Genetic advantages in sport tend to be celebrated, but that isn’t always the case when it comes to women’s athletics. At the start of July, two female runners from Namibia, Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi, were told they couldn’t compete in the 400m race in the Tokyo 2020 Olympics unless they reduced their naturally high testosterone hormone levels. Shivani Dave speaks to Katrina Karkazis, a professor of sexuality, women’s, and gender studies, specialising in ‘sex testing’ and sport regulations, about the rules that ban female athletes with naturally high testosterone Continue reading...

Last year was first to be in top 10 for heat, rain and sunshine, as scientists say UK’s mild climate is at an endExtremes of weather will strike the UK more frequently owing to the climate crisis, scientists said after data showed that last year was one of the warmest, as well as one of the wettest and sunniest, on record.Last year was the first to figure in the top 10 for heat, rain and hours of sunshine, in records stretching back more than a century, as moderate British weather is rapidly becoming a thing of the past, according to a report from the Met Office and climate scientists. Continue reading...

UK scientist says gene-drive study rendering female insects infertile may lead to ‘self destruct mosquito’ field tests within 10 yearsScientists have successfully wiped out a population of malaria-transmitting mosquitoes by using a radical form of genetic engineering to render the females infertile – in the most advanced and largest ever test of use of the technology to fight the disease.As well as bringing fresh hope in the fight against one of the world’s biggest killers, the study lays the foundations for further trials of gene-drive technology, which could mean self-destroying mosquitoes being released into the wild within 10 years. Continue reading...

Telescope picks up unexpected ‘luminous echoes’ – smaller, later and of different colour to bright flaresAstronomers have detected light behind a black hole deep in space for the first time.Bright flares of X-rays were spotted bursting from a supermassive black hole at the centre of a galaxy 800m light years away, which is relatively normal. Continue reading...

Pioneering biologist and geneticist whose research showed the emptiness of traditional biological concepts of raceThe American scientist Richard Lewontin, who has died aged 92, was intimately involved in some of the most important discoveries, and feuds, of evolutionary biology during the decades in which it passed from knowing that genes existed to specifying them in precise molecular terms.His greatest contribution came in the 1960s, when he demonstrated the existence of very widespread genetic variation within species as well as between them. This research, with John Hubby at the University of Chicago, which had started with grinding up fruit flies, was extended to human beings in a paper published in 1972 that revealed the emptiness of traditional biological concepts of race. Continue reading...

Scientists believe the unusual tubular structures may be the remnants of prehistoric spongesIntricate patterns of tubular structures discovered in giant ancient reefs may be the remnants of prehistoric horny sponges and the oldest known fossils of animal life on Earth.Researchers found the unusual features in vast reefs that were built by bacteria 890m years ago and then pushed up by geological processes to form part of the Mackenzie Mountains in north-western Canada. Continue reading...

More than 2bn Covid-19 vaccine doses have been administered worldwide. Find out which countries are vaccinating the most

PM emphasises positive benefits of having jab and appears to distance himself from vaccine passport plan

Premier indicates rapid tests may be used by year 12 students returning to school as well as some businesses

Trump sycophant Sarah Huckabee Sanders says the ex-president deserves credit for the jab rollout. If that’s the price of herd immunity, so be itForget Pfizer or AstraZeneca, the hottest shot this summer is the Trump vaccine. Hang on, you might cry: there is no such thing. Well, Donald Trump’s former White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders – a woman who has always had an unusual relationship with facts – begs to differ. Sanders is running for governor of Arkansas, a state with one of the lowest Covid vaccination rates in the US. She seems to want to change that: on Sunday, she published a column explaining her reasons for getting “the Trump vaccine” and arguing that Covid vaccines are safe and effective.Are you wondering whether Sanders, a Trump sycophant, has turned over a new leaf? Is it possible she suddenly cares more about the public good than political gain? I’m afraid not. Sanders, you see, wasn’t content with using her platform simply to encourage her fellow Arkansans to get vaccinated; she also took numerous jabs at Democrats. The reason some people are scared that vaccines are not safe, according to Sanders, is Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s fault. If “the left truly care about increasing the vaccination rate … they should admit they were wrong to cast doubt on Operation Warp Speed and give President Trump and his team the credit they are due,” Sanders wrote. Continue reading...

