Science | The Guardian

Putin boasts new intercontinental ballistic weapon will provide rivals with ‘food for thought’

Angus Rose, 52, ends 37-day hunger strike as parliamentary group agrees to host briefing by Sir Patrick VallanceSir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, will address MPs about the climate crisis after a protester’s hunger strike campaign.Angus Rose, 52, refused to eat for 37 days during his vigil outside parliament as he demanded the scientific adviser give a public address to MPs and ministers about the climate crisis. Continue reading...

Technique of reflecting sunlight back into space found to be likely to cause increase in population of disease-carrying mosquitosGeoengineering to prevent the worst impacts of climate breakdown could expose up to a billion more people to malaria, scientists have found.The report, published in Nature Communications, is the first assessment of how geoengineering the climate could affect the burden of infectious diseases. Continue reading...

A huge conservation project is under way to protect these precious and threatened habitats

Scientists don’t yet know if the microbes are causative, but if proven it could save thousands of livesScientists have discovered bacteria linked to aggressive prostate cancer in work hailed as a potential revolution for the prevention and treatment of the most deadly form of the disease.Researchers led by the University of East Anglia performed sophisticated genetic analyses on the urine and prostate tissue of more than 600 men with and without prostate cancer and found five species of bacteria linked to rapid progression of the disease. Continue reading...

Surface features similar to ones seen on Greenland ice sheet suggest underground liquid water that could host organic matterSubterranean pools of salty water may be commonplace on Jupiter’s moon, Europa, according to researchers who believe the sites could be promising spots to search for signs of life beyond Earth.Evidence for the shallow pools, not far beneath the frozen surface of the Jovian moon, emerged when scientists noticed that giant parallel ridges stretching for hundreds of miles on Europa were strikingly similar to surface features discovered on the Greenland ice sheet. Continue reading...

The Fox News pundit is promoting an unusual solution for the apparent crisis in masculinity – testicle tanning to boost testosteroneLet me be the first to admit that I’m not an expert on testicles. I’m not even an amateur enthusiast, if I’m being honest. Still, even with my limited knowledge of the subject, I was taken aback by recent reports that applying infrared beams to the little fellas might be the key to saving men and averting the apocalypse.The source of these unusual claims? Fox News, that perennial font of spuriously sourced wisdom. Tucker Carlson, one of the most popular pundits on the network, recently had the Ohio-based fitness professional Andrew McGovern on his show to discuss how one might “reverse the effects of falling testosterone”. (As everyone knows, if you’ve got a complex question about hormones, personal trainers make far better sources than endocrinologists.) Continue reading...

While telling ghost stories has always been a favourite pastime for many, during the pandemic signs of paranormal activity have reportedly been on the rise. Madeleine Finlay speaks to Prof Chris French about why more of us may have been having eerie experiences, how to explain these phenomena scientifically, and why – even among nonbelievers – ghost stories are still as popular as ever Continue reading...

From high-protein food to plastics and fuel, Swedish scientists are attempting to tap the marine plant’s huge potential“You can just see the buoys of the seafarm,” Dr Sophie Steinhagen yells over the high whine of the boat as it approaches the small islands of Sweden’s Koster archipelago. The engine drops to a sputter, and Steinhagen heaves up a rope to reveal the harvest hanging beneath: strand after strand of sea lettuce, translucent and emerald green.

Bristol study finds that for every five extra BMI units a woman’s risk of endometrial cancer increases by 88%Lifelong excess weight may almost double a woman’s risk of developing womb cancer, research suggests.Scientists and doctors have known for some time that being overweight or obese increases the risk of the disease. About one in three cases in the UK (34%) are linked to excess weight. Continue reading...

