position this afternoon, accusing the government of misinformation.

Her husband Pete died in 2005 after receiving a number of contaminated blood transfusions in the 1970s, and contracting HIV and hepatitis.

"Haemophiliacs will be mounting a legal challenge as soon as possible, no government should be above the law and must be accountable to the people. This will be a test case for truth and justice. The fight goes on, far from bringing closure, today's announcement has fuelled even more anger, and will definitely not bring resolution."

And this today from the Haemophilia Society: "Whilst there are things to be welcomed in the government's statement, the haemophilia community will see this as a gesture rather than settlement. These measures will not bring closure for the majority and a great opportunity has been missed."

The campaigners themselves were congratulated for keeping this issue in the spotlight, and for so long.

Diane Abbott, replying for the opposition, mentioned Haydn Lewis, who died last year and featured in a number of Newsnight items.

Tragically, his haemophiliac brother, Gareth, also died just before Christmas. Gareth too was named in the House by Jenny Willott MP for his work on keeping this issue in the public eye.

His death, she said, highlights the urgency of addressing the compensation issue.

In April last year, Andrew March, a composer who contracted HIV and hepatitis C through an NHS blood transfusion, won a High Court challenge over compensation levels.

Mr March had criticised the-then government's refusal to match the higher payouts in the Republic of Ireland .

Mr Justice Holman ruled that the way the UK government had reached its decision was indeed flawed, but said it was not his role to rule on the amount paid. He cautioned campaigners then against "false optimism".

Nearly five thousand people were exposed to Hepatitis C before routine heat treating of blood products began in the mid 1980s to kill viruses. They were mainly haemophiliacs, who were given a product to help their blood clot. Of these, more than 1,200 were also infected with HIV.

He was asked about the 14 deaths in Northern Ireland, and why this appears to be disproportionately higher than flu deaths in England.

He replied that the figure of 50 official deaths to date is the number that has been "verified" by the Health Protection Agency (HPA), then conceded: "There have been more deaths..." but, he explained, these have yet to be verified as deaths from flu by the HPA.

Certainly, we were hearing last week that the true number of deaths was higher than 50. So is this simply a case of the wheels of bureaucracy moving slowly?

Confusingly, in the latest HPA weekly national influenza report, the paragraph on mortality data seems to imply that the 50 deaths represent those across the UK... and yet the Department of Health has just confirmed to me that this number is deaths for England only.

Perhaps the real picture will emerge this week with the latest update due on Thursday..?

Anyone around 45 years of age now has another potential weapon to help minimise their risk of developing cancer. We already know it's important to avoid becoming overweight and drinking too much alcohol, now taking a daily dose of aspirin looks a sensible step to take for many.

If the scientists behind this latest research are right, then taking just 75mg of aspirin for five years or more can have a dramatic effect.

In their paper, published in The Lancet, a team from Oxford University and other centres looked at data from some 25,000 patients, mostly from the UK.

The figures are impressive, with aspirin cutting overall cancer deaths by at least one fifth over 20 years.

Apparently, aspirin is best absorbed if taken at night and with calcium. So a 75mg dose along with a glass of milk (which might also dampen down stomach irritation) looks likely to become a common bedtime ritual. Though you have to stick at it for at least five years to see any benefit, the researchers say.

They stop short of urging healthy people to take aspirin because it is known to increase the risk of internal bleeding. But they say the new findings shift the risk-benefit balance in favour of taking it.

Of course there are some who should not just go ahead and self-medicate. In fact, everyone is being advised to talk to their GP first.

Aspirin can interact with other medicines, and anyone under 16; people prone to asthma, allergies, liver, kidney or digestive problems; pregnant or breast-feeding women and those with a stomach ulcer or bleeding disorders should certainly not start taking aspirin without professional advice.

Talking to the lead researcher, Professor Peter Rothwell of Oxford University, I wondered how he thinks aspirin performs its apparently remarkable feat.

He reminded me of our body's natural ability to stop the uncontrollable growth of cells, which is essentially what cancer is.

This cell death, or "apoptosis", is a normal, programmed process by which cells die to allow new, healthy tissue to grow.

"There's great interest in the effect of aspirin on the control of the development of cells that are beginning to be abnormal. Aspirin enhances this process... the ability of cells to self-regulate," he said.