People deserve better than a never-ending stream of unproven practices dangled before them in the guise of hopeTen years ago a desperate young woman walked into my office and declared: “I need your help. I am dying of cancer.”Her story was incredible. At an integrative medicine seminar she had won a special blood test as a door prize. Thinking of having some bloods done anyway, she had taken advantage of the free offer, only to receive a call telling her she had cancer. It was only after an expensive course of intravenous vitamins that her sceptical cousin asked why no one had at least ordered a CT scan to find the cancer. She convinced her GP to order the scan, which detected two tiny lung nodules. The GP sent her to a surgeon who ordered a different scan, by which time the benign nodules had disappeared. The surgeon told her she did not have cancer but she did not believe him. Then she saw me. Continue reading...

Childhood poverty and health issues before adulthood all factors in decline in mid-life wellbeingMore than one in three middle-aged British adults are suffering from at least two chronic health conditions, including recurrent back problems, poor mental health, high blood pressure, diabetes and high-risk drinking, according to research that warned that health in midlife is on the decline.The study of “generation X” adults born in 1970 found that those who grew up in poorer families were 43% more likely to have multiple long-term health conditions than their peers from wealthier households. Those who had been overweight or obese as children, who had lower birthweight and who had experienced mental ill-health as teenagers were also at increased risk of poor health in midlife. Continue reading...

Team will search for evidence of extraterrestrial life by looking for advanced technology it may leave behindA team of scientists will embark on a new international research project led by Harvard University to search for evidence of extraterrestrial life by looking for advanced technology it may leave behind.The Galileo Project is led by the Harvard astronomy professor Avi Loeb. Loeb co-founded the project with Frank Laukien, CEO of Bruker Corporation, a Massachusetts-based manufacturer of scientific equipment. Continue reading...

High-risk individuals were still much more vulnerable to catching virus and dying in first wave of pandemic

Male spending – on petrol and meat – is apparently worse for the environment than women’s. But it’s the system, not individuals, that needs to changeSorry, boys, but it’s all your fault. Melting ice caps, flash floods, rising sea levels: men are to blame for the lot of it. Please don’t drown the messenger, I’m just relaying the results of a Swedish study that found that men’s spending habits cause 16% more climate-heating emissions than women’s. The biggest difference seems to be that men spend more money on petrol. Another big difference: the men surveyed bought more meat than women. So this is the way the world ends, eh? Not with a bang, but with blokes eating too many burgers.I don’t know how many studies published in the Journal of Industrial Ecology go viral, but this paper has had an enormous amount of traction. Of course, this is largely because its findings leant themselves to delicious clickbait such as Men Are Worse for Climate Change Than Women Because They Love Meat and Cars. To be fair, the study didn’t lean into gender war territory in the way you would expect based on the headlines it generated. Gender wasn’t even mentioned in the paper’s title, which was “Shifting expenditure on food, holidays, and furnishings could lower greenhouse gas emissions by almost 40%”. Continue reading...

NSW premier expected to announce Covid roadmap as Blacktown apartment block locked down

In the lead-up to the athletics competitions at the Tokyo Olympic Games 2020, Shivani Dave takes look at how advances in running shoe technology are resulting in records being smashed. Talking to Geoff Burns, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan who specialises in biomechanics, Shivani asks how so-called ‘super spikes’ work and if the mechanical advantage they provide is fair Continue reading...

Findings of Office for National Statistics analysis consistent with previous research say expertsPeople from white and mixed ethnic groups had lower life expectancy compared with Black and Asian groups in England and Wales between 2011 and 2014, according to analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).The study linked 2011 census and death registration data to produce estimates of life expectancy and cause of death by ethnic group. Continue reading...

This live blog is now closed. For the latest coronavirus updates from around the world, you can read our global Covid blog

The solutions to today’s puzzlesEarlier today I set you three ‘clueless’ Sudoku and an ‘almost clueless’ Killer Sudoku. For discussion and tips you can read the original column here.For a printable page of all the puzzles click here. Scroll down for the solutions. Continue reading...

More heatwaves even worse than those seen recently in north-west of America forecast in research“Record-shattering” heatwaves, even worse than the one that recently hit north-west America, are set to become much more likely in future, according to research. The study is a stark new warning on the rapidly escalating risks the climate emergency poses to lives.The shocking temperature extremes suffered in the Pacific north-west and in Australia 2019-2020 were “exactly what we are talking about”, said the scientists. But they said the world had yet to see anything close to the worst impacts possible, even under the global heating that had already happened. Continue reading...

