There had been rumblings for days and, yesterday, a group of seven Labour MPs quit the party to strike out alone as the Independent Group in parliament. Karl Pike explains what drove the group to take this extreme step at such an important moment for the nation. It’s inevitable that comparisons will be made with the ill-fated SDP, but Richard Carr notes that electoral success is not the only measure. British politics is stuck and he wonders if this shake up could at least throw up some fresh thinking.

From tears and sadness to a loss of pleasure in activities, it can be quite easy to spot when somebody we know gets depressed. However, up to 40% of people with depression are able to completely hide their symptoms, appearing happy to others and going about their lives as usual. Olivia Remes explains what researchers know about such “smiling depression”, and warns it puts people at particularly high risk of suicide.

Since the explosion of life that emerged after the dinosaurs went extinct, the average number of land animals found in the world’s various ecosystems has been stable, according to new research from Roger Close. Here he explains how that challenges the common belief among many scientists that this local biodiversity is always rising. The impact of humans, however, could change everything. Insect populations could “vanish within a century” according to recent reports, but what would that mean for the rest of nature? Stuart Reynolds explains.

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