He even hinted that aspirin might have an effect against cancers that have already started to develop, that is as a potential treatment as well as a preventative: "We should have more data on that in the next few months."

Prof Rothwell wants the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), or perhaps the cancer charities, to come up with guidelines to help people decide if they should take aspirin everyday, or not.

He does not think advice should come from the scientists who did the work.

"I think some kind of national advice would be helpful. In general, there aren't situations where we insist... even on folic acid we only advise women to take it. On personal decisions about prevention, it's difficult to be dogmatic, but I'm 46 and I take aspirin myself", Prof Rothwell said.

So far, Cancer Research UK is sounding a cautious welcome to the research.

Evidence to support the incredible value of aspirin has been increasing in recent years. We already knew it could be helpful for some people to protect against heart disease and stroke. Prof Rothwell says its protective signal for cancer is even stronger.

And encouragingly, it seems to work especially well against so-called adenocarcinomas. These are cancers linked to glandular tissue, and a type that is on the increase.

He is head of Seasonal to Decadal Prediction, which includes seasonal forecasting, decadal forecasting and modelling of climate variability.

After the barbecue summer fall out, the Met Office has of course stopped giving out seasonal forecasts - at least to the general public. But here's what he had to say about this week's record-breaking weather.

Why is it so cold in northern Europe so early?

"What's happened so far is consistent with El Nino/La Nina signals." Briefly put, in an El Nino year, like that of last winter, the Pacific is warm, and Europe's winters are cold and dry. In a La Nina year, which is where we are now, European winters are warmer and wetter.

But all of that is for LATE winter. In EARLY winter the situation is flipped, so cold and dry in a La Nina year - ie now. But later on this winter, possibly in January (though no one knows for sure), it should start to get warmer than it was last winter. Dr Scaife stressed that it's all very variable, so don't hold him (or me) to that.

The reason it is hard to be sure is that the El Nino/La Nina signal is strong enough only to be seen over a number of years, and not strong enough to use to determine an outcome. "In any individual year, there are lots of other fluctuations that can hide it," Dr Scaife said. Examples would be volcanic activity (strong enough for ash to reach the stratosphere), and what's going on over the Atlantic Ocean.

So what does this all mean for our understanding of climate change?

As the UK and Europe froze over, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) issued its annual global temperature data, posted today - and showing 2010 as almost certain to rank in the top three warmest years since the beginning of instrumental climate records in 1850.

"The feature we're seeing now and last winter, where the UK and most of Northern Europe are cold, are a result of a re-arrangement of the air. So for as many places that are cold, there are places that are anomalously warm. It's like a jigsaw with the pieces in the wrong place. So we have local anomalies, but on average it works out to zero," Dr Scaife said.

"For example, at the moment we have cold over northern Europe and Eastern US, but in Canada and the Mediterranean it's mild, so the heat is sitting in a different place. That kind of shuffling can happen locally, but the global mean temperature doesn't care about that."

And possibly feeling a little bruised by questions about the skills of Met Office seasonal forecasting (after that barbecue summer) Dr Scaife directed me to a paper he published in 2005, looking at trends in winter temperatures from the 1960s to 1990s. This work is beginning to look prescient. It talked about possible changes afoot in European climate.

The winter of 1962/63 was famously bitterly cold, but by the 1990s we had got used to warmer, wetter winters in the UK and Northern Europe. Dr Scaife's paper said that although some of this winter warming was directly attributable to climate change, the majority of European winter warming between the 1960s and 1990s appeared to be due to changes in Atlantic winds (Scaife et al, Geophysical research Letters, 2005).

"We worked out that 70% of the warming in that period was due to the change in the Atlantic winds, rather than a direct radiative effect of greenhouse gases. And in 2008, before the last two cold winters, we wrote in a second paper on that topic that future decades could see a reversal, if those winds changed back - and that is exactly what has happened," Dr Scaife told me.

Here's what he said back then: "Future decades could easily see a reversal of regional trends in European winter climate because North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) effects can dominate the effects of global warming on Europe in winter, even on multi-decadal time scales. Indeed, this may already be underway given the recent decrease of the winter NAO" (Scaife et al, Journal of Climate, 2008)

So a vindication perhaps? Dr Scaife said his team does not yet know what causes those decade to decade natural fluctuations in Atlantic winds. But this is just one example of how a global trend in which the planet is warming, can be masked by local, natural changes.

