Martin Hairer takes $3m Breakthrough prize for work a colleague said must have been done by aliensA mathematician who tamed a nightmarish family of equations that behave so badly they make no sense has won the most lucrative prize in academia.Martin Hairer, an Austrian-British researcher at Imperial College London, is the winner of the 2021 Breakthrough prize for mathematics, an annual $3m (£2.3m) award that has come to rival the Nobels in terms of kudos and prestige. Continue reading...

Soviet archive film is juxtaposed with inane modern footage of Moscow strays, marring what might have been an insightful documentary about animal cruelty in the name of explorationOstensibly an alternative biography of Laika, the stray mongrel who became the first cosmonaut, this film faithfully tracks her from her time on the streets of Moscow to her lonely demise in low Earth orbit. Incredible archive footage shows us Laika and a number of other dogs being subjected to a relentless barrage of exercises designed to mimic the incredible stress of space travel; it’s hard not to be affected by the footage knowing, as we do, that Laika is being led to an excruciating end.Space Dogs documents a cruel period in human history but the bleak tone the film-makers pursue throughout may not be the best way of dealing with it. It is designed, perhaps, to numb you to the horror of what you are witnessing but the unspeakable acts are presented without comment or context. Continue reading...

This review process is evidence of rigorous safety measures. As the fight against coronavirus continues, speculation is the last thing anyone needsThe Oxford trial, one of the most advanced of the major global programmes to find a vaccine for Sars-CoV-2, has been paused, resulting in much speculation about why, and what this might mean for our efforts to control the pandemic. Is this a cause for concern? Unsettling as some of the headlines may seem, in my opinion we should not be unduly worried.Vaccines are some of the most rigorously scrutinised of all healthcare products. In the UK, clinical trials of vaccines (and medicines) are overseen by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). The MHRA has strict processes governing the conduct of clinical trials, which are designed to ensure that the vaccines we develop are effective and safe. Continue reading...

Pharmaceutical firm’s boss says 2020 deadline possible if regulators move fast

Comments follow news of delay to Oxford trial after one of UK volunteers fell ill

US president proud of effort despite grim figures; deaths forecast to hit a million in weeks

The pandemic has shown how a lack of solid statistics can be dangerous. But even with the firmest of evidence, we often end up ignoring the facts we don’t like. By Tim HarfordBy the spring of 2020, the high stakes involved in rigorous, timely and honest statistics had suddenly become all too clear. A new coronavirus was sweeping the world. Politicians had to make their most consequential decisions in decades, and fast. Many of those decisions depended on data detective work that epidemiologists, medical statisticians and economists were scrambling to conduct. Tens of millions of lives were potentially at risk. So were billions of people’s livelihoods.In early April, countries around the world were a couple of weeks into lockdown, global deaths passed 60,000, and it was far from clear how the story would unfold. Perhaps the deepest economic depression since the 1930s was on its way, on the back of a mushrooming death toll. Perhaps, thanks to human ingenuity or good fortune, such apocalyptic fears would fade from memory. Many scenarios seemed plausible. And that’s the problem. Continue reading...

As the northern hemisphere heads into autumn and winter, cold and flu are beginning to spread and more people find themselves with coughs, fevers and a runny nose. With Covid-19, this brings new challenges. Should we quarantine at the first sign of the sniffles? Could co-infections of flu and Covid-19 make your symptoms worse? Do we have the capacity to test for more than one virus?In part 2 of our investigation into what happens when flu season hits, Ian Sample speaks to Prof Peter Horby about what it might mean for both individuals and medical professionals if multiple respiratory viruses are circulating, and how we can best prepare for a potential winter resurgence of Covid-19

Antimicrobial resistance ‘biggest human health threat, bar none’, says Australian research director ahead of three-year study in FijiThe emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), including drug-resistant bacteria, or “superbugs”, pose far greater risks to human health than Covid-19, threatening to put modern medicine “back into the dark ages”, an Australian scientist has warned, ahead of a three-year study into drug-resistant bacteria in Fiji.“If you thought Covid was bad, you don’t want anti-microbial resistance,” Dr Paul De Barro, biosecurity research director at Australia’s national science agency, the CSIRO, told The Guardian. Continue reading...

