Science | The Guardian

Thousands of people are given new joints each year in the UK. But can robots and smart tech soon make it a smoother procedure?Ian Doncaster is remarkably chipper for a man about to undergo major surgery. I have a busy life. So it's nice to have a break," he jokes. It is 8.30am on a chilly December morning and here at Warwick hospital he is about to receive a new knee - or part of one.At 62, Doncaster has always been active: he played rugby when young, until a knee injury and subsequent operation meant he had to trade that in for a host of other sports. But now the knee is causing problems again. As a self-employed chartered engineer, he needs to be able to get up and down tower blocks. Even going hiking with his wife seems a wistful dream. Going forward, it's only going to get worse," he says. Continue reading...

Costing $24,000 for nine months, some experts say more evidence is needed on effectiveness of MDMA and psilocybin treatments

The little-known digestive disease is hard to diagnose but can affect swallowing and require emergency treatmentLisa Thornton was heavily pregnant and in her early 30s when she noticed the feeling of a blockage in her oesophagus, the muscular food pipe that connects the mouth to the stomach. At the time, I just thought it was just the pregnancy," says Thornton, now 50, who lives in the New Forest in Hampshire. I thought it was everything pushing up. But a few years later, things started to get worse."During a Sunday roast with her family, a chunk of broccoli suddenly lodged in her throat, causing spasms that persisted for hours. Any attempts to wash it down with water failed as the fluid simply came straight back up. Thornton drove to a nearby drop-in centre, where doctors tried, without success, to free the blockage with muscle relaxants. Continue reading...

The physicist's refuge from assassins on a British heath changed the course of history, as a new docudrama showsIn September 1933, a humble wooden hut on a secluded Norfolk heath became the improbable location of one of the most important hideouts in history.Nearly a century later, the rarely told story of the three weeks Albert Einstein spent holed up in a heathland bothy, on the run from Nazi assassins, has been turned into an unusual type of docudrama. Continue reading...

Description of US president as an elderly man with a poor memory' in an official report provoked outraged defence from the White HouseIt should have been a good day for Joe Biden. After all, no charges are to be filed against the US president after an inquiry into his mishandling of classified files. But the official report from Robert Hur, the special counsel at the Department of Justice, was devastating nonetheless.Hur's description of Biden, 81, as an elderly man with a poor memory" who had diminished faculties in advancing age" provoked an outraged defence from the White House. Continue reading...

Swiss-Italian study finds MiniTouch can help people with amputations feel whether objects are hot, cold or in betweenWhether it is a simple handshake or a full-body hug, the warmth of another person adds a human touch to social interactions. Now researchers have created a device that allows people with amputations to experience such natural temperature sensations using their prostheses.The team say the innovation is a first and paves the way for integrating a host of sensations into artificial limbs. Continue reading...

Italian researchers say that joining the mafia is like entering a cult in which members must leave behind their own identityLeonardo Vitale made his way into the Sicilian mafia at age 19 by killing a boss from a rival clan. He continued his violent career as a mafioso for the next 12 years until his arrest in 1972 and transfer to a maximum-security prison when, after a week of isolation, he began to self-harm and show signs of depression.Overwhelmed by remorse for the criminal acts he had committed, Vitale suffered a nervous breakdown. The former boss felt guilty" and impure" to the point that, upon his release from prison a year later, he voluntarily went to the police station in Palermo to confess to two murders. He also provided the names of dozens of other bosses involved in criminal activities. Diagnosed with diminished capacity and schizophrenia by doctors, he was placed in a psychiatric hospital. When he was released, the mafia had already condemned him to death. Vitale was killed with two gunshots to the head on 2 December 1984. Continue reading...

As a woman at the top of my field, I am thrilled to see others rewarded. Their achievements are vital to inspiring more girls to dream big and overcome barriersOver the past four years, you could be excused for thinking that there has been an avalanche of women excelling in the field of science.We have seen half a dozen women collect Nobel prizes in physiology or medicine, physics and chemistry. Their staggering achievements range from Katalin Kariko's contribution to the development of mRNA vaccines against Covid-19 to Andrea Ghez's co-discovery of a supermassive black hole at the centre of our Milky Way galaxy. Continue reading...

3D models of human head experience less damage when subjected to lightning strike simulationGetting drenched in a thunderstorm may seem like the epitome of a bad day, but research suggests it could be a lifesaver if lightning strikes.In what appears to be a strong contender for an Ig Nobel prize, researchers have subjected 3D models of a human head to the equivalent of a direct lightning strike, revealing they experience less damage if wet. Continue reading...