The trajectory of the pandemic might look more like a range of hills rather than a single mountainWhile the government’s decision to remove most lockdown measures in England was widely expected to result in a large wave of infection and disease, the number of new cases of Covid-19 has been falling over the last five days. Many hope this could mean that we’re past the peak. Yet the reality is more complicated. This is the first time an epidemic has taken place in a highly vaccinated population without control measures in place, so we are in uncharted territory. There is considerable uncertainty about what the next two months hold.The big questions are how high the current wave will get and how long it will last. The number of people in hospital and dying of Covid-19 is directly linked to the number of infections. It’s impossible to accurately predict when we’ll reach the peak of infections, or how long it will take to come back down from this (if I had a pound for every time I’m asked “are we there yet?”, I’d be able to give away a lot of money). Continue reading...

Believing others have fixed traits which don’t change yields defensiveness, failure to listen, and failure to set boundariesOver the past few years I’ve noticed a rise in the label “toxic” as a response to difficult or destructive behavior. Media outlets from Psychology Today to Harvard Business Review run articles on how to identify or avoid toxic people. Politicians like Mitch McConnell use the term to describe their adversaries. Even academic psychologists have begun to take up the language.Related: It’s time to rethink what loneliness is | Miriam Kirmayer Continue reading...

Puzzles where less is moreUPDATE: Solutions now available here.Sudoku is an extremely elegant puzzle, and this crucial to its appeal. The rules are simple to understand and the grid – with given numbers usually presented in a symmetric pattern – is striking. Yet perhaps Sudoku is not elegant enough. Perhaps the numbers on the starting grid are an unforgivable blemish, a needless sullying of the page.Or so argue a group of mathematicians, who have come up with a new puzzle genre: ‘clueless Sudoku’, which are Sudoku-style puzzles with a pristine starting grid. These puzzles literally don’t have a (numerical) clue. Continue reading...

From Syrians helping in Germany’s floods to Russian CrossFitters fighting fires, ordinary people helping to tackle the climate crisisWhen Anas Alakkad, a Saarland-based translator and paramedic from Damascus, saw pictures of the flooded German towns on his Facebook feed on Sunday night, he fired off messages to Syrian friends around Germany. Continue reading...

Now is the chance to find Ophiuchus, which some view as the 13th sign of the zodiacThis time of year offers the opportunity to track down the large but faint constellation of Ophiuchus, the serpent bearer – literally a man holding a snake. One of the original 48 constellations listed by Ptolemy in the second century, there is no definitive association between the constellation and a myth, but several have been suggested. It could be Apollo grappling with the serpent that guarded the oracle of Delphi; or Apollo’s son Asclepius, who witnessed one serpent heal another by feeding it herbs; or maybe Laocoön, who was slain by sea serpents after he tried to warn the Trojans that the famous horse was a trap. Continue reading...

It would be easy enough to get home quickly if we had money to burn

Researchers say cases linked to products claiming to promote muscle growth or weight loss are rising and more rigorous oversight is neededThe number of patients being admitted to hospital with severe liver injuries caused by herbal and dietary supplements claiming to promote muscle growth or weight loss is increasing, with some people harmed so severely they required a liver transplant.A study led by Dr Emily Nash from the Royal Prince Alfred hospital examined hospital records of 184 adults admitted to the AW Morrow Gastroenterology and Liver Centre with drug-induced liver injury between 2009 and 2020. She and her co-authors found liver injury cases linked to herbal and dietary supplements increased from two out of 11 patients (15%) during 2009–11, to 10 out of 19 patients (47%) during 2018–20. Continue reading...

Visionary biochemist who was appointed head of the Medical Research Council in 1987As its head from the late 1980s, the research scientist Sir Dai Rees, who has died aged 85, revolutionised the way the Medical Research Council (MRC) interacted with industry. In this respect, he was a visionary: he understood the importance of a successful interface between basic research and industry, including its impact on attracting public funds.Under his leadership, centres were established with strong industrial links, with the aim of encouraging the practical application of MRC research and inventions. The work of these centres contributed to the development of the “blockbuster” Keytruda antibody for cancer treatment, and of the world’s top-selling pharmaceutical drug, the antibody Humira, which treats rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn’s disease. Continue reading...

