Hopes that device may improve diagnosis and monitoring of conditions such as lung and kidney diseaseScientists say they have created a smart mask" that can analyse the wearer's breath and detect tell-tale signs of disease.Researchers hope the device - which can beam its data to an app over Bluetooth - will offer an affordable and convenient way to capture and immediately analyse breath biomarkers related to respiratory and metabolic processes. Continue reading...
Researchers say behaviour, identified for first time in non-human primates, aids social cohesionWhether referring to a politician, cheering on an athlete, or recounting what friends and family have been up to, names often crop up in everyday human communication. Now researchers say marmoset monkeys use similar labels.Besides humans, only dolphins and elephants were previously known to use vocal labels for other members of their species. Continue reading...
As multinationals and researchers harvest rare organisms around the world, anger is rising in the global south over the unpaid use of lucrative genetic codes found on their landEven in the warm summer sun, the stagnant puddles and harsh rock faces of Ribblehead quarry in North Yorkshire feel like an unlikely frontier of the AI industrial revolution. Standing next to a waterfall that bursts out from the fractured rock, Bupe Mwambingu reaches into the green sludge behind the cascade and emerges with fistful of algae.Balancing precariously on the rocks, the researcher passes the dripping mass to her colleague Emma Bolton, who notes their GPS coordinates and the acidity, temperature and light exposure on a phone app. Continue reading...
by Presented by Ian Sample, produced by Madeleine Fin on (#6QATD)
The psychologist Chris French has spent decades studying paranormal claims and mysterious experiences, from seemingly impossible coincidences to paintings that purportedly predict the future. In this episode from April 2024, Ian Sample sits down with French to explore why so many of us believe in what he terms weird shit', and what we can learn from understanding why we are drawn to mysterious and mystic phenomena Continue reading...
by Hosted by Michael Safi with Lee Johnson and Regina on (#6QAQ7)
Revisited: Guardian journalist Michael Safi delves into the world of artificial intelligence, exploring the dangers and promises it holds for societyThis week we are revisiting the Black Box series. This episode was first broadcast on 14 March 2024.
Imperial College London study also found that a third of people at risk of a severe reaction do not carry an EpiPenThe number of people diagnosed with food allergies in England has more than doubled in a decade and a third of those with life-threatening reactions are not carrying adrenaline pens, research has revealed.Experts at Imperial College London analysed GP records for 7 million people. The number of new food allergy cases increased from 76 per 100,000 people in 2008 to 160 per 100,000 people in 2018, they found. Total prevalence grew over the 10-year period from 0.4% to 1.1%. Continue reading...
Study described as necessary first step' in discovering whether dogs and humans can use push-button devices to communicateIt has become a hot-button topic among dog lovers: can humans and canines communicate with each other using a soundboard? Now researchers say they have taken the first steps towards finding out, revealing that dogs trained to use such devices respond to the pre-recorded words just as they do to spoken words.Here we show that actually [dogs] do pay attention to the [soundboard] words and they produce appropriate behaviours independently of environmental cues and who produces the word," said Prof Federico Rossano, of the University of California San Diego, who led the research. Continue reading...
I didn't think I would ever break the law to try alternative medicine. But as Australia finds itself at the forefront of the therapy, I'm in a unique positionTo quote Eliza Doolittle from My Fair Lady, I'm a good girl, I am.I am scrupulous with my tax return, obey speed limits and send thank you cards after I've been invited to someone's place for dinner.Sign up for a weekly email featuring our best reads Continue reading...
Fewer that 1.5% of drugs trials between 1960 and 2013 included expectant women. Now, campaigners and doctors are aiming to change thatWhen she was pregnant with her second child, Busisiwe Beko was living with HIV, but that didn't worry her. She had been taking antiretrovirals for years and as an experienced Aids activist in South Africa she knew that as long as she continued to take her pills every day, her second baby would be born free of infection, just like her first.But another illness was lurking in Beko's lungs: tuberculosis (TB) had been hiding behind the common signs of pregnancy. The illness turned her pregnancy into a nightmare. Continue reading...
Focus on potential harms from staying unvaccinated found to be more effective than messaging on jab's benefitsPolicymakers who want to encourage the uptake of Covid vaccines should focus on communicating the risks of not having such jabs, research suggests.Researchers in China say they have found the approach, known as a loss frame strategy, is more persuasive in boosting people's willingness to get vaccinated than focusing on the benefits either to the individual themselves or to others. Continue reading...