And finally, he said the key point about recent global temperature change is the rate at which it's happening: "Obviously there were bigger temperature variations in the past, but they took a long time to build up, over many thousands of years*. It's the rate of change in just 50 years (a degree or so of warming) that's different."

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* Update on 13/12/2010. Please note there was an error in the reporting of this quote. We initially quoted Dr Scaife as saying: "Obviously there were bigger temperature variations in the past, but they took a long time to build up, over thousands of millions of years." This has now been rectified. Please accept our apologies.

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Never heard of "fracking"? If not, chances are you will soon. It is short for hydraulic fracturing, and is part of a process by which the United States is tapping into a vast new source of energy - natural gas trapped in shale rock, deep underground.

But this new source of energy is controversial. Video sharing website YouTube is buzzing with clips showing people who live close to gas drill sites setting light to their tap water.

They claim this happened only after drilling released methane gas and contaminated their private water wells.

There is a lot at stake - not just money, but also the reputation of a whole new industry.

Potential rewards

Some estimates suggest there is enough shale gas under US soil that in energy terms it represents at least a couple of Saudi Arabias. What is more, this trillions-of-dollars-worth of energy is home-grown, and cleaner than other fossil fuels.

Until recently it was thought too difficult to tap economically. But a new engineering approach that combines "fracking" with horizontal drilling has challenged that (see how fracking works in the video below).

If all goes well in the US, Europe could be next. Just this September, a Chatham House report weighed up the prospects of a shale gas revolution.

But is it safe to go ahead?

'Learning by doing'

In early October, I went to the town of Dimock in the US state of Pennsylvanian to find out more. Residents there have become well known for their experience with fracking, and with the gas companies at work in their backyards.

The message I took away from the trip was similar to that highlighted by Chatham House, which in its report spoke about the industry as one which is "learning by doing".

When I spoke to one of the gas companies operating in Pennsylvania, Chesapeake Energy, I found that such "learning by doing" had uncovered a problem.

The company, the second largest gas company in the US, conceded this straight away. Brian Grove, from Chesapeake, told us that problems the company had encountered with shallow pockets of gas could explain how methane might reach people's drinking water.

The threat of methane in people's drinking water is one of two chief safety concerns about the industry.

If colourless, odourless methane gas migrates into people's private drinking water wells it is not a health risk in itself, though in high concentrations methane gas is an asphyxiate.

More worrying, the gas could explode if it collects in a confined space.

Contamination claim

The second anxiety is over what is in the so-called fracking fluids. These are mixed in with millions of gallons of water, and pumped underground at high pressure to help ease the gas out of the dense shale rock.

One of the Dimock residents we met, Bill Ely, like many landowners in the area, leased his land to a company called Cabot Oil and Gas, hoping to make money from royalties.

Now he is suing the firm for contaminating his water supply with methane gas and putting his home at risk of explosion.

After a neighbour's private water well apparently did explode, Cabot installed ventilation pipes on Mr Ely's water well, and agreed to divert his well water through a hose, rather than into his home. They truck in all his drinking water too.

(You can see Mr Ely setting light to gas coming off his water in the video below)

George Stark is the spokesman for Texas-based Cabot, which has already invested $900m in exploiting gas in just this one county in Pennsylvania.

He says people have long been able to light up their water round in the area because of naturally-occurring methane:

"Our experts have checked over our casing, cementing, the drilling practice itself, the tubular that we're using to go down and they have determined that at this point that there's no Cabot operations that's occurring allowing for the discharge of methane into the waters," he told me.

But the state's environmental regulator says he has the equivalent of fingerprints linking the methane in local wells and Cabot's operations.

So there's a standoff.

UK tests

Vast tracts of North America sit on top of the ancient shale rock that holds natural gas in tightly compressed layers. Extraction or exploration is now underway in 30 US states, with attention focussed on the so-called Marcellus shale under Pennsylvania and New York states.

And in New York, they are watching Pennsylvania with interest. The state has a moratorium in place while its regulators weigh up the pros and cons.

There is growing interest in shale gas in the UK too. This summer, Cuadrilla Resources, a UK company, began test drilling near Kirkham in Lancashire.