Hunt begins near Oslo for fragments after sightings of large space rock hurtling across night skyAn “unusually large meteor” briefly lit up southern Norway on Sunday, creating a spectacular sound and light display as it rumbled across the sky, and a part of it may have hit Earth, possibly not far from the capital, Oslo, experts said.Reports of sightings started arriving at around 1am, and the phenomenon was seen as far north as Trondheim. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage. Continue reading...

An 'unusually large' meteor briefly lit up southern Norway on Sunday as it sped at up to 20km per second across the morning sky. Reports of sightings started at around 1am, with sightings of the phenomenon recorded as far north as Trondheim. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage Continue reading...

Champion of autistic people who explored the attention that they devote to a leading interestDinah Murray, who has died aged 75 of pancreatic cancer, was a key figure in autism studies, and an indefatigable advocate for autistic people for three decades. Her acute insight lay in the importance of attention and interests to an understanding of the condition.On the autistic spectrum herself and fascinated with language and the mind, in 1991 Murray read Uta Frith’s book Autism: Explaining the Enigma. She had a eureka moment when it spoke of an autistic person’s attention “going to their leading interest”. Continue reading...

She’d always found them evil and scary, but when I wanted a cat in lockdown I appealed to my mum’s faithCats are perfect to most people, but not to my 42-year-old mother. She is just like any of my 17-year-old friends’ parents – she is spirited, sparky, generous and can be feisty when she needs to be. She cooks arguably the best chicken parmesan in the world, and also has impeccable taste in Bollywood music. But there is one annoying trait that makes her different from the other mothers – she unequivocally loathes all animals, unless they are in a palatable format, like her chicken parmesan.In Britain, a hatred for pets is unheard of, any bitterness towards animals is considered completely unacceptable. After all, we are considered a zoophilist nation. Throughout lockdown, pet ownership has surged. According to statistics from the Pet Food Manufacturers’ Association, there are now 34m pets in the UK including 12m cats and 12m dogs, along with 3.2m small mammals, such as guinea pigs and hamsters, 3m birds and 1.5m reptiles. Continue reading...

Insects have declined by 75% in the past 50 years – and the consequences may soon be catastrophic. Biologist Dave Goulson reveals the vital services they performI have been fascinated by insects all my life. One of my earliest memories is of finding, at the age of five or six, some stripy yellow-and-black caterpillars feeding on weeds in the school playground. I put them in my empty lunchbox, and took them home. Eventually they transformed into handsome magenta and black moths. This seemed like magic to me – and still does. I was hooked.In pursuit of insects I have travelled the world, from the deserts of Patagonia to the icy peaks of Fjordland in New Zealand and the forested mountains of Bhutan. I have watched clouds of birdwing butterflies sipping minerals from the banks of a river in Borneo, and thousands of fireflies flashing in synchrony at night in the swamps of Thailand. At home in my garden in Sussex I have spent countless hours watching grasshoppers court a mate and see off rivals, earwigs tend their young, ants milk honeydew from aphids, and leaf-cutter bees snip leaves to line their nests. Continue reading...

‘Disastrous’ energy policies of China, Russia, Brazil and Australia could stoke 5C rise in temperatures if adopted by the rest of the worldA key group of leading G20 nations is committed to climate targets that would lead to disastrous global warming, scientists have warned. They say China, Russia, Brazil and Australia all have energy policies associated with 5C rises in atmospheric temperatures, a heating hike that would bring devastation to much of the planet.The analysis, by the peer-reviewed group Paris Equity Check, raises serious worries about the prospects of key climate agreements being achieved at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow in three months. The conference – rated as one of the most important climate summits ever staged – will attempt to hammer out policies to hold global heating to 1.5C by agreeing on a global policy for ending net emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050. Continue reading...

The new space race between the world’s richest men proves one thing to the rest of us – the sooner they leave this planet the betterThe time has come to abolish billionaires. I mean, it’s been coming for a while, but now the alarm is ringing.It started ringing when it first became clear that the existence of billionaires revealed a huge failure in our economic system. When it first became clear where wealth comes from, a combination of inheritance, corruption and exploitation. When the benefits of billionaires, who have often been believed to helpfully provide a trickle-down of cash to the rest of us ordinaries, were revealed to be at best minimal and at worst devastating, as their tax avoidance fatally impacts education and healthcare. In June, ProPublica reported that American billionaires essentially pay no taxes – they didn’t break the rules; the rules were broken already. And in this way wealth begets wealth – a millionaire can become a billionaire by simply sitting very still. Continue reading...

