Billions unlikely to get jabs as rich countries secure 53% of most promising vaccines

Billionaire, 49, confirms move to Wall Street Journal and says he plans to focus on new Tesla plant and SpaceX ventureElon Musk said on Tuesday he had relocated to Texas from California, where he plans to focus more on the new Tesla plant and his SpaceX venture.Related: Joe Biden pledges to distribute 100m vaccine shots in first 100 days of presidency – live Continue reading...

Protecting patients from Covid-19 is a wonderful step forward. But we cannot yet afford to relax our guard

Dr Richard Lawson argues for the need to prioritise frontline workers, Dr Hugh Adler praises clinical trial volunteers, and Heidi Chow says patents must be suspended so all countries can access the Covid vaccine“NHS staff no longer top priority to receive coronavirus vaccine” (Report, 3 December). This is because the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advises that the first priority should be prevention of mortality, and to do this they have opted for immediate protection of very vulnerable, elderly people in care homes, rather than general prevention of mortality by using the vaccine to reduce the reproduction rate (R-number) of the virus.JCVI did model the use of the vaccine to interrupt transmission of the virus in society, but decided this would only take place when a majority of the general population had been vaccinated, which would take many months to come about. It appears that they did not model giving the vaccine to potential super-spreaders, to people who encounter scores or even hundreds of other people during the course of their working day – people like doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers, teachers, police officers, shop workers, delivery drivers and many other groups who keep the real economy running. The key point is that these workers are at increased risk both of contracting and transmitting the disease. Continue reading...

American pilot who was the first person to fly faster than the speed of soundChuck Yeager, who has died aged 97, stands alongside the Wright Brothers and Charles Lindbergh in the history of American aviation. In 1947 Yeager was the first person to break the sound barrier; and, in hitting Mach 1, he set the US on a path that was to lead to Neil Armstrong’s 1969 moon landing.On the evening of Sunday 12 October 1947, Yeager, a 24-year-old US air force test pilot based at Muroc army air field in California, dined with his wife, Glennis, at Pancho’s bar and restaurant in the Mojave desert. Then the couple went horse-riding, but it was a moonless night and, racing against his wife, Yeager hit a gate, knocked himself out, and cracked two ribs. The pain took his breath away. Continue reading...

Are the robots going to kills us? Film-maker Tonje Hessen Schei speaks to a range of interviewees including Elon Musk’s computer scientist in an eye-opening, anxiety-inducing filmWhat will happen when robots become smarter than humans – will they want to kill us? No, according to the computer scientist in charge of Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence research company OpenAI. His name is Ilya Sutskever and he believes that super intelligent machines won’t hate us, but they will prioritise their own survival. Think about the way we treat animals. We’re fond of them but we don’t ask their permission to build a road; it’ll be like that. His analogy is an extraordinary moment in this doom-laden documentary about the future of AI from Norwegian film-maker Tonje Hessen Schei – an eye-opening film if your anxiety levels are up to it.Another interviewee jokes that AI is being developed by a few companies and a handful of governments for three purposes – “killing, spying and brainwashing” and the film then briskly rattles through the worst-case scenarios facing human civilisation. I suspect nothing here will be a bombshell to anyone who is up to speed on surveillance society in China, autonomous weapons, bias in policing algorithms, the effects of living in online echo chambers, big data and the Cambridge Analytica scandal. But iHuman helpfully gathers all the strands together into one apocalyptic package, detailing the many ways in which technology is a risk to life as we know it. Continue reading...

Comments raise hopes that the vaccine could soon be available to Americans aged 16 and aboveUS Food and Drug Administration (FDA) staff said on Tuesday that data on Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine was in line with its guidance on emergency use authorization, raising hopes it could soon be available to Americans aged 16 and above.Related: Biden picks defense secretary as Trump hosts vaccine summit – live Continue reading...

North Yorkshire’s two national parks, the Yorkshire Dales and North York Moors, have been named international dark sky reserves after a five-year campaign for designation, forming the largest dark sky area in the UK Continue reading...