Geoff Maitland, professor of energy engineering at London's Imperial College, told me there is probably significant potential in the UK, as yet unexplored:

"There are good indications both in the Lancashire area, and in Dorset in the onshore Kimmeridge shales. Scotland also has good prospects," he said.

Tony Ingraffea, is a civil engineer from Cornell University in the US, with expertise in fracture mechanics. He has spoken out against the way shale gas drilling is being carried out:

"You have steel casing, surrounded by cement, surrounded by rock. If any of those protection barriers fails we have an open pathway. A faulty cement job can be a failure by which gas or other fluids can find their way to the surface."

And it seems Chesapeake Energy might have hit upon at least one explanation for people's flaming tap water. The company told us that it had been forced to change its drilling mixture earlier this year, adding more latex.

Why? Because, just as Mr Ingraffea feared, problems with cement had allowed gas to migrate outside the well casing.

Brian Grove, from Chesapeake, explained: "In some cases it looks like, as the cement was drying, high pressure shallow methane kept it from drying properly, and would allow channelling to develop on the outside of the casing, which then could allow methane to move upwards through the shallower zone and to get into fresh water."

Mr Ingraffea is not surprised, but does not think this is the right approach: "I don't accept the notion that that industry can come in and say 'we're safe - oops, wait a minute, we found another mistake, we found another situation we hadn't anticipated, we're learning while we're doing'."

Haliburton subpoena

Much of the suspicion about the natural gas industry dates back to 2005, when US President George W Bush signed an energy bill which granted it exemptions from federal regulations, including the Safe Drinking Water Act.

Then-US vice-president Dick Cheney, the former CEO of Halliburton, worked prominently on energy policy at the time.

Halliburton is one of the major makers of fracking fluids, but appears to be the most reluctant to disclose their chemical make-up.

Earlier this month, the company was issued with a subpoena by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to force it to disclose more. Halliburton said it has worked to supply the EPA with the information it wants.

And as the gas companies expand their work across the US, this is a debate that is going global. As we finished filming in October, China's state gas company announced plans to invest in Chesapeake Energy's oil and gas fields.

The growing interest in the industry is not all positive. A documentary called Gasland has fired up the debate.

While New York State weighs up its position, many landowners welcome the industry, and the jobs and wealth it brings. Others say they are determined to secure the best deal for themselves, and for the environment, from this new gas Gold Rush.

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The warnings from the scientific community about the state of the world's fisheries are becoming increasingly apocalyptic.

As ministers arrive in Japan this week for the closing stage of the U.N. Convention on Biodiversity, they're being urged to place a monetary value on the world's resources, in the hope that this might spur more action.

Over exploitation of global fisheries apparently equates to an annual loss to the world of $50 billion, according to a new analysis released at the Japan meeting by the UN Environment Programme, among others.

Sustainable fishing is what the UN auditors prefer, but what does that mean? How much do we really know about the numbers of fish out there, and the ability of the oceans to keep replenishing that stock?

And in practical terms, how can governments balance the needs of consumers, the fishing industry and those who want to protect biodiversity and conserve fish stocks?

There are two places where delegates hope to make a start. One is in dealing with illegal fishing, which one expert told me represents about 20 per cent of the global catch. This week there will be a call for a radical new approach to policing the seas.

And the second place where talks are focused is on making sure that those agreements on managing fisheries that have already been signed, actually happen.

Dr Alex Rogers, a scientist from Oxford University and London's Institute of Zoology, campaigns to help draw attention to the state of the oceans. He told me about a recent study of his on fishing on the "High Seas" - waters outside of territorial claims.

He found that surprisingly few fish stocks are actually managed at all, and that in some cases, even those covered by international agreements are being fished as if they weren't.

In many cases, he says, fish stocks have been decimated - reduced to ten per cent or less of their original stock levels - so we are fishing only the remnants of these fisheries.

Here's what he said when he released that report in the Spring.

"There's evidence of systematic misreporting of catches in many cases, and in many other cases we simply do not know what is being taken in these fisheries. These fisheries have to be brought into a situation where they are managed sustainably or they have to be closed. If you can't manage a fishery then it should not be taking place."

He was also surprised to find that in the main area in the world for deep water fishing, the north Atlantic, most of the vessels are European.

