A new book tells the story of the painstaking process to preserve the 1,200-year-old Faddan More PsalterOne summer’s day in Tipperary as peat was being dug from a bog, a button peered out from the freshly cut earth. The find set off a five-year journey of conservation to retrieve and preserve what lay beyond: a 1,200-year-old psalm book in its original cover.Bogs across Europe have thrown up all sorts of relics of the ancient past, from naturally preserved bodies to vessels containing butter more than a millennium old, but the 2006 discovery of an entire early medieval manuscript, entombed in a wet time capsule for so long, was unprecedented, said the National Museum of Ireland. Continue reading...

Like seatbelts, vaccines lower risk and two studies reveal the protection that a third jab offersLast week, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) reported encouraging research on booster doses. That analysis estimated that, compared with the preceding waned protection, the booster reduced the risks of symptomatic Covid-19 disease in people over 50 by around 85%.Compared with not being vaccinated at all, a booster gave similar protection to that obtained soon after two Pfizer/BioNTech doses. Encouragingly, this reduction occurred regardless of the initial vaccine, implying Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccinees have more protection after the booster dose than ever. Continue reading...

The Delta variant was first detected a year ago and is now dominant across the globe. Scientists are concerned that a new strain could supersede it

Experts’ warning as Covid crackdowns across Europe result in widespread protests

Demonstrations come after announcement of new lockdown and plan for compulsory vaccines

Benefits of approving age extension outweigh the risks, says secretary for food and health

Victoria’s health department says child who died had ‘other serious comorbidities’A Victorian child under 10 has become Australia’s youngest person to die with Covid-19.Victoria reported 1,166 new coronavirus infections on Saturday and five new deaths, including the child. Victoria’s health department said the child had “other serious comorbidities”. Continue reading...

Australian company joins global effort to recycle dangerous space debris

Claim will reignite debate about origins of pandemic, a continuing source of tension between US and ChinaThe first known Covid-19 case was a vendor at the live-animal market in Wuhan, according to a scientist who has scrutinised public accounts of the earliest cases in China.The chronology is at odds with a timeline laid out in an influential World Health Organization (WHO) report, which suggested an accountant with no apparent link to the Hunan market was the first known case. Continue reading...

A partial lunar eclipse was visible for several hours – the longest one in 580 years, giving November’s Beaver Moon reddish hues and appearing across North America, parts of South America, Asia and Australia Continue reading...

Kew Gardens and RHS reporting glut of fungi as public sends in ‘weird and wonderful’ samplesThe UK is having a bumper year for mushrooms due to the warm, damp weather, says scientists, with an increase in the number of rare and unusual species identified.Members of the public have been sending in unusual samples from their gardens to experts at Kew Gardens and the Royal Horticultural Society after a glut of fungi this year, and scientists say such booms will become more common as Britain’s climate changes to become warmer and wetter. Continue reading...

Report says detailed plans on shielding, job support schemes and school disruption were lacking

As the days get shorter and we huddle indoors, memories of 2020’s catastrophic winter are close at hand. Now a new surge of coronavirus cases is spreading across Europe. But as well as notes of caution, there are good reasons to hope that the UK will avoid the lows of last year – from lower hospitalisation rates to exciting treatments on the verge of approval. How optimistic should we be – and can we still go to Christmas parties?“I am seeing the storm clouds gathering over parts of the European continent,” Boris Johnson said last week. “We have been here before and we remember what happens when a wave starts rolling in.”The prime minister’s warning was full of foreboding for anybody who lived through last year’s winter – when a doggedly optimistic government refused to countenance imposing coronavirus restrictions over Christmas, only to be forced to reverse its position at the last minute. The move confirmed the seriousness of a long, grim second wave that proved even deadlier than the first – and fundamentally changed the way many of us thought about coronavirus, dispelling all hopes that we would soon be able to turn the page and go back to life as it was before. Continue reading...

This will be the longest partial eclipse of the 21st century, lasting three hours and 28 minutes

Migraines disappeared after man started diet that included lots of dark-green leafy vegetables, study showsHealth experts are calling for more research into diet and migraines after doctors revealed a patient who had suffered severe and debilitating headaches for more than a decade completely eliminated them after adopting a plant-based diet.He had tried prescribed medication, yoga and meditation, and cut out potential trigger foods in an effort to reduce the severity and frequency of his severe headaches – but nothing worked. The migraines made it almost impossible to perform his job, he said. Continue reading...

