by Presented by Alex Hern and produced by Madeleine F on (#5F6T0)
Last week videos of what appeared to be Tom Cruise at home and playing golf appeared on TikTok. It later emerged the clips were actually AI-generated by a creator of ‘deepfake’ videos. Deepfake videos depict situations that have never happened in the real world, and are becoming increasingly convincing. Alex Hern goes behind the scenes to find out exactly how such videos were made, and how far this technology has progressed Continue reading...
Designer babies and ethical quicksand ... The biographer of Steve Jobs tells the story of Jennifer Doudna and the development of gene-editingOne of the most striking passages in Walter Isaacson’s new book comes towards the end. It is 2019 and a scientific meeting is under way at the famous Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory in New York State, but James Watson, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, is banned from it because of the racist and scientifically unfounded views he has expressed on intelligence. Isaacson, who is to interview Watson, therefore has to make his way to the house on the nearby campus that the scientist has been allowed to keep. When the conversation sails dangerously close to the race issue, someone shouts from the kitchen: “If you are going to let him say these things, then I am going to have to ask you to leave.” The 91-year-old Watson shrugs and changes tack.The voice from the kitchen belonged to Rufus, Watson’s middle-aged son who suffers from schizophrenia. “My dad’s statements might make him out to be a bigot and discriminatory,” he once said. “They just represent his rather narrow interpretation of genetic destiny.” In many ways, Isaacson observes, Rufus is wiser than his father. Continue reading...
by Denis Campbell Health policy editor on (#5F68Y)
Innovation in NHS self-care will see patients in England swallow tiny cameras instead of having standard endoscopyPeople will be able to check if they have bowel cancer by swallowing a tiny capsule containing miniature cameras, in an extension of patient self-care.In what experts described as a trend towards more NHS at-home care, hastened by the Covid-19 pandemic, thousands of people in England will be able to avoid the discomfort of having a camera inserted into their bowel by instead swallowing a capsule the size of a cod liver oil tablet. Continue reading...
Before the vaccine, Britain’s pandemic defences were in a scandalous state. The government must still be held to account for its failuresContact tracing was once advertised as the centrepiece of the government’s strategy for managing the pandemic. The coronavirus would be held at bay and other nations would be in awe at Britain’s “world-beating” system. Neither goal was achieved.A report, published on Wednesday by the Commons public accounts committee, struggled to find evidence that NHS test and trace has made a significant difference in reducing transmission. That is not to say it did nothing. Hundreds of thousands of daily tests have been administered. In the second half of last year, 2.5 million people who tested positive were contacted and a further 4.5 million people were told to self-isolate. (How many did so and for how long is another question.) Continue reading...
Those of us who have received free vaccinations may want to show our appreciation by contributing to a scheme to ensure vaccine rollout in lower income countries, writes Paul TylerThe timely reminder (A ‘me first’ approach to vaccination won’t defeat Covid, 5 March) from Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization, coincides with a growing public awareness that we are all in this pandemic together. UK citizens will not be safe – or able to travel freely – until all the world is protected. We who have received free vaccination – thanks to the NHS – may want to show our appreciation by contributing to the rollout in lower income countries.To this end, members from all parties of the House of Lords have come together with GAVI (the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation) to enable UK residents to contribute to the Covax programme. Our #GetOneGiveOne campaign has raised £56,000 from individual donations in its first week. Continue reading...
Science-fiction author honoured in Nasa’s chosen name for Mars rover’s touchdown“Mars is a rock - cold, empty, almost airless, dead. Yet it’s heaven in a way,” Octavia E Butler wrote in her acclaimed novel Parable of the Sower. Decades later, Nasa has informally named the touchdown site of the Mars rover Perseverance after the late science fiction novelist.Nasa said there was “no better person” to mark the landing site than Butler. “Her guiding principle, ‘When using science, do so accurately,’ is what the science team at Nasa is all about. Her work continues to inspire today’s scientists and engineers across the globe – all in the name of a bolder, more equitable future for all,” said Nasa’s Thomas Zurbuchen. Continue reading...
Russian space agency Roscosmos and Chinese counterpart CNSA to develop research facilities on surface of moon or in its orbitRussia and China have unveiled plans for a joint lunar space station, with the Russian space agency Roscosmos saying it has signed an agreement with China’s National Space Administration (CNSA) to develop a “complex of experimental research facilities created on the surface and/or in the orbit of the moon”.The CNSA, for its part, said the project was “open to all interested countries and international partners” in what experts said would be China’s biggest international space cooperation project to date. Continue reading...
New findings cement idea that ritual and religion was invoked using talismans to soothe nervesWith sky-high levels of maternal mortality, the science of obstetrics virtually nonexistent and the threat of infectious disease always around the corner, pregnant medieval women put their faith in talismans to bring them divine protection during childbirth.From amulets to precious stones, the list of items that the church lent to pregnant women was substantial, but the most popular lucky charm was a “birthing girdle”. Continue reading...