"So it's us here in Europe that are responsible for these unsustainable fisheries on the High Seas... Despite the fact that Europe has signed up to many of these international agreements on fishing they are failing to meet their commitments. It's a real shock that this kind of free-for-all is still going on on the High Seas with respect to deep water fish resources, and I just find it appalling that this can be allowed to go on."

His point is that despite the fact that many of the states and the regional fisheries management organisations involved took part in negotiated agreements, they simply aren't implementing those rules.

Dr Rogers is at the Japan biodiversity meeting. He says talks over extending marine protected zones have already run into trouble, with moves to try to divert attention to coastal regions, and not to deal with the high seas at all - even though these represent about half of the world's oceans.

Fishing groups don't quite see things Dr Rogers' way.

Newsnight spoke to Dale Redmell, chief executive of the National Federation of Fishermen's Organisations.

He thinks Marine Protected Areas have been brought in in a state of moral panic.

"They think fish stocks are on a fast trajectory to destruction, we don't agree with that at all. We're beginning to see an upturn of low stocks - we've seen that since the early part of the century, which shows were going in the right direction."

He says that MPAs are based on a set of untested scientific principles, defined too narrowly.

"They haven't accounted at all for the inter-relation between human use of marine resources and their protection. It has potential economic, social impacts that we need to consider too."

And on policing, he thinks that from the UK perspective at least, regulation has improved and our fleet is performing well.

"Whether there is a broader, global issue that may be the case. It's about getting the right governance arrangements in place. That applies in Europe and elsewhere. It's not just about enforcement, it's about getting governance to work properly. We'd like to see management responsibilities devolved to countries, as opposed to from Brussels. They need to listen to industry better, also."

In Vancouver in British Columbia, a micro version of the bigger global fisheries debate is currently underway. We went to hear more about the fierce discussions taking place over how best to ensure the returning Sockeye Salmon run each year. Click here to read more about that and to see our interactive map with video which illustrates the salmon life cycle.

Watch my film from British Columbia on Newsnight on Tuesday 26 October 2010 at 2230 BST on BBC Two and then afterwards on the BBC iPlayer.

Rumours had suggested cuts of around 20%, which leading figures had said would mean "game over", not just for science in this country, but for future growth of the economy as well.

And at face value, it's a powerful vote of confidence in the contribution that science can make.

"Astonishing" was how particle physicist and television science presenter, Professor Brian Cox, described the outcome today, as he received an OBE for services to science.

He said the success was a clear signal for scientists like him that it is vital they stand up and speak out for their subject:

"For the first time I think we've made the political point as well as the economic point that supporting science is invaluable," he said.

He added that science is clearly part of the future of the country: "So it needs to be seen as something that kids want to do, it needs to be seen as a career that you can attain...you don't have to be a Hawking or an Einstein or a Newton to make a contribution.

"But for me, the main thing to say to school kids is, if you want to be a scientist, it doesn't matter if it's medical research, or chemistry or whatever it is, then you can choose to do it."

Without wishing to spoil the fun, the freeze in the annual science budget (of £4.6bn billion) still means that, in real terms, science faces a cut - and a significant one - of just under 10% over the next four years. And that is a huge challenge.

Most importantly, the freeze must be seen in an international context in which countries from Asia to Europe to the US are pumping extra money into science.

Evan Harris, the former Liberal Democrat Science spokesman, conceded the point:

"The science community will be relieved by this settlement, but we know that even 10% real terms cuts will be painful, (and) will need reversing as soon as the fiscal position improves."

But Mr Osborne does seem to have listened to what scientists have been saying in recent weeks.

In his speech today he said: "Britain is a world leader in scientific research, and that is vital to our economic success."

Addressing the Commons he said that he will protect the £220m UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation at St Pancras, the Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, the Institute for Animal Health in Pirbright and the Diamond Synchrotron facility in Oxford.

Questions remain then over the UK's continued role in international projects in fields such as particle physics and astronomy, as well as the impact of cuts in university funding and R&D budgets across Government departments, which could still have a damaging effect on overall science spend in the UK.

More will be asked of the charities which currently support science. Professor Peter Weissberg, medical director of the British Heart Foundation, said "even at about 10% down, we'll be playing catch-up in an international field which could see UK science left behind".