More than a million of you read our article calling for volunteers to take part in research into why some gamers invert their controls. The response was incredibleIt is fair to say that no one was anticipating this. When the Guardian ran my article on the Visual Perception and Attention Lab at Brunel University London and how it planned to investigate why some gamers invert their controls, I expected a modicum of interest among seasoned readers of the Games section. When I placed an appeal at the end of the article asking for volunteers to take part in a series of virtual research experiments, I thought we’d maybe get a few dozen responses. That’s not what happened. At the time of writing this, more than 1,250,000 have read the article.“The moment the article went live, our phone notifications went crazy,” says Dr Jennifer Corbett who is leading the study with her colleague Dr Jaap Munneke. “In less than a few hours, we had more than 100 participants, and by the end of the day, more than 500. We have more than 1,000 volunteers now and we’re so grateful.” According to Corbett, the lab currently has the resources to test around 100 participants in the first exploratory study, but they are working on ways to support follow-up studies so that every eligible volunteer can be tested. “There are so many questions we can pursue – we just need to find the time and money to keep going!” Continue reading...

Analysis: Funding and high public interest contributed to slashing of research and approval time

From black holes to consciousness, Nobel-winner Roger Penrose shows the beauty of theory. But it needs more support• Dr Thomas Fink is the director of the London Institute for Mathematical Sciences

The US aviation legend was a fighter ace in the second world war, before becoming the first man to break the sound barrier, training test pilots, fighting in the Vietnam war and becoming immortalised in The Right Stuff

The alarming pattern of second waves of Covid-19 infection across the world, and the promise of vaccines on the horizon, has once again brought public health messaging into focus. So what has the pandemic taught us about what makes a successful programme? The Guardian’s health editor, Sarah Boseley, speaks to Prof Linda Bauld about how best to encourage people to change their behaviour in order to mitigate the spread of disease Continue reading...

Lead author of controversial paper making the claims says it has been ‘through rigorous peer review’A study that found US school closures during the Covid-19 pandemic cut the life expectancy of each child in primary school by an average of three months contains “critically flawed assumptions” and “clear mistakes in study design”, according to a rebuttal led by an Australian epidemiologist.The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association on 12 November, was widely shared on social media including by scientists, doctors and policymakers and was covered in dozens of news stories. Continue reading...

Pilot planned for January will give subjects a shot of both Oxford/AstraZeneca and Pfizer/BioNTech versions

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Two compounds in fresh faeces inhibit cold sensation, Chinese researchers sayGiant pandas have been seen smearing themselves with horse manure in the wild, and the sweet smell of scat isn’t the only reason – it appears the manure helps them tolerate low temperatures, according to a study.Unlike insects that make a beeline for faeces, digging for olfactory cues to locate food, attraction to excrement across mammal species is rare. But researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences observed that a giant panda subspecies in China’s Qinling Mountains tended to seek out and sniff fresh horse manure and then roll over it. Continue reading...

UK study finds rapid tests coupled with tough quarantine rules helped bring rate down

Protein analysis provides digital picture of immune response and mortality risk, say scientists

My father, John Mitchell, who has died aged 75, was the founder of Carbohydrate Polymers, a scientific journal which grew from humble roots to become one of the publisher Elsevier’s lead journals. John recognised the need for this much-needed outlet for research into polysaccharide science – the branch of food technology focused on the carbohydrates found most often in plants, algae and micro-organisms

Stress due to racism can wear and tear on the body – literally ‘getting under the skin’ to affect African Americans’ healthI’m part of a research team that has been following more than 800 Black American families for almost 25 years. We found that people who had reported experiencing high levels of racial discrimination when they were young teenagers had significantly higher levels of depression in their 20s than those who hadn’t. This elevated depression, in turn, showed up in their blood samples, which revealed accelerated ageing on a cellular level.Related: 'To be black or brown is to see your body suffer' | Angela Saini Continue reading...