Feat by scientists at Oxfordshire facility described as fitting swansong' for pioneering project as reactor is decommissionedThe prospect of a green energy source based on the power of the stars has received a boost after scientists set a world record for the amount of energy created by fusing atoms together.Researchers at the Joint European Torus (JET), an experimental fusion reactor at the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy in Oxfordshire, generated 69 megajoules of energy over five seconds from a mere 0.2 milligrams of fuel in the final fusion experiment performed at the facility. Continue reading...

Valerii Zaluzhnyi and I both have deeply furrowed brows. Should one or both of us be thinking about Botox?About 15 years ago, an Australian woman I worked with took me to one side and told me I should get Botox. I was busy building a career as a television presenter and she felt very strongly that, if I wasn't careful, something would hold me back. It's that frown line across the middle of your forehead. It's kind of distracting," she said. It'll only get worse," she added. Her tone was neither kind nor unkind. No particular offence was taken.She was right about one thing: it has got worse. I was barely in my 40s then. The line has since deepened, into first a crevice and then a canyon. Around the time of my 50th birthday, the tops of the canyon sides closed up, turning it into a kind of tunnel, I suppose you'd have to call it. No daylight gets in there unless I physically pull my forehead back. Or I'm very astonished by something. These days - I'm 57 next month - it's so deep that to clean it properly I need to use a small toothbrush. You'd be amazed what turns up in there.Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnistDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Rothamsted Research is having to pause non-essential' work, according to a letter from its directorThe UK's leading agricultural research facility is facing a funding crisis with its future work in jeopardy, it can be revealed.Rothamsted Research in Harpenden, Hertfordshire, is one of the oldest agricultural research institutions in the world, having been founded in 1843, and its research has been credited with preventing crop failures across the globe. Continue reading...

Beginner's guide to the wrap-your-brain-around-them facts of mycological science boosts the wonder with 3D time-lapse photographyIf you've got face of fungi" biologist Merlin Sheldrake's global bestseller Entangled Life on your bookshelf, unbattered and spine uncracked, this documentary might feel like an easier option. A beginner's guide to fungi, just 40 minutes long, it is narrated by Bjork and presented by the gently eccentric Sheldrake (imagine Timothee Chalamet playing a Cambridge academic, with a mop of unruly curls). It's being released in 3D on the giant screen at London's BFI Imax - all the better to gawp at Steve Axford's trippy time-lapse photography of strange, wondrous and beautiful fungi.Like Sheldrake's book, the film is on a mission to change the way we look at fungi - and the world. Fungi made life possible on Earth, and virtually all trees - and 90% of plants - rely on fungus to survive. The vast underground networks of fungi that provide trees with nutrients - the wood wide web" - are dazzlingly visualised here. Fungus is a miracle worker too: giving us life-saving medicines and decomposing organic matter. (Without fungi, forests would be tree-deep in animal carcasses.) Continue reading...

Aerospace industry has researched extensively into how raindrops affect planes and spacecraft travelling at high velocityRain blown by the wind batters your face. Driving on a motorway, it smashes into your car windscreen with even greater force. At high speeds raindrops can wear away solid materials, which is a serious concern in the aerospace industry.For propeller aircraft, rain was mainly a vision problem, but in the jet age planes were vulnerable to raindrops eroding paint coatings and damaging plastic, ceramic and even metal components. The problem was even more acute with rockets; to a spacecraft re-entering the atmosphere at high velocity, every droplet is a liquid bullet. Continue reading...

Despite research into a male contraceptive pill starting around the same time as its female counterpart, no product has ever made it to market. But that could soon change, with a new non-hormonal male pill entering human trials in the UK late last year. Ian Sample speaks to bioethicist Prof Lisa Campo-Engelstein of the University of Texas and Prof Chris Barratt from the University of Dundee about why male contraceptives have been so difficult to develop, and what kind of options are in the pipeline Continue reading...

Health minister resists push to boost number of sessions to 20 as new data shows visits have dropped by almost quarter of a million

Teach First highlights gender gap in maths and science and calls for higher pay for trainee teachers in Stem subjectsMore than half of British girls do not feel confident learning maths while two-fifths feel insecure about science, according to a report which highlights an alarming" gender confidence gap in schools.Research by the education charity Teach First found that 54% of girls lacked confidence in maths, compared with 41% of boys, but the gap was even wider in science, where 43% of girls lacked confidence compared with 26% of boys. Continue reading...