For many women, the healthcare system entails long searches for diagnosis and few answers. Join authors Gabrielle Jackson, Kylie Maslen and Katerina Bryant as they discuss their books that take on the male-centric world of medicine• If you have a question for the authors, head to the comments – or join our interactive book club, hosted by Australia at HomeWhen I first started thinking that I needed to write a book about women’s health, my questions were too big and the canon too small to define what it should be about. Where to start in a world that knew so little about female biology, that made a taboo of subjects relating to menstruation, desire, pleasure or anything to do with female sex organs? I eventually settled on an idea that focused on pain – because I was in pain, so often – although it shape-shifted constantly. During the research and writing process I kept finding there was more to write, more ideas to explore, other books to be written. Continue reading...

Over 8,500 new cases in France; 1140 new cases in the Netherlands; Portugal reports 646 new cases; Oxford vaccine trial on hold. This blog is now closed

First uncrewed mission of the Space Launch System now scheduled for November 2021Nasa has quietly made public that the development of its giant rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), is now budgeted at $9.1 bn (£7bn). Ground systems to support the mission are budgeted at a further $2.4bn. As pointed out by Ars Technica, the new development cost represents a 33% increase in the cost of the mission.In 2017, Nasa set itself the target to launch the SLS rocket in the December 2019-June 2020 window, with a total cost of $7.17 bn. The first launch of the SLS will now be an uncrewed test in which the rocket will propel Nasa’s newly developed Orion multi-purpose crew vehicle on a 25-and-a-half day journey to the moon and back. Scheduled to take place in November 2021, it will be the first test flight in Nasa’s Artemis programme, which is designed to land astronauts on the moon with its third mission, slated for 2024. Continue reading...

With Covid-19 cases rising sharply, clarity and rigour are needed rather than visions of technological breakthroughs

Boris Johnson restricts gatherings in attempt to prevent second national lockdown

Tests have been paused after a UK volunteer became ill. How will it affect the search for a cure?

Man says he would continue with trial despite being worried about a second injection

Is this the end for hopes of an early breakthrough in the race to find a coronavirus drug?The halt in development of the University of Oxford’s Covid-19 vaccine due to an adverse reaction in a trial participant has triggered fears of a delay in finding a solution to coronavirus restrictions.A spokesman for AstraZeneca, the company working with the academic team to produce the vaccine, said the voluntary pause is “routine”. Continue reading...

Prof Catherine Bennett says it’s important for the public to understand how modelling data is being used to determine the lifting of restrictions

A spokesman for AstraZeneca, the company working on the coronavirus vaccine, said pausing trials was common during vaccine developmentThe development of a promising Covid-19 vaccine has been put on hold due to an adverse reaction in a trial participant.A spokesman for AstraZeneca, the company working with a team from Oxford University, told the Guardian the trial has been stopped to review the “potentially unexplained illness” in one of the participants. Continue reading...

Latest figures bring France’s total cases to 335,524 and Spain’s to 534,513; concerns over spread of virus in Greek migrant camps. This blog is now closed

Ministers concede lack of laboratory capacity for tests could take fortnight to resolve

Labour leader says government did not use summer to make system effective; Bolton lockdown tightened amid highest case numbers in UK. This live blog is now closed - for updates, please follow the global coronavirus live blog

A third of government and industry-employed ecologists and conservation scientists had work unduly modified, study findsAustralian scientists say they are prevented from speaking openly about their work and their advice is being suppressed by government and industry when it comes to the impact of logging, mining, land-clearing and the climate crisis, new research suggests.A study by the Ecological Society of Australia, published in the journal Conservation Letters, surveyed 220 scientists across government, industry and academia on the extent to which their work had been suppressed. Continue reading...

Amid more cases, people with suspected infections have been reporting difficulties

Pubs and restaurants in north-west England town restricted to takeaway-only

Rise in carbon capture as global warming speeds growth of forests would be negated by earlier deaths, say scientistsLive fast, die young is a truism often applied to rock stars but could just as easily describe trees, according to new research. Trees that grow rapidly have a shorter lifespan, which could spell bad news for tackling the climate crisis.Trees grow faster in warmer conditions, and this should act as a natural brake on global heating, as they take up and store more carbon dioxide from the air as they grow. But the new study casts doubt on this beneficial cycle, finding that the faster trees grow, the sooner they die – and therefore stop storing carbon. Continue reading...