Stargazers across all of North America can witness the phenomenon from Thursday night into Friday morningStargazers across North America can expect to be dazzled by a red-hued “beaver” full moon on Thursday night and into Friday morning, during the longest partial lunar eclipse in almost six centuries.Lunar eclipses happen when Earth blocks the sun’s light, which usually illuminates the moon. Early on Friday, more than 97% of the full moon’s diameter will be covered by Earth’s shadow, according to Space.com. Continue reading...

Agency says human landing will not be possible until 2025 at the earliest after lawsuit delays projectNasa has resumed work on the lunar lander needed to return humans to the moon. The space agency voluntarily paused work on the Human Landing System (HLS) for several months after a lawsuit over the spacecraft’s development and manufacture.In April, Nasa awarded the $2.9bn HLS contract solely to Elon Musk’s SpaceX. The Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, whose Blue Origin company also bid for the work, sued Nasa in August because the space agency had originally stated it would award two lander contracts. Budget shortfall, however, forced it to renege on this. Continue reading...

Over the past few weeks, a thick brown smog has enveloped Delhi. The pollution is so bad that the capital and surrounding states have shut schools and imposed work-from-home orders. Toxic air at levels 20 times higher than those deemed healthy by the World Health Organization has become a seasonal occurrence in India, causing about 1.6 million premature deaths every year. Madeleine Finlay speaks to Guardian South Asia correspondent Hannah Ellis-Peterson and environmental researcher Karthik Ganesan about what it is like to live with poisonous air – and what needs to be done Continue reading...

Researchers said results highlight the need to continue with face coverings, social distancing and handwashing alongside vaccine programmes

Only 54 of 166 assessed treatments have policies aiding use by low-income countries, says non-profit groupThe world’s biggest drugs makers have pressed on in the fight against superbugs despite the pandemic, but millions of people in poorer countries, where the risk of drug-resistant infections is highest, are still missing out on key antibiotics.A report from the Access to Medicine Foundation, an Amsterdam-based non-profit group, shows that only 54 of 166 medicines and vaccines assessed are covered by an access strategy to make them available to low- and middle-income countries. Continue reading...

Safe injectable antiretroviral drugs, approved by health bodies, ‘could lift burden of daily oral therapy’Thousands of people living with HIV in Britain are to be freed from the burden of taking daily pills, after health chiefs gave the green light for a revolutionary treatment by injection every two months.Draft guidance from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) recommends offering the antiretroviral drugs cabotegravir and rilpivirine in England and Wales after trials proved they work as effectively as daily tablets. Continue reading...

Audio description | Boris Johnson | Space missions | Cuckoo clocks | #MeTooWe are unashamed septuagenarian members of the alleged subtitle-friendly minority (Pass notes, 16 November), utilising the TV facility for everything from British documentaries to US crime thrillers. The only potential hazard we ever encounter is when something called “audio description” is applied by mistake and a disembodied voice will suddenly proclaim: “And now he sticks a knife in her back.”

When dog moves ball containing device it sends a signal to a laptop and launches a video callWhether it is a silent stare or simply a rousing bark, dogs have found myriad ways to communicate with humans. Now researchers have created a hi-tech option for canines left home alone: a ball that allows them to call their owners on the old dog and bone.The device – nicknamed the DogPhone – is a soft ball that, when moved, sends a signal to a laptop that launches a video call, and the sound of a ringing telephone. Continue reading...

While many trees were felled to prevent ‘leaves on the line’, Network Rail is now trying to treat them as assetsTrees and railways have never really got on with each other. In the days of steam engines, trees alongside railways were cut down to prevent engines sparking fires.Once steam engines were scrapped, the vegetation grew back and more than 6m trees became established alongside Britain’s rail network. However, every autumn led to “leaves on the line” disruption and trees sometimes toppled on to railway tracks in high winds. There led to intense criticism of Network Rail, which then felled many trees, destroying valuable habitats.

Study of women’s brain function finds more empathy activation when looking at pictures of grandchildrenThey say that grandchildren are life’s greatest joy, and now the first study to examine grandmothers’ brain function has suggested grannies may be more emotionally connected to their grandkids than to their own sons and daughters.Since the 1960s, researchers have posited that one reason women tend to live decades past their reproductive years is that it increases the chances of their grandchildren surviving, through the physical support they often provide – the grandmother hypothesis. More recent evidence has suggested that children’s wellbeing and educational performance is also boosted by the presence of engaged grandparents. Continue reading...