People with invisible disabilities have long asked for flexible options such as working from home. Then came the pandemicI struggle with a mild form of face blindness, or prosopagnosia. The condition, usually associated with autism, makes it difficult to remember people’s faces. This means that, in high-stress situations, I am often unable to match someone’s face to their name or even remember if I’ve met them before. When I worked at an office, I inadvertently offended colleagues who did not understand why I struggled to place who they were.This is just one way that the daily office environment made my career difficult to navigate. Working from home, as I have for the past three years, has made a positive difference in my ability to be a successful, confident journalist, and a happier person overall. Continue reading...

The Wellcome Trust director and Sage member on what politicians and scientists got right and wrong on Covid and why we need an immediate public inquiry

Bezos, Musk and Branson have achieved much – but the biggest challenge facing humanity is not the stars, but our planetFor three of the world’s most famous billionaires, space is indeed the final frontier – for their egos. Jeff Bezos, the planet’s richest man, launched into the great beyond last week via his Blue Origin venture, days after Sir Richard Branson did the same on a Virgin Galactic craft. Elon Musk, the sometime world’s richest man, has yet to join his rivals in the heavens with his SpaceX business, but has bought a ticket to ride with Branson at some point.Space travel is the stuff of legend and these lauded entrepreneurs are clearly caught up in the mythology. Humanity and space have connotations of bravery, and technological and intellectual brilliance, that run through the ages, from Galileo to Gagarin and the moon landings. Continue reading...

Fears over ‘experimental’ inoculation show that more needs to be done to counter harmful misinformation

The Amazon founder returned to Earth last week with a pledge to help save the planet, but technology alone is not the answerSo Jeff Bezos made it safely back to the universe that most of us lesser mortals inhabit. He graciously thanked his Amazon employees and customers (that’s you and me, folks) who made the realisation of his childhood Star Trek dreams possible. “I want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you guys paid for this,” he said. “Seriously, for every Amazon customer out there and every employee thank you from the bottom of my heart very much. It’s very appreciated.”Aw, shucks. Thanks, Jeff. In a post-flight press conference he declared that the venture had reinforced his commitment to tackling the climate crisis and using his project as a stepping stone towards colonising space for the benefit of Earth. “We’re going to build a road to space,” he said, “so our kids, and their kids, can build the future. This is not about escaping Earth … this is the only good planet in the solar system and we have to take care of it. When you go to space and see how fragile it is you want to take care of it even more.” Continue reading...

Deputy chief medical officer Michael Kidd says NSW will get additional 50,000 vaccines from national stockpile. This blog is now closed

Being a good listener isn’t just about shutting up and not interrupting – it’s about really taking in what someone is telling youWhen I was a young girl, a fabulous woman called Pam who lived opposite us would come to do my mum’s hair once a week. Pam was a retired hairdresser and beautician who had been taught partly by Vivien Leigh’s mother.I knew this because I listened as she and my mother talked. My mum would sit under the stand hairdryer with wads of cotton wool curling out from under her hairnet to protect her ears from the heat, and Pam would talk and talk: about Margaret Thatcher (my mum wasn’t a fan); their early lives (Pam’s in Yorkshire, my mum’s in Naples); and about life up and down the London street where we all lived. Continue reading...

Science is the only method we have of understanding the world, making predictions, and rationally adapting our own behaviour

Risk of reinfection with Delta may be 46% greater than with the Alpha variant, national testing data finds

Cases increased in all four nations, says Office for National Statistics

Hope’s scientific mission is to study atmosphere and climate of Mars and is remarkable successIt is one year since the United Arab Emirates launched the Hope space mission from the Tanegashima Space Centre in Kagoshima prefecture, in south-west Japan, to begin its journey to Mars.By 9 February 2021, Hope had crossed 493m km of space and performed the Mars Orbit Insertion (MOI) manoeuvre. On 23 March, Hope manoeuvred into its final operating orbit, a highly elliptical path that carried it from 20,000km to 43,000km in altitude above Mars, and, after a period of commissioning the instruments, science operations began on 23 May. Continue reading...