Research by UCL, which examined medical records of 260,000 men with erectile dysfunction, has provided food for thought'After a decades-long and largely fruitless hunt for drugs to combat Alzheimer's disease, an unlikely candidate has raised its head: the erectile dysfunction pill Viagra.Researchers found that men who were prescribed Viagra and similar medications were 18% less likely to develop the most common form of dementia years later than those who went without the drugs. Continue reading...

Calculations suggest a 45-mile-deep internal body of water lurks beneath Mimas's 15-mile-thick icy shellA moon of Saturn that resembles the Death Star from Star Wars because of a massive impact crater on its surface has a hidden ocean buried miles beneath its battered crust, researchers say.The unexpected discovery means Mimas, an ice ball 250 miles wide, becomes the latest member of an exclusive club, joining Saturn's Titan and Enceladus and Jupiter's Europa and Ganymede as moons known to harbour subterranean oceans. Continue reading...

This year, photographers had the chance to win up to 100 for capturing a striking image of the night sky over South Downs national park, England, in one of three categories: Starry skyscapes, Nature at night and Magnificent moon Continue reading...

Women may find it harder to adjust to relationship splits later in life, according to Danish study, with men more likely to re-partnerWomen are more likely to use antidepressants following the breakdown of a relationship compared with men later in life, researchers have found.The observational study, funded by the European Research Council and Academy of Finland, looked at 228,644 Finnish residents aged 50 to 70 between 1996 and 2018, who had all experienced a relationship breakup, divorce or bereavement between 2000 and 2014. Continue reading...

As the moon's core cools, it causes shriveling, creating ripples tens of meters high across its surfaceThe constancy of the moon in the night sky belies a more volatile reality, researchers said in new Nasa-funded research.As the core of the Earth's only natural satellite cools, the moon is shrinking, causing it to shrivel. That creates ripples tens of meters high, called thrust faults, across the moon's surface. Continue reading...

Research shows chances of developing cancer halve at least 15 years after stopping the habitStopping smoking at any age helps to reduce the risk of cancer, according to a major study, which found the most substantial drop in cancer risk came after the first decade of stubbing out.The chances of developing cancer halved in people who quit for at least 15 years, compared with those who continued to smoke, with the risk from lung cancer falling further and faster, particularly in those who quit before middle age. Continue reading...

The moment scientists had been dreading arrived late last year, when H5N1, or bird flu, was found for the first time in the Antarctic. Last week a king penguin on the island of South Georgia became the first in the region to be suspected to have died from the disease. The Guardian's biodiversity reporter, Phoebe Weston, tells Ian Sample why researchers have said the spread of bird flu through the Antarctic's penguin colonies could signal one of the largest ecological disasters of modern times'You can follow all the Guardian's reporting on bird flu here Continue reading...

Estimated value of the samples thought to be in the millions as incident reported to policeResearch samples collected over decades at a Swedish medical university were destroyed when a freezer malfunctioned during the Christmas holidays, the institute has said.The samples were stored in tanks cooled with liquid nitrogen, at a temperature of -190C, at Karolinska Institutet (KI) in Stockholm. Continue reading...

Scientists propose new category 6 rating to classify mega-hurricanes', becoming more likely due to climate crisisHurricanes are becoming so strong due to the climate crisis that the classification of them should be expanded to include a category 6" storm, furthering the scale from the standard 1 to 5, according to a new study.Over the past decade, five storms would have been classed at this new category 6 strength, researchers said, which would include all hurricanes with sustained winds of 192mph or more. Such mega-hurricanes are becoming more likely due to global heating, studies have found, due to the warming of the oceans and atmosphere. Continue reading...

Research lab submits plans for next-generation model at least three times size of Large Hadron ColliderOfficials at Cern, home to the Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, are pressing ahead with plans for a new machine that would be at least three times bigger than the existing particle accelerator.The Large Hadron Collider, built inside a 27km circular tunnel beneath the Swiss-French countryside, smashes together protons and other subatomic particles at close to the speed of light to recreate the conditions that existed fractions of a second after the big bang. Continue reading...

Researchers find those with PCOS had 8.47-fold higher risk than similar women without the conditionWomen diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome may have an increased risk of attempting suicide, research suggests.PCOS is a common health condition thought to affect about one in 10 women in the UK, although many cases are undiagnosed. Continue reading...

The answers to today's puzzlesEarlier today I set you three puzzles for 12-year-olds, used by the charity Axiom Maths, whose mission is to help top performing children from low incomes continue achieving well throughout secondary school.1. Backwards multiplicationAgent 001 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 002Agent 002 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 003Agent 003 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 004and so on, untilAgent 009 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 001 Continue reading...