A recording captured the moments International Space Station astronauts discussed putting on space suits and evacuating the station, after an anti-satellite missile test by Russia against one of its own targets generated a debris cloud. Astronauts talked through various scenarios with mission control – including the possibility of returning to Earth if the capsule they were sheltering in was hit by a piece of debris. Continue reading...

US officials accuse Moscow of ‘irresponsible’ behavior after it conducts test that threatened lives of astronauts onboard the ISSRussia has admitted to destroying one of its satellites during a missile test but rejected US accusations that it had endangered the International Space Station.US officials on Monday accused Moscow of “dangerous and irresponsible behavior” after it conducted an anti-satellite weapons test that threatened the lives of the seven astronauts on board the ISS. Continue reading...

Research looking at 365,000 people aged 50-74 finds moderate consumption could have health benefitsDrinking coffee or tea may be linked with a lower risk of stroke and dementia, according to the largest study of its kind.Strokes cause 10% of deaths globally, while dementia is one of the world’s biggest health challenges – 130 million are expected to be living with it by 2050. Continue reading...

Privately funded Toliman telescope to be launched into low-earth orbit to search Alpha Centauri star system

Around 256,000 Americans live in areas where incidences of cancer caused by air pollution exceed the Environmental Protection Agency’s current upper limit of ‘acceptable risk’How do you calculate the price of a human life? What about 256,000 human lives?Around a quarter of a million Americans are living in parts of the United States where rates of cancer caused by air pollution exceed the US government’s own limit of “acceptable risk.” Environmental experts have a chilling name for these sites:Adrienne Matei is a freelance journalist Continue reading...

Steve and Dee Allen say sponsorship deal and ‘gagging clause’ show it is no longer a credible scientific institutionTwo prominent scientists are refusing to allow their work to be included in the Science Museum’s collection because of the institution’s links to Shell.Steve and Dee Allen, who have carried out some of the most important research into global plastic pollution, say the museum’s sponsorship deal with the fossil fuel company – and a subsequent “gagging clause” – meant it was no longer a credible scientific institution. Continue reading...

The explosion has increased the chances of a disastrous collision, says a leading astrophysicist, and warns of ‘real environmental problem’

Growing numbers of people catching coronavirus are experiencing an unpleasant distortion of smells. Scientists are still unsure what causes this often distressing condition, known as parosmia, where previously enjoyable aromas trigger feelings of disgust. Madeleine Finlay talks to science correspondent Linda Geddes about her own parosmia, and chemist Dr Jane Parker discusses research into why the smell of coffee seems to be a trigger for so many people Continue reading...

Russia has blown up one of its own satellites, sending thousands of pieces of debris into space. The seven astronauts on the International Space Station were forced to take shelter in a transport capsule. 'Thanks for a crazy but well-coordinated day, we really appreciated all the situational awareness you gave us', Nasa astronaut Mark Vande Hei told Nasa headquarters. ‘Russia's dangerous and irresponsible behaviour jeopardises the long-term sustainability of outer space’, said US state department spokesman Ned Price.

Russia fired missile at its own satellite, generating debris that US says ‘threatens interests of all nations’The US has accused Russia of “dangerous and irresponsible behavior” after it conducted an anti-satellite weapons test that threatened the lives of the seven astronauts on board the International Space Station (ISS).Russia fired a missile at one of its own satellites over the weekend, generating more than 1,500 pieces of trackable orbital debris and hundreds of pieces of smaller debris, which the US said “now threaten the interests of all nations”. Continue reading...

The solutions to today’s puzzlesProfessor Hoffman was the pen-name of Angelo Lewis, a Victorian barrister whose book Modern Magic, published in 1876, is considered one of the most important and influential magic books of all time.(I read about him recently in David Copperfield’s History of Magic, a stunning book he coauthored with psychologist Richard Wiseman and magician David Britland.) Continue reading...