Psychology researchers say health-related conspiracy theories appeal to but do not satisfy a need to make sense of the world

According to WHO analysis, figure for country is more than 4 million and not official tally of 520,000India has been accused of attempting to delay an effort by the World Health Organization to revise the global death toll from Covid-19 after its calculations suggested that the country had undercounted its dead by an estimated 3.5 million.India’s official number of deaths from Covid is 520,000. But according to in-depth analysis and investigations into the data by WHO, the total is more than 4 million, which would be by far the highest country death toll in the world. Continue reading...

The solutions to today’s teasersEarlier today I set you the following puzzles, adapted from Math Games with Bad Drawings by Ben Orlin.1. Five nice dice Continue reading...

Beacon of Galaxy message could be sent into heart of Milky Way, where life is deemed most likely to exist“Even if the aliens are short, dour and sexually obsessed,” the late cosmologist Carl Sagan once mused, “if they’re here, I want to know about them.”Driven by the same mindset, a Nasa-led team of international scientists has developed a new message that it proposes to beam across the galaxy in the hope of making first contact with intelligent extraterrestrials. Continue reading...

Go figure, stick figure!UPDATE: The answers to today’s puzzles can be read here.Today’s puzzles begin with a low-fi version of Countdown: you roll five dice and using the basic arithmetical operations aim to get as close as possible to a target number.Then the questions get a bit trickier, and a bit more interesting. Continue reading...

Drug used to treat epilepsy and bipolar disorder is being given to pregnant women despite risks, data shows

Sodium valproate, associated with birth defects, reportedly being prescribed without proper warnings

What can the behaviour of apes teach us about sex and gender? A great deal, according to a new book by primatologist Frans de Waal – and his findings are already stirring controversySex and gender have come to represent one of the hottest fronts in the modern culture wars. Now, on to this bloody battlefield, calmly dodging banned books, anti-transgender laws and political doublespeak, strolls the distinguished Dutch-American primatologist Frans de Waal, brandishing nearly half a century’s worth of field notebooks and followed, metaphorically speaking, by an astonishingly diverse collection of primates.Given the world it enters, de Waal’s new book, Different: What Apes Can Teach Us About Gender, would arguably have failed if it didn’t stimulate debate. It seems safe from death by indifference, however, since it is dividing opinion even before it is published. Continue reading...

Scientists say the natural world has an important role to play in creating new drugs to fight the diseaseCancer care relies on complex therapies involving radioactive materials and sophisticated drugs and has come far from past remedies based on plants and herbs.However, scientists warn there is still a need to understand the botanical roots of tumour treatments – to maintain new sources of drugs and to ensure plant resources are not overexploited. The natural world still has a lot to teach us about tackling disease. Continue reading...

Director of network that processed millions of tests says smart diagnostics could tackle other major diseasesTwo years of mass Covid testing have paved the way for a revolution in how we diagnose other diseases, the founding director of the Lighthouse labs network has said.In his first interview since the pandemic began, Prof Chris Molloy said that people’s familiarity with using swabs for Covid tests meant that they could also discover and monitor their risk of other conditions, such as diabetes and heart disease. Continue reading...

The Australian physicist on why research is an investment, forgotten female scientists, and the impact of the Ukraine war on scienceBorn in Australia in 1984, Dr Suzie Sheehy is an accelerator physicist who runs research groups at the universities of Oxford and Melbourne, where she is developing new particle accelerators for applications in medicine. As a science communicator, she received the Lord Kelvin award in 2010 for presenting science to school and public audiences. Her first book is The Matter of Everything: Twelve Experiments that Changed Our World.How did you first become interested in physics?

