The renowned fossil hunter on the anti-African prejudice in palaeontology, her dream discovery, and bathing her daughter beside a baby hippoFor over 50 years, British-born palaeoanthropologist Meave Leakey has been unearthing fossils of our early ancestors in Kenya’s Turkana Basin. Her discoveries have changed how we think about our origins. Instead of a tidy ape-to-human progression, her work suggests different pre-human species living simultaneously. Leakey’s new memoir, The Sediments of Time: My Lifelong Search for the Past, co-written with her daughter Samira, reflects on her life in science and pieces together what we now understand about the climate-driven evolution of our species.Leakey is part of a famous family of palaeoanthropologists. Her husband, Richard Leakey, and his parents, Louis and Mary, are known for their discoveries of early hominins. Continue reading...

For many, baking is therapeutic. But is cooking along with Bake Off really such a good idea?An acquaintance speculated recently that we would only realise after the fact what kind of mad we went during the pandemic, but I already know: I became Bake Off mad.I used to love baking, especially the showy kind where you produce something slightly flashy to a chorus of coos of admiration. Mine almost never elicited that reaction – I lack skills, attention to detail and artistic flair – but for a few brief, glorious years when my sons were little, I was a cake magician to them. Anything a bit creative filled them with wonder. I made dragons, cartoon characters and even a giant spider crab. Continue reading...

Sir David King’s temporary organisation, formed in response to government’s Covid policy failings, will fight onIt began in the summer when a group of scientists decided to give the government a short, sharp lesson on how to use scientific advice in a transparent manner when tackling Covid-19. Once they had done that, the men and women of the Independent Sage organisation intended to disband.But now the group, led by former government chief scientist Sir David King, is considering a move six months after its formation that would allow Independent Sage to fight on for years to come – but with an expanded agenda. This time it is considering a plan to hold ministers to account over a range of issues, including the UK’s attempts to tackle the climate crisis. Continue reading...

In 1978, a photographer at a Birmingham lab fell ill with smallpox, prompting a race against time to prevent an epidemic. Does the outbreak carry lessons for Covid-19? Sally Williams reportsOn Friday 11 August 1978, Janet Parker was getting ready for work when her head started to pound. She thought she was coming down with flu: she felt sore all over. But she had lots to do that day, so her husband, Joseph, drove her to Birmingham University, where she worked as a photographer in the medical school’s anatomy department.At 40, Parker’s life was steady. She and Joseph, a Post Office telecoms engineer, lived in a modest house in Kings Norton, a quiet suburb of Birmingham. They had two dogs, and were close to her parents, who lived nearby. Parker was an only child, and her father worked for a small family firm in Birmingham’s jewellery quarter. She got into a grammar school and stayed on beyond 16, unlike many children from her background. Her first job was to photograph crime scenes for the West Midlands police, being summoned, often in the middle of the night, to photograph the aftermath of brutal murders, bodies with alarming injuries and blood-spattered walls. Continue reading...

Eva Green’s career-best performance as a single-mother astronaut is an ideal launchpad for a look at cosmic adventurers from Jane Fonda to Juliette BinocheFor too long in the movies – as in life – space exploration was presented as a boy’s realm: brave, lantern-jawed men soaring off to the final frontier while their wives waited and fretted on terra firma. A recent spate of films and TV series have redressed the balance, putting women at the centre of their stargazing narratives – few more stirringly than Proxima (multiple platforms), a superb astronaut character study from the French director Alice Winocour that gives Eva Green the role of her career.Proxima got a UK cinema release in July, but amid pandemic uncertainty never found the audience it deserved. Now, VOD should serve as a reintroduction to a film that combines compelling space-station activity with a frank, straightforward feminist message. Green plays Sarah, an ambitious astronaut and single mother surprised to receive a last-minute invitation to join a European Space Agency mission to Mars – the realisation of a lifelong dream, but one that necessitates a year spent apart from her eight-year-old daughter Stella (the delightful Zélie Boulant). Continue reading...

Katalin Karikó’s mRNA research helped pave way for Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna’s successful work

Obrador rejects criticism as political attacks; Canada fears big rise in cases could overwhelm hospitals; Italy records 37,242 new cases

Scientists say jab could be used to protect those who cannot be given vaccines

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News about potential vaccines has been encouraging – but when will they be ready?

Fritillaria delavayi, used in traditional medicine, turning grey to blend into rocksFor thousands of years, the dainty Fritillaria delavayi has grown slowly on the rocky slopes of the Hengduan mountains in China, producing a bright green flower after its fifth year.But the conspicuous small plant has one deadly enemy: people, who harvest the flower for traditional Chinese medicine. Continue reading...