Martin Rees, president of the Royal Society, again cited the international context: "The government has recognised the importance of sustaining the international standing of UK science in a context where other nations are forging ahead."

And that's the point, science in the UK may be breathing more than a sigh of relief today, but elsewhere they're investing, fast and furious, not just keeping funding level.

Dr Trossel used stem cells not designed for human use

"They were given false hope by him and the experience not only cost them financially but for the most part it caused them personal and emotional loss when they realised that the treatment provided to them was not only expensive but pointless."

Mr Kark reminded the panel that Dr Trossel had also injected some of his patients with a material from Germany called Regeneresen, which contained live bovine brain and spinal cord cells, without explaining what he was injecting into them, or getting proper consent.

But the doctor's own lawyer, Robert Jay QC, argued that Dr Trossel should be suspended, not struck off, because the panel had found that Dr Trossel did not act dishonestly.

He described him as a "genuine and compassionate". He said Dr Trossel was "neither driven by love of money nor love of self" and had made it clear to patients that stem cell treatment was an experimental and untested therapy.

The panel is now weighing up this and other submissions behind closed doors, including its own finding in April this year that Dr Trossel was "taking unfair advantage of vulnerable patients and was therefore exploitative of them", and that his behaviour constituted "repeated and serious breaches of the essential tenets of good medical practice" earlier this month.

The GMC placed restrictions on Dr Trossel's work as a doctor in 2007, after a Newsnight investigation in 2006, which revealed that he was injecting patients with stem cells not intended for human use, but for research purposes only.

After a lengthy hearing process, the GMC panel ruled earlier this month that Dr Trossel's fitness to practice as a doctor is impaired, stating that he had "demonstrated little insight into the seriousness of your misconduct and the effects this may have had on your patients", adding that it was not convinced that his misconduct would not be repeated.

His patients paid around £10,000 or more for stem cell injections for a variety of conditions ranging from spinal injury to multiple sclerosis. Families raided pension funds, or organised fundraising events among friends and local communities to find the money.

Many of his British patients had reached Dr Trossel after contacting a web-based company operating out of South Africa, called Advanced Cell Therapeutics (ACT).

Newsnight established in 2006 that ACT was run by a couple called Stephen Van Rooyen and Laura Brown, who are wanted by the FBI for stem cell fraud under an extradition arrangement with South Africa. They failed in an appeal against that earlier this year.

Mr Jay, Dr Trossel's lawyer, argued on Monday that in his dealings with ACT "like Icarus, he flew too close to the Sun" in over enthusiastic pursuit of what he believed to be an exciting new development for his patients.

The GMC has already decided that in its view Dr Trossel "exaggerated the benefits of the treatment, overstated the success rate in treating patients with MS, and failed to inform patients fully of what was contained in the freeze medium in which the stem cells were delivered, namely that it contained bovine calf serum".

The panel said Dr Trossel's offer of such treatments was "unjustifiable on the basis of the available scientific or clinical medical evidence, inappropriate, not in the best interest of the patients and was exploitative of a vulnerable patient. It was therefore an abuse of his position as a doctor".

Dr Trossel has admitted that he did not inform some of his UK patients that he was separately injecting them with additional material which included bovine brain and spinal cord. The panel therefore found that informed consent could not have been given, an omission which the panel on Monday described as "serious".

The doctor had earlier told the panel that he had since had a "change of heart" about stem cell therapy, and that he should have been more careful in the advice he'd given to patients about its efficacy. He also said he regretted not having followed up patients with more scrutiny.

Dr Trossel has admitted many of the facts of the case, but in his defence he has argued that he stopped injections as soon as the Newsnight investigation made the origin of the stem cells clear.

He was told that a funding gap, between research and commercialisation of stem cell therapies, is already being filled overseas. Leading edge research is at a critical stage in the UK, stem cell scientists said this morning, where it needs money to progress through clinical trials, and then on to commercialisation.

If the UK misses the opportunity successfully to translate and commercialise such therapies, scientists will start to be attracted to other countries, according to Sir Richard Sykes, chairman of the UK Stem Cell Foundation, newly-appointed head of the Royal Institution and former chairman of the pharmaceuticals giant GlaxoSmithKline. "We will see British scientists move away if that happens, and crucial benefits that we could exploit will be exploited by other people," Sir Richard warned.