I was heartbroken and angry but horse riding and medieval poetry revealed the quest I was onThis April, I will be older than my elder sister Nell. She died of cancer in December 2019. She was 46 when she died, two years older than me. This year I will be 47. Nell will always be 46. Writing “Nell died” still disturbs me as it did in the months after her death. She was my older sister. She wasn’t supposed to die. As little girls we learned to talk lying in beds beside one another. We sat in the same bath water, shared the same toothbrush, wore the same knickers, fought over the same toys.Her prognosis had been good. Days before her death, we were told she had years – maybe as many as 10 of them – to live. I didn’t think about death; I didn’t want to let it jinx anything by letting its shape enter my consciousness. Ten days later, I was in a hospital room with Nell and our father when a consultant knelt by her bed and told her she had a day to live. I wanted to tell death to stop, to block it from entering the room, to scream at death that I wasn’t ready for it to take her from me. But death when it comes, is unstoppable. So I stood by her bed with her as death came into the room and did its thing. Continue reading...

Remains found in the Rhône Valley, dating back 54,000 years, are earliest discovered outside AfricaIt is a weapon whose effectiveness was overtaken centuries ago by the gun and rifle. Yet the bow and arrow may deserve a prize place in the history of our species, say scientists. They believe archery could have been critical to Homo sapiens’ conquest of the planet, helping modern humans emerge from their African homeland tens of thousands of years ago.Early archers would have been able to kill their prey at a considerable distance while at the same time giving their diets a protein boost without endangering themselves, say researchers. It has also become clear that bow-and-arrow technology is ancient, with some of the oldest arrowheads traced to caves in South Africa and dated to around 64,000 years ago. Continue reading...

Volunteering to test new treatments can net up to £7,000 – enough to help offset the cost of living riseFancy a relaxing two-week getaway where you get your travel expenses paid, plus your own en suite room with all mod cons including a TV, PlayStation games console and free wifi? What’s more, it won’t cost you anything – in fact, they are so keen for you to come that you’ll be paid £4,200.If that sounds appealing, then you might want to think about booking a stay at FluCamp. However, as the name suggests, there’s a catch to this “holiday”: FluCamp runs residential clinical trials in the UK to test potential treatments for colds and flu. Continue reading...

Failure to recognise the need for a response could be a blunder we rue for decades to comeWhatever your standpoint on whether the pandemic is over, or what “living with the virus” should mean, it is clear some manifestation of Covid-19 will be with us for some time to come. Not least for the estimated 1.7 million people in the UK living with long Covid.And lest any who made a full and rapid recovery from infection still wonder whether long Covid might be a self-reported creation of the indolent, this is a now a large, well-documented, convergent cluster of clear physiological symptoms, and it is common to every part of the globe affected by Covid-19. Many sufferers of my acquaintance were keen cyclists, runners, skiers and dancers, but are now disabled and deprived of their former passions, while some are unable to resume their former professions. Doctors and scientists the world over now consider this a recognised part of the Sars-CoV-2 symptom profile.Danny Altmann is a professor of immunology at Imperial College London. He has contributed advice to the Cabinet Office, the all-party parliamentary group on long Covid and the EU Continue reading...

Test subjects from International Space Station may shed light on link between space travel and high incidence of painful conditionWhen astronauts travel into space they can expect some extraordinary new experiences. But they may also face a more mundane and potentially mission-ending one: kidney stones.According to Nasa, kidney stones have been reported more than 30 times by astronauts upon returning to earth. Now researchers are beginning to unpick why space travel is linked to the painful condition. Continue reading...

There is so much intelligence on this planet other than ours. Realising that will be key to adapting to climate breakdownFor the past couple of years, I’ve been working with researchers in northern Greece who are farming metal. In a remote, beautiful field, high in the Pindus mountains in Epirus, they are experimenting with a trio of shrubs known to scientists as “hyperaccumulators”: plants which have evolved the capacity to thrive in naturally metal-rich soils that are toxic to most other kinds of life. They do this by drawing the metal out of the ground and storing it in their leaves and stems, where it can be harvested like any other crop. As well as providing a source for rare metals – in this case nickel, although hyperaccumulators have been found for zinc, aluminium, cadmium and many other metals, including gold – these plants actively benefit the earth by remediating the soil, making it suitable for growing other crops, and by sequestering carbon in their roots. One day, they might supplant more destructive and polluting forms of mining.The three plants being tested in Greece – part of a network of research plots across Europe – are endemic to the region. Alyssum murale, which grows in low bushes topped by bunches of yellow flowers, is native to Albania and northern Greece; Leptoplax emarginata – taller and spindlier, with clusters of green leaves and white petals – is found only in Greece; and Bornmuellera tymphaea, the most efficient of the three, which straggles across the ground in a dense layer of white blossom, is found only on the slopes of the Pindus (its name comes from Mount Tymfi, one of the highest peaks of the range). Continue reading...