Group calls for change to statutory sick pay to help prevent spread of coronavirus

Seiko Hashimoto says country is planning for event next year even though a widely available vaccine is unlikely

The numbers point to a second wave. Without strong action, hospitalisations will increase and deaths will follow

Restrictions could be reimposed amid claims people have ‘relaxed too much’

Comments from Robert Jenrick come amid stricter measures for parts of Scotland and Wales

More than 170 teams of researchers are racing to develop a safe and effective vaccine. Here is their progressResearchers around the world are racing to develop a vaccine against Covid-19, with more than 170 candidate vaccines now tracked by the World Health Organization (WHO). Continue reading...

Researchers say people with prolonged symptoms at risk of being forgotten as they struggle to get helpUp to 60,000 people in the UK may have been suffering from “long Covid” for more than three months, unable to get the care they need to recover from prolonged and debilitating symptoms.Tim Spector, a professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London who runs the app-based Covid symptom study, said around 300,000 people had reported symptoms lasting for more than a month. Continue reading...

For those of us in the northern hemisphere, flu season is quickly approaching. This raises an important question: what will it mean for Covid-19? Could hospitals be overloaded? Is co-infection likely and could it make symptoms worse? Or, will transmission of Sars-CoV-2 prevent the spread of seasonal influenza? In the first of two parts, Ian Sample addresses the question of flu and Covid-19 by investigating how different respiratory viruses interact. Speaking with Prof Pablo Murcia, Ian explores the interplay when viruses meet – both on a population level, and on the human scale Continue reading...

Spain case total now at 525,549; French expert warns over case rate in France; Scottish government could ‘put brakes’ on lockdown easing. This blog is now closed

Image of 15th-century Abbot John of Wheathampstead bears likeness to contemporary figuresScholars involved in the digital reconstruction of the face of a medieval Benedictine abbot admit there is something “faintly familiar” about the results.The image was extrapolated by experts from CT scans of a well-preserved skull of Abbot John of Wheathampstead, whose skeleton was discovered during excavations for a new visitor centre at St Albans Cathedral in December 2017. Continue reading...

Denial of the basic facts of the coronavirus outbreak is not confined to conspiracy theorists but has crept into what passes for government policy. Covidiocy is now mainstream

Rates growing fastest among those aged 10-29, and decreasing in the older age groups

Discovery of early bony fish casts doubt on accepted ideas about evolutionary history of vertebrates

The answer to today’s puzzleEarlier today I asked you to construct a triangle whose existence seems to defy reason.Show that there is a triangle, the sum of whose three heights is less than 1mm, that has an area greater than the surface of the Earth (510m km). Continue reading...

Five teachers in Suffolk test positive, with cases in Cardiff, Yorkshire and elsewhere

Researchers call for age-based symptom checklists as virus presents differently in children

The conditions appeared to cause structural changes that harmed memory and thinkingHigh blood pressure and diabetes bring about brain changes that impair thinking and memory, research suggests.Doctors examined brain scans and medical data from 22,000 volunteers enrolled in the UK Biobank project and found significant structural changes in the grey and white matter among those with diabetes and high blood pressure. Continue reading...

The Earth ain’t big enough for this tiny shapeToday’s puzzle is simple and spectacular. It asks you to construct a triangle whose existence seems to defy reason.Show that there is a triangle, the sum of whose three heights is less than 1mm, that has an area greater than the surface of the Earth (510m km). Continue reading...

Significant rise in UK with 2,988 new cases; Netanyahu backtracks on lockdowns for cities with high infection rates; thousands attend protests against measures in Croatia and Italy. This blog is closed

Giving home monitors to those with high blood pressure would reduce heart attacks and other conditionsBlood pressure monitors should be handed out on prescription to slash the number of people who die or are left with disabilities from strokes and heart attacks, a medical charity has said.Making the home monitors available to anyone diagnosed with high blood pressure would allow people to control the condition more effectively and reduce the demand on GPs’ surgeries, Blood Pressure UK said. Continue reading...

Austrian research shows how recovery can be slow process for those with severe infection

Capricornus is one of the fainter constellations, but at the moment there are two bright planets pointing the way

Exclusive: John Dargavel says his professional body ‘damaged and demeaned’ all foresters by dismissing links between logging and bushfire risksA veteran Australian forestry scientist has launched a blistering attack on his professional association after it used the retraction of a scientific paper to dismiss links between logging and increased bushfire risks.In an open letter to the Institute of Foresters Australia seen by Guardian Australia, Dr John Dargavel said the institute’s reaction “damages our standing” and “demeans all foresters in the public eye”. Continue reading...