Sinopharm chairman claims there has not been a single case of infection after inoculation of officials, students and workers heading overseasAlmost a million people in China have taken an emergency Covid-19 vaccine that is still in its testing phase, the company that developed the vaccine has said.Chinese authorities released the vaccine, developed by China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm), to select groups of people in July including Chinese government officials, students, and workers travelling overseas, before the vaccines had been proven to work. Continue reading...

With potential injectable vaccines estimated to be out of reach for two-thirds of world’s population, scientists hope to find less-heat-sensitive formulationsNews that one of the potential coronavirus vaccines had at least a 90% efficacy rate was a “victory for science”, said K Srinath Reddy, a cardiologist and president of the Public Health Foundation of India. But it meant little to his country’s 1.3 billion citizens.“For us, the Pfizer vaccine is more of a scientific curiosity than a practical possibility,” Reddy said. Continue reading...

The observatory has played a key part in space exploration – and a few movies – but two accidents have rendered the 305m-wide instrument unsafeA huge US space telescope nestled deep in the Puerto Rican jungle will be shut down after suffering two destructive mishaps in recent months, ending 57 years of astronomical discoveries.Operations at the Arecibo observatory, one of the largest in the world, were halted in August when one of its supportive cables slipped loose from its socket, falling and gashing a 30-metre (100ft) hole in its 305m-wide (1,000ft) reflector dish. Continue reading...

Agency says no evidence the intravenous antiviral works for severe infections

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Long March-5 rocket has been rolled into position for ignition expected this monthChina is preparing to launch its lunar sample return mission, Chang’e-5. On Tuesday the 57-metre Long March-5 rocket was rolled into position at the Wenchang spacecraft launch site in south China’s Hainan province.This will be the fifth launch of the Long March-5. According to the China National Space Administration, ignition is likely to take place sometime in later November. Chang’e-5 was originally planned for launch in 2017, but the failure of the Long March 5’s second flight delayed the schedule as a rocket engine was redesigned. Continue reading...

Trial suggests that tocilizumab improves outcomes for critically ill patients, say researchers

Putting mass Covid testing in place before financial support for those required to self-isolate is putting the cart before the horse

Further trials required but ‘delight’ after early data reveals strong immune response in over-70s

Study says efforts to prevent spread of disease, such as social distancing, reduce virulence

There’s now evidence that ignoring social distancing rules could help more lethal strains of Covid-19 to win out

Request will be made at WTO meeting in order to allow mass production of treatments

Phase 2 trial data shows strong immune response in over-70s and better tolerance in older adults

Exclusive: Retired doctors, district nurses and physios recruited to administer jab in England’s biggest programme of its kind

The second part of Ian Sample’s 2016 interview with Prof Sir Roger Penrose, which includes a quantum theory of consciousness and the age-old question of whether mathematics is invented or discoveredListen to the first part of the conversation here.We’ll be back next week with two new episodes – see you then! Continue reading...

The CSIRO research vessel, Investigator, has captured vision of a meteor breaking up over the ocean off Tasmania's southern coast. The meteor was filmed at 9.21pm AEDT on November 18 on the ship's 24/7 livestream camera. The ship is currently mapping the ocean floor 100km south of Tasmania, near the Huon Marine Park Continue reading...

Cases and deaths surge in Italy; new Pfizer vaccine data better than first reported; Swiss intensive care beds at full capacity

Costs and overruns on key technology have hit schedule of Artemis programme, says report

Sexual orientation gap for men larger than gap between white and black men, study showsMen in same-sex relationships are significantly less likely to have a degree in a Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths) subject than their heterosexual male peers, according to research.Until now, studies have focused largely on the gender gap in Stem, where women are still hugely underrepresented in higher education and make up less than a quarter of the Stem workforce in the UK. Continue reading...

Denmark has already launched a nationwide cull of its farmed mink herd after concerns for vaccine efficacy

The UK must use safe vaccines as soon as they become available, not wait for the ‘very best’ to come along, writes the deputy chief medical officer, Professor Jonathan Van-TamI was concerned about the tone and accuracy of your story which appeared on the front page of the Guardian newspaper (Government admits millions may miss out on most effective vaccine, 12 November).This headline, which I view as both misleading and sensationalist, occurred due to a lack of understanding. Vaccines against Covid-19 will not all come at once, or in large quantities in all cases. Nor will they be delivered in volumes or over timeframes we can fully predict currently, and their storage characteristics may differ. We will have to use the vaccines that are authorised, in the quantities they become available, according to expert advice. We should use them as soon as we get them. If the choice is between the eligible public accessing a safe vaccine with a lower interim efficacy or having no vaccine at all, we would always choose the former as some protection is absolutely better than no protection. Continue reading...