Michelin-starred chefs see opportunities and creative challenge in catering for commercial space travelWhen a trio of paying customers and their astronaut chaperone were blasted off to the International Space Station, their voyage was touted as a milestone for the commercialisation of spaceflight.For the Michelin-starred Spanish chef José Andrés, however, the recently departed mission ushered in another – albeit more niche – breakthrough: the first time paella was sent into orbit. Continue reading...

The most soothing voice on the box tells an apocalyptic tale in Dinosaurs: The Final Day. Plus: a killer on the loose in Grantchester. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading...

Archaeological dig also finds body-shaped lead sarcophagus buried at the heart of the fire-ravaged monumentAn archaeological dig under Notre Dame Cathedral has uncovered an extraordinary treasure of statues, sculptures, tombs and pieces of an original rood screen dating back to the 13th century.The find included several ancient tombs from the middle ages and a body-shaped lead sarcophagus buried at the heart of the fire-ravaged monument under the floor of the transept crossing. Continue reading...

Medicines regulator says it is first in world to approve Valneva productA Covid-19 vaccine developed by the French pharmaceutical company Valneva has been given regulatory approval by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, bringing the total number of jabs approved for use in the UK to six.As the Covid pandemic swept the world, scientists began developing vaccines against it, with the Pfizer/BioNTech jab being the first in the UK to be authorised for emergency use by the MHRA in 2020. Since then the MHRA has approved the Moderna, Oxford/AstraZeneca, Janssen and Novavax vaccines, although, according to NHS England, Janssen and Novavax are not currently available. Continue reading...

To slow down a surge in Covid cases, last week Chinese authorities put Shanghai into lockdown. But with a population of 26 million there have been difficulties providing residents with basic necessities, and videos have appeared on social media showing protests and scrambles over food supplies. Now, authorities have begun easing the lockdown in some areas, despite reporting a record of more than 25,000 new Covid cases.Madeleine Finlay talks to the Guardian’s China affairs correspondent, Vincent Ni, about what’s been happening in Shanghai, whether the Omicron variant may spell the end of China’s zero-Covid policy, and what an alternative strategy could look like

Scientists believe specimen shows life existed earlier than is widely assumed – increasing chances of life elsewhereScientists believe they have found evidence of microbes that were thriving near hydrothermal vents on Earth’s surface just 300m years after the planet formed – the strongest evidence yet that life began far earlier than is widely assumed.If confirmed, it would suggest the conditions necessary for the emergence of life are relatively basic. Continue reading...

But goal of limiting global heating to 1.5C will fail without immediate action, scientists warnFor the first time the world is in a position to limit global heating to under 2C, according to the first in-depth analysis of the net zero pledges made by nations at the UN Cop26 climate summit in December.Before these pledges it was more than likely that at the peak of the climate crisis there would be a temperature rise above 2C, bringing more severe impacts for billions of people. Now it is more likely that the peak temperature rise will be about 1.9C. Continue reading...

Schools are encouraging students to use mental health chatbots to address a surge in depression and anxiety. Critics worry they’re a Band-Aid solution unsupported by evidenceFifteen-year-old Jordyne Lewis was stressed out.The high school sophomore from Harrisburg, North Carolina, was overwhelmed with schoolwork, never mind the uncertainty of living in a pandemic that has dragged on for two long years. Despite the challenges, she never turned to her school counselor or sought out a therapist. Continue reading...