Findings in leading scientific journal that globe has breached key warming milestone challenged by climate science expertsBetween 30 metres and 90 metres below the surface of the Caribbean Sea, an ancient sponge species that grows a hard skeleton has been quietly recording changes in the ocean temperature for hundreds of years.Now those sponges are at the centre of a bold and controversial claim made in a leading scientific journal that, since the start of the Industrial Revolution, the planet may have already warmed by 1.7C - half a degree more than estimates used by the United Nation's climate panel. Continue reading...

Research into bacteriophages adds to evidence that gut and brain interactions influence our behaviourViruses are widely regarded as harmful to our health, but a subset of viruses living in the gut could play a crucial role in regulating stress, research suggests.The discovery adds to mounting evidence that interactions between the gut and brain influence people's behaviours, and could eventually lead to new treatments for stress-related conditions that target the vast community of viruses living inside us. Continue reading...

In the UK, the people who are paying for today's retirees are those who won't be able to retire themselves. We need to muster a full-throated response

Researchers used AI to read letters on papyrus scroll damaged by the blast of heat, ash and pumice that destroyed PompeiiScholars of antiquity believe they are on the brink of a new era of understanding after researchers armed with artificial intelligence read the hidden text of a charred scroll that was buried when Mount Vesuvius erupted nearly 2,000 years ago.Hundreds of papyrus scrolls held in the library of a luxury Roman villa in Herculaneum were burned to a crisp when the town was devastated by the intense blast of heat, ash and pumice that destroyed nearby Pompeii in AD79. Continue reading...

Can we really maintain our levels of empathy in the face of an increasingly brutal news cycle?If you believe some commentators, we're in the midst of a compassion crisis, with a particularly brutal daily news cycle taking itstoll on our reserves of sympathy. The moresuffering we see, the less we care, as wementally switch off from others' pain. Theresult may even be that we struggle to feel as muchconcern for people close at hand when they cometo us for support; we end up feeling numb to any expression of emotion.The whole world is at risk for compassion fatigue,'"Time magazine declared recently. And while occasionally disengaging might seem like a sensible form of self-protection, the prospect of losing any senseof concern for others over the longer term would be a disaster. But is this an inevitable consequence of paying attention to the realities of the world around us? Are there ways to avoid it? Continue reading...

The futuristic $1.9bn Vera C Rubin Observatory took nine years to build and will survey the night sky in unprecedented detailAfter nine years of construction, a state-of-the-art telescope connected to the world's largest camera is set to change our understanding of astronomy.Perched on top of a barren mountaintop in the arid Chilean desert region of Coquimbo, the Vera C Rubin Observatory looks out of this world, quite literally. Continue reading...

First such piece to be found in Britain is incredibly well-made', say experts, and remarkably preservedArchaeologists in London have made the exceptionally important" discovery of a complete wooden funerary bed, the first ever discovered in Britain.The remarkably preserved bed, described as unparalleled" by experts, was excavated from the site of a former Roman cemetery near Holborn viaduct, central London, alongside five oak coffins. Prior to this dig, only three Roman timber coffins in total have been found in the capital. Continue reading...

Teasers for top tweensToday's problems come from Axiom Maths, a charity that that takes high-attaining primary school children and provides them with maths enrichment during secondary school.One of Axiom's main activities is to organise maths circles', in which small groups of pupils get together to tackle fun problems. Such as the ones below, which are aimed at children aged 11/12, and form the basis for further explorations.Agent 001 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 002Agent 002 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 003Agent 003 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 004and so on, untilAgent 009 gives a present to the agent who gives a present to agent 001 Continue reading...

It's bright in the morning sky now, but the planet will be lost to the dawn light by early MarchVenus is beautifully bright in the morning sky at the moment. The chart shows the view looking south-south-east from London at 7am GMT early in the week (and the view is easily visible from the southern hemisphere too).The waning crescent moon will be fast approaching the horizon, and its phase will be shrinking. On successive mornings, it will pass by the red supergiant star Antares in Scorpius, the scorpion, before heading for a close encounter with Venus just 24 hours later. Continue reading...

Charities say deaths will be prevented if sponge on a string' test is widely adoptedA test that can detect oesophageal cancer at an earlier stage than current methods should be made more widely available to prevent deaths, charities have said.The capsule sponge test, previously known as Cytosponge, involves a patient swallowing a dissolvable pill on a string. The pill then releases a sponge which collects cells from the oesophagus as it is retrieved. Continue reading...