Travel | Recipes | Kids’ quiz | Boriscard | Christmas puddingsAdjacent articles online – Fear, panic and chaos: the joy of flying from the UK to New York again (Emma Brockes, 12 November) and How can Britain cut emissions when the Tory party fetishises travel? (Andy Beckett, 12 November). Not only Tories…

Extension approved by government’s vaccine watchdog as well as second doses for 16- and 17-year-olds

In many democracies the political chasm seems wider than ever. But emotion, not policies, may be what actually divides usIn 2020, the match-making website OkCupid asked 5 million hopeful daters around the world: “Could you date someone who has strong political opinions that are the opposite of yours?” Sixty per cent said no, up from 53% a year before.Scholars used to worry that societies might not be polarised enough. Without clear differences between political parties, they thought, citizens lack choices, and important issues don’t get deeply debated. Now this notion seems rather quaint as countries have fractured along political lines, reflected in everything from dating preferences to where people choose to live. Continue reading...

Ten mind-bending riddlesUPDATE: The solutions can be read hereDavid Copperfield’s History of Magic is a beautiful new book by the eponymous magician (coauthored with psychologist Richard Wiseman and magician David Britland), which tells the story of magic through objects in his private museum, the largest and most impressive collection of magic memorabilia in the world.The International Museum of the Conjuring Arts is housed in a gigantic building on the outskirts of Las Vegas, the city where Copperfield, aged 65, still performs 15 shows a week. (His industriousness has helped make him the highest grossing solo entertainer of all time.) Continue reading...

People in the Americas and Pacific best placed to view lunar event from start to finishThis week, a full moon occurs on 18-19 November, and for some around the world it will be an “almost total” lunar eclipse. A lunar eclipse occurs at full moon, when the moon travels directly behind the Earth and so crosses through our planet’s shadow. More than 97% of the moon’s disc will be in the darkest part of Earth’s shadow, known as the umbra.The eclipse begins at 6.02 GMT, when the moon’s western limb touches the outer edge of the Earth’s shadow. This edge does not block out all the sunlight, and is known as the penumbra. It produces a subtle dimming effect that is easily overlooked. Contact with the umbra takes place just before 7.19 GMT, and will cause a distinct shadow to begin crossing the lunar disc. The midpoint of the eclipse, the almost total phase, occurs at 9.03 GMT. The moon then leaves the umbra at 10.47 GMT, and the penumbra just before 12.04 GMT. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Oxfordshire-based Emergex gets go-ahead for trials in Switzerland for skin patch vaccine

I was turning 40 and very unfit. Now my super-healthy parents, both in their 70s, have inspired me to exercise and I love itIt’s Saturday morning and I’m standing in the middle of Osterley Park, west London, between my mum and dad, getting ready for the weekly parkrun. My dad is jogging on the spot, my mum is doing the same. I am thinking how do I get out of this? Both of them are full of energy, encouraging me to get warmed up. All I want is a chocolate and nice masala chai – my favourite spicy tea. I hear the countdown, getting nervous now, and off we go. My dad has sped ahead and with his hand he signals to me to keep up. Behind me is my mum. I can’t go anywhere, they are both watching me and I will have to finish this run stuck between them. Finally, we get to the finishing line and I’m shattered. My dad can do a 5km in 33 minutes. I can barely do it in 45. My mum and I walk and run together.Later on my dad will encourage me to do some skipping, and Mum will get me hula-hooping. This, along with their nutritional advice, has been my daily routine for the past six months. Who needs expensive personal trainers when I can turn to Mum and Dad? Continue reading...

Homo sapiens migrated to the continent in waves – but the reasons for their early failures to overcome Neanderthals are a mysteryModern humans made several failed attempts to settle in Europe before eventually taking over the continent. This is the stark conclusion of scientists who have been studying the course of Homo sapiens’s exodus from Africa tens of thousands of years ago.Researchers have recently pinpointed sites in Bulgaria, Romania and the Czech Republic where our ancestors’ remains have been dated as being between 40,000 to 50,000 years old. However, bone analyses have produced genetic profiles that have no match among modern Europeans. Continue reading...

The ability to control our dreams is a skill that more of us are seeking to acquire for sheer pleasure. But if taken seriously, scientists believe it could unlock new secrets of the mindMichelle Carr is frequently plagued by tidal waves in her dreams. What should be a terrifying nightmare, however, can quickly turn into a whimsical adventure – thanks to her ability to control her dreams. She can transform herself into a dolphin and swim into the water. Once, she transformed the wave itself, turning it into a giant snail with a huge shell. “It came right up to me – it was a really beautiful moment.”There’s a thriving online community of people who are now trying to learn how to lucid dream. (A single subreddit devoted to the phenomenon has more than 400,000 members.) Many are simply looking for entertainment. “It’s just so exciting and unbelievable to be in a lucid dream and to witness your mind creating this completely vivid simulation,” says Carr, who is a sleep researcher at the University of Rochester in New York state. Others hope that exercising skills in their dreams will increase their real-life abilities. “A lot of elite athletes use lucid dreams to practise their sport.” Continue reading...