Operations stopped in Chinese cities of Shanghai and Kunshan as global supply chains feel pinch of Beijing's zero-Covid measuresKey iPhone maker Pegatron has halted operations at two subsidiaries in the Chinese cities of Shanghai and Kunshan, as global supply chains feel the pinch of Beijing’s strict zero-Covid measures.The business hub of Shanghai has become the heart of China’s biggest Covid-19 outbreak since the virus surfaced more than two years ago. Continue reading...

Scientists find that as video quality deteriorates, people speak louder and alter gestures to compensateFrom frozen screens to the oblivious person on mute, the trials and tribulations of video calls became familiar challenges as the pandemic forced workers to communicate from their kitchen tables, makeshift offices and boxroom desks.Now scientists have revealed why we often end up raising our voices at our colleagues: as video quality deteriorates, we speak louder and alter our gestures in an attempt to compensate. Continue reading...

UV filters absorbed by Posidonia oceanica may have damaging effects on ecosystems, scientists warnChemicals found in sunscreen lotions are accumulating in Mediterranean seagrass, a study has found.Scientists discovered ultraviolet filters in the stems of Posidonia oceanica, a seagrass species found on the coast of Mallorca and endemic to the Mediterranean Sea. Continue reading...

Research shows effects of compound found in magic mushrooms can be seen weeks after treatmentThe psychedelic compound found in magic mushrooms helps to open up depressed people’s brains and make them less fixed in negative thinking patterns, research suggests.According to the findings, psilocybin makes the brain more flexible, working differently to regular antidepressants, even weeks after use. Researchers say the findings indicate that psilocybin could be a viable alternative to depression treatments. Continue reading...

The virus is now embedded in our world. But there are steps we can take to keep it at bay while we continue to live our livesWhat do I wish I had known in early 2020? Other than to buy shares in toilet paper, Zoom and vaccine companies, I wish I had known that a safe and effective vaccine against severe disease and death from Covid-19 would arrive within a year – and that reinfection would nevertheless become a major issue in managing the disease. These two facts would have shifted the UK government’s response, and allowed for a more unified scientific front in advising them.At the very beginning of the pandemic, several governments – including in Sweden, Netherlands and the UK – believed the best path through this crisis was to allow a controlled spread of infections through the population, especially the young and healthy, in order to reach some static state against the virus. The idea was that “the herd” who got infected would protect a more vulnerable minority.Prof Devi Sridhar is chair of global public health at the University of EdinburghJoin Devi Sridhar for a Guardian Live online event on Monday 25 April. She will talk to Nicola Davis about Covid-19 and the lessons we can learn from our handling of the pandemic. Book here Continue reading...

Last week’s IPCC report gives the world just 30 months to get greenhouse gas emissions falling. Beyond that, we’ll have missed our chance of limiting global heating to 1.5C and protecting our planet from the most serious impacts of climate change. As the window closes, some scientists feel like writing reports and publishing papers is no longer enough, and researchers around the world are leaving their desks and labs to take action on the streets.Madeleine Finlay meets scientists protesting at Shell HQ in London and speaks to the conservationist Dr Charlie Gardner about civil disobedience – and why he thinks it’s the only option left

As a format it’s slow, encourages hype, and is difficult to correct. A radical overhaul of publishing could make science betterWhen was the last time you saw a scientific paper? A physical one, I mean. An older academic in my previous university department used to keep all his scientific journals in recycled cornflakes boxes. On entering his office, you’d be greeted by a wall of Kellogg’s roosters, occupying shelf upon shelf, on packets containing various issues of Journal of Experimental Psychology, Psychophysiology, Journal of Neuropsychology, and the like. It was an odd sight, but there was method to it: if you didn’t keep your journals organised, how could you be expected to find the particular paper you were looking for?The time for cornflakes boxes has passed: now we have the internet. Having been printed on paper since the very first scientific journal was inaugurated in 1665, the overwhelming majority of research is now submitted, reviewed and read online. During the pandemic, it was often devoured on social media, an essential part of the unfolding story of Covid-19. Hard copies of journals are increasingly viewed as curiosities – or not viewed at all. Continue reading...