Advisory meeting will discuss feasibility of human challenge trials despite first jabs becoming available

A slender, waning crescent moon will slide past the brilliant jewel of Venus in the pre-dawn skyGetting up before dawn brings a reward this week. Between 11 and 13 December, a slender, waning crescent moon will slide past the brilliant jewel of Venus in the pre-dawn sky. The chart shows the view looking south-east from London on 12 December at 07:00 GMT. Continue reading...

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This is an achievement that answers one big scientific question but raises more fundamental ones for society

No one would argue that running isn’t good for you, but do we really have to pretend to like it, too?For the 126th time this year, I turn the corner by the rowing club and begin the climb towards Stamford Hill. I have half a kilometre to go. Mist has settled on the river to my left, where waterfowls, Egyptian geese and a single, stately heron have gathered by some rushes in a dazzlingly pretty scene for Haringey in late November. They likely make some pleasant noises, but only the fortunes of HMS Royal Oak reach my ears, as my earphones sizzle with its battle against four French frigates near the Bight of Benin in the War of 1812. I am trying to enjoy myself.Last November, with the cooperation of this magazine (ie they paid me), I defied my natural inclinations and did a radical diet and exercise overhaul. The experience produced not just an eminently readable lifestyle piece, but a substantial improvement in my general fitness. And then, shortly before Christmas, it ended, as did my adherence to its stipulations. I jettisoned the protein shakes and the thrice-weekly workouts, and gamely resumed my close personal relationship with butter, sugar, alcohol and grease. I discarded all the measures that had given me these results bar one – running. Continue reading...

Vaccine safety message ‘vitally important’, head of medicines regulator tells Andrew Marr Show

Director of Wellcome Trust, speaking on Desert Island Discs, says he believes everyone should get a second chance in educationThe director of the Wellcome Trust has spent the last nine months under intense pressure, advising government ministers on Covid-19 as a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage). Yet Sir Jeremy Farrar has revealed that his most frequent nightmare has been about sitting his A-levels more than 40 years ago.“I used to wake up thinking, ‘Have I got to do my bloody A-levels again?’ For years, and it’s only in the last year or two I’ve got over that actually. It’s amazing, the scars.” Continue reading...

We trace the extraordinary research effort, from the discovery of the virus’s structure to the start of inoculations this week

When Covid-19 struck, immunologists hit the ground running, and haven’t stopped since. But the effort paid off, writes a scientist who worked on the Oxford clinical trials

Successful docking will be followed by orbiter separating and returning lunar material to EarthA Chinese probe carrying samples from the lunar surface has successfully docked with a spacecraft orbiting the moon, in another space first for the nation, state media reported.The manoeuvre on Sunday was part of the ambitious Chang’e-5 mission – named after a mythical Chinese Moon goddess – to bring back the first lunar samples in four decades. Continue reading...

A capsule released by Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft containing pristine asteroid fragments briefly turned into a fireball as it returned to the Earth’s atmosphere, before landing in the South Australian outback In the early hours of Sunday. For the past six years, Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft has conducted a remarkable 5.2bn km mission to extract the first subsurface samples from the asteroid Ryugu, which scientists hope will shed light on the origins of life Continue reading...

WHO says virus spreading fast despite vaccine progress; French infections rise to 2.29m; Brazil reports 627 new deaths. This blog is now closed. Follow our new global coronavirus blog here

Released capsule entered atmosphere at 5.30pm GMT on Saturday before landing safelyA capsule containing pristine asteroid fragments that may unlock secrets about the formation of the universe has been recovered in the South Australian outback after landing safely back to Earth on Sunday.For the past six years, Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft has conducted a remarkable 5.2bn km mission to extract the first-ever sub-surface samples from the asteroid Ryugu, which scientists hope will shed light on the origins of life. Continue reading...