Russian surpasses compatriot Gennady Padalka after logging more than 878 days at the international space stationA Russian cosmonaut has set a world record for the most time spent in space on Sunday, after logging more than 878 days or nearly two-and-a-half years.As of 0830 GMT, Oleg Kononenko overtook the record set by his compatriot Gennady Padalka, according to Russia's space corporation Roscosmos. Padalka logged 878 days, 11 hours, 29 minutes and 48 seconds during five space flights before retiring in 2017. Continue reading...

Janet Dube, Hazel Davies and Peter Emerson respond to a piece by George Monbiot on the psychology of voters' supportGeorge Monbiot suggests we can see human values as clustering around two poles, extrinsic and intrinsic (To beat Trump, we need to know why Americans keep voting for him. Psychologists may have the answer, 29 January). There might be something more at play.In 1980, physicist David Bohm wrote about explicate and implicate orders in reality. Before the advent of quantum theory, said Bohm's colleague and biographer, David Peat, science dealt with the order of space and time, separation and distance, mechanical force and effective cause, which Bohm called the explicate order. He posited a deeper order, more congruent with quantum theory and closer to our unconditioned thought. He called it the implicate or enfolded order. Continue reading...

Switching off at home, mastering hobbies and greater control over workload can all help improve self-doubt at work

You can't fight death, sickness, ageing and life's various indignities, but you can play very loud rock'n'rollEvery morning my older daughter calls from London. What you doing today?" Erm... she's most solicitous. She's really checking in to check that I'm not checking out - that I haven't woken up dead or had a stroke or a dizzy spell or plunged down some stairs or otherwise conked out. That I'm still above ground and that the manifold pills I'm compelled to take to prevent extinction, continue to kick in. So what are you up to today?"Erm... doing? Up to? That's a little too chirpy. Active. Aspirational. I'm 79. I've been fortunate: I'm still here, a lucky boomer with privilege and a triple-lock pension. A war baby with free orange juice, free milk and a free education for life. They paid me. I even passed the 11-plus. It's been all right. It's been more than all right. Then it wasn't. My wife, Jill, died. Cancer in a time of plague. Continue reading...

The British clinical trial of the revolutionary new mRNA treatment will test its effectiveness in combating a range of cancersA revolutionary new cancer treatment known as mRNA therapy has been administered to patients at Hammersmith hospital in west London. The trial has been set up to evaluate the therapy's safety and effectiveness in treating melanoma, lung cancer and other solid tumours.The new treatment uses genetic material known as messenger RNA - or mRNA - and works by presenting common markers from tumours to the patient's immune system. Continue reading...

If tests are successful, Windracers Ultra UAV will be used for research such as surveying marine ecosystems and studying glaciersPilotless drones are being tested in Antarctica with the aim of using them to carry out scientific research.A test crew has arrived at the largest British science facility on the continent, the Rothera Research Station. Continue reading...

Last year, 10,000 sham papers had to be retracted by academic journals, but experts think this is just the tip of the icebergTens of thousands of bogus research papers are being published in journals in an international scandal that is worsening every year, scientists have warned. Medical research is being compromised, drug development hindered and promising academic research jeopardised thanks to a global wave of sham science that is sweeping laboratories anduniversities.Last year the annual number of papers retracted by research journals topped 10,000 for the first time. Most analysts believe the figure is only the tip of an iceberg of scientific fraud. Continue reading...

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Psychiatrist whose insights into bereavement were shaped by events such as the Aberfan disaster, the Rwanda genocide and 9/11The much-quoted phrase Grief is the price we pay for love" reached a global audience in 2001 when Queen Elizabeth II used it in her message of condolence to those affected by the 9/11 attacks in the US.But it was the psychiatrist Colin Murray Parkes, who has died aged 95, who first came up with the words that have given solace to so many. In his 1972 book Bereavement: Studies of Grief in Adult Life, he wrote: The pain of grief is just as much a part of life as the joy of love; it is, perhaps, the price we pay for love." Continue reading...

Flowers used in the microbiome garden' can enhance gut health by being eaten or just walked pastAn edible meadow" designed to improve gut health is to be displayed at the Chelsea flower show this year.The two gardeners behind the microbiome garden" say it will be filled with flowers that can enhance gut health by being eaten or just walked past. Continue reading...

Researchers say they have found how anemonefish identify unwelcome guests of their own kind, by counting white markingsUnlike the star of Disney's Finding Nemo, real-life common clownfish are not keen on sharing their home with members of their own species.Researchers say they have discovered how they kick unwelcome guests out, by counting the stranger's vertical white markings. Continue reading...