It's been quite a revelation to discover that my version of reminiscing is nothing like other people'sHave you ever had the experience where a smell or a taste pulls you into a world of memory? One bite of a cookie of a similar kind to those in your old school cafeteria, and suddenly you can practically see the linoleum floors and hear the squeak of plastic chairs. Most people can have these sudden reveries - I can't.When I have come across descriptions of this phenomenon - Proust's madeleine scene, for instance, or the memory bubbles in the movie Inside Out - I've always assumed that it was some kind of metaphorical device. I had no idea that most people actually re-experience moments from their pasts in some sensory detail, even if it's a bit shaky or faint. Continue reading...
With talk of an Oasis reunion, experts explain how sibling relationships can be particularly intense and problematic and rewarding'For most of the 1990s and 2000s, the Gallagher brothers clashed on stage and traded high-profile insults in newspaper interviews and on social media. So rumours of an Oasis reunion tour in 2025 have prompted furious speculation about how the pair repaired a rift that for decades appeared intractable.Family therapists told the Guardian that although sibling rifts are common and often reparable, reunions like the Gallaghers' only succeed if both warring parties are ready to bury the hatchet. Continue reading...
by Presented and produced by Madeleine Finlay with Ni on (#6Q8WQ)
Labradors are known for being greedy dogs, and now scientists have come up with a theory about the genetic factors that may be behind their behaviour.In this episode from April 2024, the Guardian's science correspondent and flat-coated retriever owner Nicola Davis visits the University of Cambridge to meet Dr Eleanor Raffan and Prof Giles Yeo to find out how understanding this pathway could help treat the obesity crisis in humansMuch more fixated on the sausage': study sheds light on obesity in labradors Continue reading...
Whether it's your partner that's getting on your nerves, or your friends, or even your pet, sometimes you just want to burn everything to the ground and start over. But will you feel the same way tomorrow?A friend of mine has a useful phrase to describe an experience I think many of us can relate to: she calls it getting divorcey". She isn't actually married, but you don't have to be, to recognise what she's talking about.Getting divorcey is what happens to her when her partner sneezes into his hand and then rubs it on his jeans, or when he chews his food very loudly, and when they disagree on how to raise their daughters and have arguments about money. Continue reading...
It's time to ditch the stereotypes about only children. The same goes for the cliches about conscientious and controlling eldest siblingsAre only children selfish, spoiled and lonely? Duh, no, a piece in the New Scientist recently concluded, unpicking all these stereotypes.There are many more only children now: in 2022, 44% of UK families with dependent children had just one child. According to researchers at University College London's Faculty of Education and Society, they are doing just fine. Rejecting the outdated preconceptions and stereotypes about only children", they found an overall reassuring picture of UK only children's lives and outcomes". Continue reading...
A red triangle, helmed by the baleful red eye of Aldebaran, will be visible before the light of dawnExtremely early risers will have a special treat this week, as the moon meets two planets in a patch of sky already studded with bright stars. The chart shows the view looking east from London at 04.00 (BST) on the morning of 28 August.The planets will have climbed to a comfortable altitude by this time, but the dawn will not yet have begun to encroach on the darkness. The bright white beacon of Jupiter will be easy to spot, as will the waning crescent moon. Continue reading...
Researchers will use artificial intelligence to match image data of patients from Scotland with linked health recordsScientists are to analyse more than a million brain scans using artificial intelligence with the aim of developing a tool to predict a person's risk of dementia.Researchers at the University of Edinburgh and the University of Dundee will examine CT and MRI scans of patients from Scotland captured over more than a decade, as part of a global research effort called NEURii. Continue reading...