Biak island residents say SpaceX launchpad would devastate island’s ecology and displace people from their homesPapuans whose island has been offered up as a potential launch site for Elon Musk’s SpaceX project have told the billionaire Tesla chief his company is not welcome on their land, and its presence would devastate their island’s ecosystem and drive people from their homes.Musk was offered use of part of the small island of Biak in Papua by Indonesian president Joko Widodo in December. Continue reading...
Scottish first minister announces limited changes to mixing, in particular for teenagers. This live blog has now closed – please follow the global coronavirus live blog for updates
by Presented by Linda Geddes and produced by Tiffany on (#5F3SK)
Social distancing measures mean most of us now have very little opportunity to talk to strangers and acquaintances. These chats might seem insignificant, but they can provide lots of psychological benefits. To find out more, Linda Geddes speaks to Gillian Sandstrom about what we’re currently missing out on. And, when told Gillian finds finishing a chat particularly hard, Linda gets in touch with the author of a recent paper asking why we find it so challenging to end a conversation Continue reading...
Octopuses and their relatives are remarkably clever and controlled. How many of our top politicians can say the same?Back in the gentler days of the internet, before it was just bots and people shouting at tea, I had a blog, and through it, occasional exchanges with a woman I described as my “cephalopod correspondent”. She would write, sharing interesting titbits about squid behaviour, cuttlefish news and, once, a picture of “an Octopus cyanea on a penny”.I think of her often now, as every week it seems we learn something spectacular about the tentacular. Octopuses are competent and creative problem-solvers, can master mazes, and frequently escape from captivity. They can even predict the outcome of football matches (OK, possibly not, but octopus Paul’s strike rate was impressive). Our collective fascination only deepened with last year’s Netflix documentary My Octopus Teacher, a lovely exploration of the curiosity and resourcefulness of one uncommonly touching common octopus. Perhaps even better was the relatable recent revelation that octopuses sometimes punch their fish co-workers when on joint hunting missions: it has certainly deepened my respect for them. Continue reading...
Groundbreaking new analysis could allow more than 100,000 people to claim compensationFrance has consistently underestimated the devastating impact of its nuclear tests in French Polynesia in the 1960s and 70s, according to groundbreaking new research that could allow more than 100,000 people to claim compensation.France conducted 193 nuclear tests from 1966 to 1996 at Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls in French Polynesia, including 41 atmospheric tests until 1974 that exposed the local population, site workers and French soldiers to high levels of radiation. Continue reading...
Researchers at Japan's Nara Women's University have discovered a new trait exhibited by the sacoglossan sea slug – it has the ability to decapitate itself, then regrow its body. The process, from shedding all of itself below the neck to regrowing a new body, takes less than a month, in an extreme example of a process known as autotomy
‘Dream come true’ to locate first carbonaceous chondrite seen in UK, part of fireball that caused sonic boomA lump of a rare meteorite that lit up the night sky over the UK and northern Europe last week has been recovered from a driveway in Gloucestershire.The fragment, weighing nearly 300 grams, and other pieces of the space rock were located after scientists reconstructed the flight path of the fireball that unleashed a sonic boom as it tore across the sky shortly before 10pm UK time on Sunday 28 February. Continue reading...
Dr Annie Hickox advocates for the powerful combination of medication plus talking therapy. And Laurel Farrington highlights how empathy reduces when we are anxious and stressedAs a mental health professional, I was glad to read Jenny Stevens’ description of her experience of antidepressant medication and how it helped her during a mental health crisis that was exacerbated by Covid-19 (I’m not ashamed medication got me through the pandemic – but we need talking therapies too, 2 March). Her account of the initial effects of medication on her sleep and her ability to return to day-to-day activities that helped keep her “sane and stable” will resonate with many who have had severe depression.She rightly points out that despite the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines, and her own recognised need, talking therapy was repeatedly unavailable to her on the NHS. The difficulty in accessing psychological support contributes greatly to the surge in antidepressant prescribing and increases the stigma surrounding medication by those whose agenda is driven by an anti-medication ideology and misinformation. Continue reading...
Zolgensma, which costs £1.79m for one-off treatment, will be available in England this year for the first timeThe world’s most expensive drug, which treats babies and young children with a rare and often fatal degenerative disorder, will be available this year for the first time on the NHS in England.Zolgensma, which costs £1.79m per dose, halts the progression of spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), which involves loss of movement, muscle weakness and paralysis, and is the leading genetic cause of death in infants. Continue reading...