RATs are not infallible, but a few tips and tricks will help you get the most out of them

Testing people in their 50s could identify individuals at risk of poor balance later in life, study findsSimple cognitive tests in midlife could predict the likelihood of falling in later life, one of the most common causes of injury and death, new research suggests.Poor levels of word memory, verbal fluency, processing speed and cognitive ability in our 50s are early indicators of worsening balance in later life, a condition that increases the risk of falls, injury and death, researchers from University College London have found. Continue reading...

After an ectopic pregnancy that ruptured, Georgina Scull spoke to people around the world facing death – and discovered the regrets they want us all to learn fromI’m not sure I ever fully appreciated my life until I nearly lost it. In fact, I’m sure I didn’t. On the surface everything was good. I was married and living overseas with our two-year-old daughter. There was food on the table and a roof over our heads, but it felt as if I was drifting – constantly waiting for my real life to start. And then, at 37, I had an ectopic pregnancy, which ruptured and I nearly died.That was 10 years ago. It should have been the start of my second chance. The jolt to get me going. But, I’m afraid it wasn’t. I was alive, but I still wasn’t really living. I still seemed to be stuck in all the things I hadn’t done over the years, rather than enjoying all the things that I did. As the days and weeks passed, my regrets just grew. Continue reading...

Substance marketed online to ease range of joint and liver conditions, and to promote wellbeing, should not be usedA dietary supplement sold in the UK could be toxic and should not be used until it has been shown to be safe, an international group of biologists has warned.The team, from Manchester and Kyoto universities, reported last week that the supplement – known as SAMe – can break down inside the body into substances that cause a wide range of medical problems, including kidney and liver damage Continue reading...

A tiny smudge on the space telescope turned out to be starlight from Earendel, almost 13 billion years old – revealing evidence of the universe in its infancyEarendel – “morning star” in Old English – is among the first stars to exist in our universe, born less than one billion years after the Big Bang. And the Hubble space telescope has just performed the remarkable feat of detecting light from it.Mostly, the telescope gives us images of nearby galaxies in intricate detail, but those of distant galaxies are very murky indeed. Astronomer Brian Welch and his team, from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, discovered the star while hunting for hints of the earliest galaxies. These galaxies are very hard to see, and the team chose to examine a selection of images from the Hubble looking for clues. Continue reading...

Bid to fill underground visitor centre in complex with artefacts not even dug up yet shocks archaeologistsNo one in the column of tourists making their way to York Minster along the city wall even glances at Northern House. The slab of beige 1960s architecture is not a building that provokes much passion.But the layers of mud beneath it are a different matter. A plan to demolish Northern House to unearth the centuries of history below and create a new Roman-themed visitor centre, hotel and apartments has caused a row among archaeologists. Continue reading...

Electrical problem triggers global safety alert on 2,000 Philips machinesTwo thousand ventilators being used in UK hospitals are at risk of suddenly shutting down due to electrical faults that have led to a global safety alert.Hospitals have been ordered to source replacement ventilators after Philips Respironics said its breathing support devices could suddenly stop working, in some cases without activating a warning alarm. Continue reading...

Team rides SpaceX-launched Falcon 9 rocket on flight hailed as commercial milestoneThe first all-private team of astronauts sent to the International Space Station arrived safely on Saturday to begin a week-long mission hailed as a milestone in commercial spaceflight.The rendezvous came about 21 hours after the four-man team representing Houston-based startup company Axiom Space lifted off on Friday from Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center, riding a SpaceX-launched Falcon 9 rocket. Continue reading...