The US-based journalist has fashioned a wide-ranging and thought-provoking study of how everything from microbes to mammoths transformed our world into a living organismWhy read popular science? The best books manage to entertain, educate, astonish and even galvanise the reader, bringing an appreciation of new realms of knowledge. They expand awareness, not just of the beauty and complexity of the universe, but our place in it as human beings. They serve as celebrations and warnings, challenges and pleas. Traditionally, the genre tends to garland hard data with lashings of anecdote and well-turned, elegant metaphor. With Becoming Earth, Oregon-based journalist Ferris Jabr achieves all of these aims and more. He takes James Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis, which proposed a reframing of Earth as a living being, and shows how the history of life on Earth is the history of life remaking Earth" in perpetual feedback spirals. Becoming Earth is an exploration of how life has transformed the planet, a meditation on what it means to say that Earth itself is alive, and a celebration of the wondrous ecology that sustains our world."It's a vision thick with baroque possibilities, potentially endless, and Jabr simplifies his mission by dividing his book into three sections: rock, water and air. In Rock, he journeys a mile underground and learns that as much as 20% of the Earth's biomass - the collective weight of all living things - may be simple organisms that live deep within the earth. There are some microbes that flourish in the cracks between rocks, magma-heated to 60C, and which get their energy from radioactive uranium; he describes others that live for millions of years. The weathering effect of bacteria, fungi and lichens has, over eons, created the silts that have lubricated plate tectonics, creating our continents. Computer models suggest that on a barren planet, the expansion of the continents would have been severely stunted and Earth would have remained a water world flecked with islands." Continue reading...
The long-running series in which readers answer other readers' questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical conceptsWhat is the evolutionary purpose of blushing? Peter Walls, LiverpoolPost your answers (and new questions) below or send them to nq@theguardian.com. A selection will be published next Sunday. Continue reading...
How our mutual love of music - and interest in each other's tastes - brought my daughter Laila and me closer togetherIt is a cloudy Saturday evening in Edinburgh in early June and I am in a rugby stadium surrounded by young women who are wearing glitter and homemade friendship bracelets. Pink stetsons and shiny bodysuits abound, middle-aged men in TK Maxx less so. This is not my tribe - I am here with my 12-year-old daughter, Laila, to see Taylor Swift in concert. She has been looking forward to this night for months, having seen the Eras tour countless times online. Every night since the tour began, Laila would watch live streams, but nothing could have prepared her for the moment Swift appears on stage and the stadium screams along to Cruel Summer. Laila sings the lyrics with passion and delight. I can tell by her expression that today is the greatest day of her life.Trying to recall a time when Laila was not a Swiftie is like trying to remember a time before I had children. It must have existed, but it is hard to believe. It feels like Taylor has been an unofficial part of our family for years. She pops up in almost every conversation with my daughter, particularly in recent weeks, albeit in sombre tones, following the tragic events in Southport, with the death of three children, all Swift fans, and the riots that followed - such a far cry from the inclusiveness and joy Taylor Swift embodies. Continue reading...
Team at University of Edinburgh using microbes to recycle lithium, cobalt and other expensive mineralsScientists have formed an unusual new alliance in their fight against climate change. They are using bacteria to help them extract rare metals vital in the development of green technology. Without the help of these microbes, we could run out of raw materials to build turbines, electric cars and solar panels, they say.The work is being spearheaded by scientists at the University of Edinburgh and aims to use bacteria that can extract lithium, cobalt, manganese and other minerals from old batteries and discarded electronic equipment. These scarce and expensive metals are vital for making electric cars and other devices upon which green technology devices depend, a point stressed by Professor Louise Horsfall, chair of sustainable biotechnology at Edinburgh. Continue reading...
The continent will belatedly get 10,000 shots amid criticism of delays to the process caused by WHO red tapeAfrica's first batch of mpox vaccines will this week finally reach the continent, weeks after they have been made available in other parts of the world.The 10,000 shots, donated by the US, will be used to tackle a dangerous new variant of the virus, formerly known as monkeypox, after a 2022 outbreak triggered global alarm. Continue reading...
Campaigners hail decision to give thousands of sufferers access to new set of drugs known as modulators'Alix Oxlade was 30 weeks into her pregnancy when scans showed fluid building up in the stomach and bowels of her unborn son, Rufus. The cause was unclear, though there was an early suspect: cystic fibrosis.One of the most common inherited illnesses in the west, cystic fibrosis is caused by a defective protein that allows mucus to build up in the lungs, bowels and other organs and can lead to chronic infections that worsen through life. Tests subsequently showed Alix and her partner, Ben, who live in East Yorkshire, were both carriers of the disease. Continue reading...