As if to back up his fears, professor Peter Coffey of the London Project to Cure Blindness, at University College London, said other countries are already looking "very attractive". He is working on a stem cell-based therapy for the eye condition age-related macular degeneration. He cited Californian investment of $3bn in stem cell science, and Singapore's announcement two weeks ago of a $10bn stem cell research fund - one area of which is the eye.

Professor Coffey clearly wants to resist the lure of overseas facilities and money. Speaking to journalists in London he said: "I'm loyal to where I was born. I was educated here, I have family here, I don't see why I should move out of the UK."

But if funding fell by a certain level, he feared having to make people unemployed. "The pressures are becoming huge," he said. And professor Coffey may be one of the luckier researchers. His research has backing from Pfizer and AstraZeneca.

The government's spending review is clearly at the back of everyone's mind. Asked how much of a cut would make a serious dent in his ability to carry on, professor Coffey said a 10% cut in research council money or in the infrastructure that supports stem cell science in this country would mean he'd be looking at laying people off.

Sir Richard said charitable money is available to be tapped - perhaps as much as £100m - but that most investors want the security of knowing that their money is matched by government investment.

Scientists say stem cell therapies could reach clinical practice sooner than some regulators had expected. Therapies to treat liver and heart conditions, and perhaps bone and joint disorders could come in under five years, depending on investment, though therapies for neuro-degenerative disorders such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's Disease are likely to be 10 years out or more.

David Willetts said the government recognises that stem cells have enormous potential for health benefits, and for contributing to our wealth and economic growth, describing this as "an exciting area of scientific advance."

He announced the go-ahead for two competitions for companies seeking to bring new therapies to the marketplace. These are expected to be worth about £10m though, as with so much else, scientists will have to wait for the spending review before the exact amount available will be clear.

The GMC placed restrictions on Dr Robert Trossel's work as a doctor in 2007, after a Newsnight investigation in 2006 which revealed that he was injecting patients with stem cells not intended for human use, but for research purposes only.

After a lengthy hearing process, the GMC panel said today that Dr Trossel's fitness to practice as a doctor is impaired, stating that it is concerned that he had: "demonstrated little insight into the seriousness of your misconduct and the effects this may have had on your patients," adding that it was not convinced that his misconduct will not be repeated.

A decision on whether or not Dr Trossel will be "struck off" or face lesser sanctions, such as suspension, is expected at the end of September. His patients paid around £10,000 or more for stem cell injections for a variety of conditions ranging from spinal injury to multiple sclerosis. Families raided pension funds, or organised fund-raising events among friends and local communities to find the money.

The GMC case involves nine such patients, some of whom gave evidence during the hearing. Many had reached Dr Trossel after contacting a web-based company operating out of South Africa, called Advanced Cell Therapeutics (ACT).

Newsnight established in 2006 that ACT was run by a couple called Stephen Van Rooyen and Laura Brown, who are still wanted by the FBI for stem cell fraud under an extradition arrangement with South Africa. They failed in an appeal against that earlier this year, and patients in South Africa are currently pursuing their own case against the pair.

In April, in its "findings of fact", the GMC found that Dr Trossel was "taking unfair advantage of vulnerable patients and was therefore exploitative of them"

It ruled that he: "exaggerated the benefits of the treatment, overstated the success rate in treating patients with MS, and failed to inform patients fully of what was contained in the freeze medium in which the stem cells were delivered, namely that it contained bovine calf serum".

The panel also concluded that given Dr Trossel's state of mind and his "actual belief" at the time, his actions were "not dishonest".

The panel said Dr Trossel's offer of such treatments was "unjustifiable on the basis of the available scientific or clinical medical evidence, inappropriate, not in the best interest of the patients and was exploitative of a vulnerable patient. It was therefore an abuse of his position as a doctor".

Dr Trossel has already admitted that he did not inform some of his UK patients that he was separately injecting them with additional material which included bovine brain and spinal cord. The panel therefore found that informed consent could not have been given, an omission which the panel today described as "serious".

The doctor had earlier told the panel that he had since had a "change of heart" about stem cell therapy, and that he should have been more careful in the advice he'd given to patients about its efficacy. He also said he regretted not having followed up patients with more scrutiny.