Science is forcing vegans and vegetarians who demand others join them to think againWith the developments in laboratory-cultured meat, vegetarians and vegans need to ask themselves: is it still about animal welfare or is it about stopping people eating meat?Cultured meat, produced in bioreactors from muscle cells taken from live animals, has been approved for the first time by a regulatory authority. “Chicken bites” by San Francisco startup Eat Just have been approved for sale by the Singapore Food Agency. It’s a landmark moment that could lead to a revolution in “kind/clean” meat, significantly cutting down industrial livestock production, potentially doing away with it altogether. Continue reading...

A condition once overlooked by researchers is now in the spotlight as a key symptom of Covid-19

Online stores draw in shoppers but those with mental health issues are particularly susceptibleAs a digital marketer, Emily Ware spends a lot of time online, yet this comes with a risk. Ware has borderline personality disorder, a mental health condition linked with impulsive behaviours. In her case, that’s spending money online.“At the start of 2020 I was £4,250 in debt with nothing to show for it,” she says. “A good 95% of this was due to impulse spending, from clothes to pub trips to gig tickets. One of the worst was spending £300 on tickets to see Cher on a whim.” Continue reading...

Research shows how arachnids’ sense of atmospheric electricity allows it to spin a line and take offWe humans are only aware of the Earth’s electrical field on stormy days, when the positively charged sky makes a circuit with the negatively charged Earth and lightning flashes between them. Spiders have a more nuanced sense of atmospheric electricity, and can harness it to take flight.Research from the University of Bristol sheds light on “ballooning”, in which a spider holds on to a single strand of thread that carries them aloft. This feat was always assumed to be a matter of riding air currents by some unknown mechanism; Darwin was puzzled by “aeronaut spiders” reaching the Beagle on gossamer threads 60 miles off South America. Since 2013 researchers have believed electric fields are involved – now they have observed the effect experimentally. Continue reading...

WHO concerned over perception that vaccine approval means pandemic is over; revelations of distorted case tallies cause controversy in Greece

The six-year round trip to an asteroid named Ryugu will end in the red sands of Woomera, AustraliaThe Japanese space agency’s remarkable Hayabusa2 mission will on Sunday deliver the second-ever artificially collected sample of asteroid material when a return capsule falls to Earth at the Woomera rocket range in South Australia.The Hayabusa2 probe has been on a 6bn km, ¥30bn ($388m) round trip to an asteroid named Ryugu, which started six years ago in December 2014. After landing on Ryugu twice last year, the spacecraft began its return journey to drop a capsule protected by a heat shield to deliver its payload. Continue reading...

The regulatory fast-tracking of the Covid vaccine in Britain by MHRA has led some to question its methods

New ONS figures reveal the impact of stricter lockdown measures

Further 504 coronavirus-related deaths and 16,298 confirmed cases reported; capital’s public health chief says cases are still too high. This live blog is now closed – please follow the global live blog for updates

Two members of the Royal Statistical Society say UK government’s figures rely on spiked lab tests and not real world tests

Former Gloucestershire home of ‘father of immunology’ Edward Jenner too small for safe social distancing measures

Close relatives of Covid-19 virus likely to be circulating in nature beyond China, says Dr Shi Zhengli

From Palaeolithic paintings to astrophysics … a glittering history takes in explorers, aliens and a world vanishing from viewTwenty thousand years ago, in a cave in France, Palaeolithic humans painted a great bull with a collection of seven dots above his shoulder. Scholars are divided over the meaning of such paintings, but at the start of this book Jo Marchant makes a convincing and picturesque argument that the image is a remnant of a fairly sophisticated astronomy, in which the movement of stars informed human hunting: “a star calendar, with the Pleiades marking key moments in the life cycle of the aurochs bull”.It’s the earliest of many stories in which the cosmos is intrinsically bound up with human behaviour, beliefs, art, science, discovery and understanding – a fundamental connection whose recent loss, Marchant argues, is bad news for humans today. The star myths we tell “are not just stories. They’re cultural memories passed through generations for thousands of years.” Continue reading...