Six well-known public figures take the colour test. Who chose calming blue?The Observer Magazine of 8 March 1970 had a bit of fun with a colour test developed by the psychologist Dr Max Lüscher that supposedly revealed personality and character traits (‘Showing your true colours’), despite his stern warning that ‘it is not a parlour game or a horoscope’.Robert Shields, the Observer’s psychology correspondent, assessed the test and presented a simplified version to try out for yourself. There were eight coloured cards to rank in order of preference. Mine were violet, red, dark blue, green, brown, black, yellow, and grey. I was delighted to find that violet is ‘popular among pre-adolescents, emotionally immature adults and homosexuals’ and showed one’s modus operandi, but the second choice shows what one’s objective really is – for red, ‘excitability, sexual desire, the will to win and the urge to dominate others’. Nailed it. Continue reading...

A recent wave of mistakes shows how misinterpreting data risks misrepresenting the impact of the virusSince we have just had Maths Week in England, it seems appropriate to look at a wave of recent errors when communicating numbers.First, the statistics may be described wrongly. The chief executive of NHS England recently claimed: “We have had 14 times the number of people in hospital with Covid than we saw this time last year”, a claim repeated on Sky News and ITV. But there were fewer Covid-19 patients in England on 4 November (7,201) than a year earlier (11,037). The intended reference was to last August, when there were about 23,000 admissions within two weeks after a positive test, about 14 times higher than last year. Continue reading...

These ‘must-do’ itineraries people feel the need to undertake before they die can come with a heavy costIt was revealed last week that a retired lecturer named Darrell Meekcom had been arrested for indecent exposure and dangerous driving after he mooned a speed camera. It sounds as though he’d managed to perform a contortionist manoeuvre at the wheel but in fact he stopped the car and got out while his wife went to buy some bread. The key detail, though, is that Meekcom is terminally ill, having been diagnosed with multiple system atrophy.The act of baring his bottom to a traffic enforcement camera, Meekcom told the police, was an item on his “bucket list”. “Have you never wanted to moon a speed camera?” he asked one of the arresting officers. Continue reading...

The online star with 15 million subscribers on demystifying everything from black holes to the immune system, the trouble with anti-vaxxers, and what his cancer taught himSkim Philipp Dettmer’s CV and you’d have to say he was an improbable candidate to become one of the world’s foremost science communicators. The 35-year-old from Munich dropped out of high school in Germany aged 15. He eventually did a history degree, and only became involved in science through his interest in infographics. This led, in 2013, to him creating Kurzgesagt (AKA “In a nutshell”), one of the most popular science channels on YouTube. The platform’s irreverent, kaleidoscopic videos – stripped-back guides to everything from black holes to Covid – have more than 15 million subscribers and have clocked up almost 1.5bn views.Dettmer has now written a book about the human immune system, which has intrigued him for more than a decade. Everyone has an opinion on theirs – whether it’s good or not up to much; how best to “boost” it – but it can be a struggle to understand how it works. In Immune: A Journey into the Mysterious System That Keeps You Alive, Dettmer uses eye-catching graphics and simple language to untangle the strange, compelling, sometimes grisly methods our bodies use to defend us from disease. Continue reading...

The machine learning outfit’s foray into pharmaceuticals could be very useful, but its grand claims should be taken with a pinch of saltThe most interesting development of the week had nothing to do with Facebook or even Google losing its appeal against a €2.4bn fine from the European commission for abusing its monopoly of search to the detriment of competitors to its shopping service. The bigger deal was that DeepMind, a London-based offshoot of Google (or, to be precise, its holding company, Alphabet) was moving into the pharmaceutical business via a new company called Isomorphic Labs, the goal of which is grandly described as “reimagining the entire drug discovery process from first principles with an AI-first approach”.Since they’re interested in first principles, let us first clarify that reference to AI. What it means in this context is not anything that is artificially intelligent, but simply machine learning, a technology of which DeepMind is an acknowledged master. AI has become a classic example of Orwellian newspeak adopted by the tech industry to sanitise a data-gobbling, energy-intensive technology that, like most things digital, has both socially useful and dystopian applications. Continue reading...