Greater social contact over period could have to be followed by tougher Covid measures

Among first 170 Covid cases in trial, eight had received vaccine and 162 were in placebo group

Finding has implications for one-size-fits-all approach to vaccine developmentAntibody levels against the virus that causes Covid-19 appear to fall faster in men than in women, a study suggests – a finding that could have implications for vaccine research.Historically, medical research has often taken a one-size-fits-all approach, lumping women and men together despite growing evidence that the sexes differ in how they catch and fight disease. Covid-19 seems to be a case in point, with women more likely to be infected but men thought to be up to twice as likely to die from the virus. Continue reading...

On the anniversary of the start of the Nuremberg trials, 90-year-old Colette Marin-Catherine confronts her past by visiting the Nazi concentration camp in Germany where her brother was killed. As a young girl, she had been a member of the French resistance and had always refused to set foot in Germany. That changes when a young history student named Lucie enters her life. Prepared to reopen old wounds and revisit the terrors of that time, Marin-Catherine offers important lessons Continue reading...

Talk of ‘moonshots’ is typical of the belief that the UK is an innovative state – but it’s far from itThough many have speculated on what Dominic Cummings’s “legacy” might be, one of the more significant contributions he made to No 10 was his thinking about science and technology. Prime ministerial speeches have been peppered with passé futuristic slogans about how Britain leads the world in quantum computing, genomics and AI, and promises that the country can be a “science superpower” – notions that Cummings made a central part of the Brexit project.Like many a macho innovation guru, Cummings is an amateur not a professional, an artless nerd and not an expert. That his policies and prescriptions have been taken seriously is a measure of our collective credulity about Britain’s place in the world of innovation. But whether this foolishness will leave with the fool is another matter. Continue reading...

Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration says coronavirus vaccines can be bought privately. This is a bad idea for many reasonsAs the world continues to grapple with Covid-19, the prospect of a vaccine gives us hope of returning to some kind of “normal” in the not-too-distant future.The Australian government has signed supply agreements with manufacturers of four Covid vaccines in clinical trials. Assuming one or more meets the requirements for safety and effectiveness, everyone will be able to be vaccinated for free Continue reading...

Doctor’s organisation says without tough action NHS will be overwhelmed by Covid patients

Bags are still on sale despite a phasing out in England for amateur usersGrowing plants, both in houses and gardens, has been hugely popular this year, helping to raise spirits during the coronavirus lockdowns. But gardeners and the horticulture industry often use peat compost from peatlands.Peatlands hold vast amounts of carbon that was absorbed by living sphagnum moss. When the moss dies it does not fully decompose in the waterlogged ground, and healthy peatlands can lock away the carbon for thousands of years. Continue reading...

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The drugmaker, whose vaccine candidate has 90% efficacy, will run the programme in Rhode Island, Texas, New Mexico and Tennessee

SpaceX’s newly launched capsule with four astronauts onboard has docked with the International Space Station (ISS), the crew’s home for the next six months.The Dragon capsule arrived after a 27-hour, completely automated flight from Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. There was a brief delay after the 'sunset' threw shadows across the docking area, making it more difficult for the crew to monitor the procedure

Three Americans and one Japanese astronaut on Nasa mission will remain at orbiting lab until their replacements arrive in April

The country music icon’s $1m donation supported the latest breakthrough by Moderna and several research papers

Medics may have to decide who lives or dies due to scarcity of resources during pandemic

Researchers worry PFAS, commonly found in the bodies of Americans, will reduce the immunization’s effectivenessThe successful uptake of any vaccine for Covid-19, a crucial step in returning a sense of normalcy after a year ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic, could be hindered by widespread contamination from a range of chemicals used in everyday products.Small amounts of per- and polyfluoroalkyl (or PFAS) chemicals are commonly found in the bodies of people in the US, as well as several other countries. These man-made chemicals, used in everything from non-stick pans to waterproof clothes to pizza boxes, have been linked to an elevated risk of liver damage, decreased fertility and even cancer. Continue reading...

Jenrick says government wants significant easing of controls to have ‘more normal’ December