These insects have declined by a third over 50 years. While their appetites can be a nuisance, ultimately we must protect these gloriously beautiful, elusive creatures
Psychiatrist Bruce Greyson has spent decades talking to people about near-death experiences. His work raises questions about what happens when we die, and how we ought to choose to liveWhen Gregg Nome was 24 years old, he slipped into the churn beneath a waterfall and began to drown, his body pummelled against the sandy riverbed. What he saw there surprised him. Suddenly, his vision filled with crystal-clear scenes from his childhood, events he had mostly forgotten, and then moments from early adulthood. The memories, if that’s what they were, were vivid and crisp. Was he reliving them? Not quite. They came at high speed, almost all at once, in a wave. And yet he could process each one individually. In fact, he was able to perceive everything around him: the rush of the water, the sandy bed, all of it brilliantly distinct. He could “hear and see as never before,” he recalled later. And, despite being trapped underwater, he felt calm and at ease. He remembered thinking that prior to this moment his senses must have been dulled somehow, because only now could he fully understand the world, perhaps even the true meaning of the universe. Eventually, the imagery faded. Next, “There was only darkness,” he said, “and a feeling of a short pause, like something was about to happen.”Nome recounted this story at a support group in Connecticut, in 1985, four years after the experience. He had survived, but now he hoped to understand why, during a moment of extreme mortal crisis, his mind had behaved the way it did. The meeting had been organised by Bruce Greyson, now a professor emeritus in psychiatry at the University of Virginia. (Some of the group’s members had responded to an ad Greyson placed in a local newspaper.) As Nome spoke, Greyson sat in a circle of 30 or so others, as if at an AA meeting, listening intently, nodding along. Continue reading...
There is too much messianic passion and not enough enlightening psychology in Peterson’s follow-up to the bestselling 12 Rules for LifeFew books in recent years have had quite so noisy a cultural impact as Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos. With its odd mixture of Darwinian determinism, Jungian myth-interpretation and Heideggerian ontology (Being written with a capital B!), it was an unlikely self-help manual and an even unlikelier bestseller. But its dozen behavioural rules for leading a meaningful life rode a steep wave of frustration with the shibboleths of postmodernity.Peterson’s radical traditionalism was seen as a bracing corrective to the notion that there was no objective truth, only a matrix of prejudicial power relations. Social hierarchies, he argued, were the product of evolution rather than of capitalist exploitation. Continue reading...
A love of complex smells and flavours gave our ancestors an edge and stopped hangoversHuman evolution and exploration of the world were shaped by a hunger for tasty food – “a quest for deliciousness” – according to two leading academics.Ancient humans who had the ability to smell and desire more complex aromas, and enjoy food and drink with a sour taste, gained evolutionary advantages over their less-discerning rivals, argue the authors of a new book about the part played by flavour in our development. Continue reading...
She has always maintained her four children died of natural causes. Now 90 scientists argue she may be rightLeading scientific experts are petitioning for the pardon of the woman dubbed Australia’s worst female serial killer, arguing that all four of her children had rare genetic conditions that could explain their deaths.Kathleen Folbigg is in jail for killing her children as infants between 1990 and 1999. Continue reading...
Forty years after the mutant genes that cause the deadliest cancers were discovered, drugs that target them could be approvedIn the early 1980s, Channing Der was just beginning his career as a scientist at Harvard Medical School when he happened upon a discovery that would change the course of cancer research. At the time, the holy grail of cancer biology was discovering so-called oncogenes – genetic switches that can turn a normal cell into a cancer cell – in the genomes of tumours. But while teams of scientists had thrown everything at it for the best part of a decade, their efforts had proved fruitless. One by one, they were beginning to accept that it might be a dead end.Der found himself assigned to test 20 different genes that had been identified as possible oncogene candidates. His question was simple: did any of them actually exist in tumours in a form that was different from normal cells? Continue reading...
A difficult pregnancy meant the only item I dared buy for my unborn child was a book. When she arrived we read it to her every dayNine years ago, I gave birth to a little girl. And now that little girl has grown into a bookworm. It began, as all stories about books should really begin, in a bookshop. I was several months pregnant and I picked up an American picture book I had never come across before: Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. It featured a poem that my husband and I would end up reading, oh, I don’t know, at least 900 times. The book became such a pillar of my daughter’s nightly routine that by the time she could talk, I realised she knew it by heart.It also marked a turning point for me. I had been finding the pregnancy hard. Various complications meant it was high risk, and there was a good chance I would not manage to carry my baby to term. This knowledge weighed heavily in my heart while, in my womb, Flora was literally doing somersaults for the sonographers, happily oblivious to my concerns. Continue reading...
Vehicle had no problem going 6.5 metres, turning and backing up, then photographed its own wheel marks on planet’s surfaceNasa’s Mars rover Perseverance has taken a short drive two weeks after touching down, mission managers have said.The six-wheeled, car-sized probe went 6.5 metres (21.3 feet) during a half-hour test within Jezero crater, an ancient lake bed and river delta. Continue reading...
The speed and cooperation of the Covid response has been honed by decades of dealing with ‘the biggest pandemic the world has ever seen’When Dr Anthony Fauci spoke at the 20th International Aids Conference in Melbourne in 2014, his appearance garnered little media attention.Nearly seven years later, the HIV expert and director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has become a household name throughout the world as the adviser to the White House on the Covid-19 pandemic, appearing in the media daily and speaking plainly about the science and the nature of the virus. Continue reading...
Science | The Guardian