Dr Trossel, whose wife is TV diet doctor Wendy Denning, admitted many of the facts of the case, but in his defence he has argued that he stopped injections as soon as the Newsnight investigation made the origin of the stem cells clear.

The Large Hadron Collider is helping in the quest

But it's esoteric stuff. So, in his first television interview, Newsnight asked him how he would explain the importance of M-theory to the many people in the UK who have little interest in theoretical physics.

"M-theory is the theory of everything. It explains how the universe was created out of nothing in the Big Bang, and how it behaves now. It governs everything we think and do. Isn't that of interest?" Hawking asks.

Though he hasn't really tackled the important part of the question, it's clear from his answer that Professor Hawking is as dogmatic about M-theory as he is about God. Recall his quote from the book: "It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going."

He deals with M-theory in a similar tone: "M-theory is the only (sic) candidate for a complete theory of the universe." He adds later: "M-theory is the unified theory Einstein was hoping to find."

The thing about M-theory that most people find confusing is that its maths implies extra dimensions - not yet observed - that exist alongside the four dimensions of space and time that we have become familiar with in our everyday world.

The trouble with theories of everything, including M-theory, is that testing them in the laboratory is tricky - and that leaves them open to the charge that they're as much a leap of faith as religion. Theoretical physicist and broadcaster, Jim Al-Khalili, suggested as much on Newsnight last week.

But experimental evidence may be closer than some think. Atom smashers such as the LHC may one day "see" the extra dimensions that M-Theory implies, and London's Imperial College has published a paper in Physical Review Letters with a press release making the bold claim: "Researchers discover how to conduct first test of 'untestable' string theory."

Lead author Michael Duff tells me it's not quite as black and white as that and that the "test" is an indirect one, but it could have important implications for both string theory and M-theory - effectively an umbrella theory that embraces all five leading string theories.

The team from Imperial say they've found that string theory predicts the behaviour of entangled quantum particles - another mind-boggling area of physics. As this prediction can be tested in the laboratory, researchers say they can now test string theory.

"This will not be proof that string theory is the right 'theory of everything' that is being sought by cosmologists and particle physicists," Professor Duff explained.

"However, it will be very important to theoreticians because it will demonstrate whether or not string theory works, even if its application is in an unexpected and unrelated area of physics."

But Professor Hawking is not alone in his attachment to M-theory, or to the idea that our universe is just one world in a "multiverse" of worlds.

This is an idea which echoes work by the physicist Hugh Everett III in the 1950s on quantum theory. This was roundly dismissed while he was alive, but has enjoyed a late renaissance in recent years. Everett described the universe as having not one single history, but multiple histories, in his so-called Many Worlds, or Parallel Worlds, theory.

Though there's no direct link between Everett's many worlds theory and M-theory, Professor Hawking does describe how M-theory "allows for 10 to the power of 500 different universes, each with its own laws".

Hugh Everett's son, the musician Mark Everett, more famously known as E of the rock band Eels, has tried to grapple with some of this physics in an effort to better understand his difficult relationship with his father.

E, promoting his latest album Tomorrow Morning, tells me how he believes his father's withdrawn character was down to the early dismissive reaction to his work from other physicists.

"He was a 24-year-old genius that was brushed under the carpet, and that ruined his life," he tells me.

But Professor Hawking explains how Hugh Everett III contributed to our knowledge of the universe.

"Hugh Everett made an important contribution to our understanding of quantum theory," he said. "In classical theory the universe has a definite history but this is not the case in quantum theory, Instead Everett suggested we could think of it as if the history kept branching into alternative histories."

The struggle to understand our world, or worlds, will continue, and the concluding paragraph of Professor Hawking's book sets out a seductive insight into the drive behind that search.

"The fact that we human beings - who are ourselves mere collections of fundamental particles of nature - have been able to come this close to an understanding of the laws governing us and our universe is a great triumph... If the theory is confirmed by observation, it will be the successful conclusion of a search going back more than 3,000 years. We will have found the grand design."

Incidentally, the M in M-theory is variously said to stand for "membrane", or according to Professor Hawking, possibly "master", "miracle" or "mystery". And mystery it may well remain for those of us still trying to make sense of it all.

Watch an extended interview with Professor Stephen Hawking here.