Sunita Suni' Williams and Barry Butch' Wilmore have been on the International Space Station since 6 JuneNasa has decided that the two astronauts currently stuck on the International Space Station will return next February on a SpaceX-crewed Dragon flight where two seats have been made available for Sunita Suni" Williams and Barry Butch" Wilmore.Space agency officials said there was too much uncertainty" for the astronauts to return on the craft that brought them to the space station, Boeing's Starliner, which has had problems after the capsule sprang small leaks and some of its thrusters failed. Continue reading...
It's a dangerous emotion that makes us crave drama, and one exacerbated by the modern worldThe age of boredom... has now passed". So begins On Boredom, a 2021 essay collection that claims the likes of TikTok and YouTube have driven it to extinction. These days, the time needed to be bored is no longer available". This view, that boredom has been blotted out, is widely held - so much so that psychologists have started to worry that we have lost something in the process: attention spans, or the state of blankness from which creative thoughts must spring.But last week a study came along to confirm what has been lurking at the back of our distracted minds all along - scrolling through endless content actually makes boredom worse. Of course it does. Open up your phone while in a queue or on the bus, and your brain goes into a restless kind of limbo. If I'm honest, it's not boredom that makes me reach for Instagram but the urge to quiet other thoughts and emotions under a hum of static, like putting a blanket on a bird cage. Watching other people's travel slides and home videos was once seen as the epitome of tedium - now it's all some of us do. Continue reading...
In an extract from his new book on making the most of our finite time on Earth, the writer argues that worrying about how friends and colleagues are feeling is an agonising way to liveGreat news! I found the cure for my anxiety!!" the author Sarah Gailey once announced on social media. All I need is for everyone I know to tell me definitively that they aren't mad at me, once every 15 seconds, for ever." I know how she feels. For years, I possessed a remarkable superpower: I could turn almost any work opportunity that came my way, no matter how exciting, into an unpleasant emotional drama, simply by agreeing to do it. Once I'd accepted a deadline or signed a contract, there was now another person in the world who might be growing impatient that I hadn't finished yet, or who might end up disappointed in what I produced - and the thought that they might be harbouring any negativity towards me felt hugely oppressive. This same overinvestment in other people's emotions meant I was always saying yes to things I should really have declined, because I flinched internally at the thought of the other person feeling crestfallen. And that I rarely enjoyed myself fully at social gatherings, owing to a deep suspicion that the others present, however happy they appeared, might secretly only be spending time with me reluctantly.People-pleasing tendencies develop for different specific reasons, but right at the core of all of them lies a fundamental denial of what it means to be a limited human being. When it comes to the challenge of building a meaningful life, it's easy enough to see that our limited quantity of time is a major stumbling block. (A vast proportion of conventional productivity advice consists of techniques for maintaining the illusion that you might, one day, find a way to fit everything in.) But we're saddled with many other limitations, too, including the one that makes people-pleasing such an absurd and fruitless endeavour - which is that we don't have nearly as much control over other people or their emotions as we might wish. Essentially, it's a form of perfectionism, a felt need to perfectly curate what's going on inside other people's heads, if you're ever to let yourself relax or feel secure. Like all flavours of perfectionism, it diverts energy and attention from what really matters most; and it encourages the sufferer to lead what the Swiss psychotherapist Marie-Louise von Franz called a provisional life" - a life that somehow doesn't quite count as the real thing", not just yet, because you haven't yet developed the skills to keep everyone around you permanently happy with everything you're doing. Continue reading...
Scientists still trying to work out why some people live beyond 100, but agree it is best to avoid taking advice from centenarians themselvesThe death of the world's oldest person, Maria Branyas Morera, at the age of 117 might cause many to ponder the secrets of an exceptionally long life, but scientists say it could be best to avoid taking advice on longevity from centenarians themselves.According to the Guinness World Records website, Branyas believed her longevity stemmed from order, tranquility, good connection with family and friends, contact with nature, emotional stability, no worries, no regrets, lots of positivity and staying away from toxic people". Continue reading...
by Hosted by Savannah Ayoade-Greaves; written by Emma on (#6Q71W)
Actor Gillian Anderson on prudes, powerful women, and collecting secret fantasies; How singer-songwriter Chappell Roan slow-burned her way to stardom; and Oliver Burkeman tells you how to stop being such a people-pleaser. Continue reading...
Fate of Starliner crew to be revealed as early as Saturday as rival SpaceX prepares to launch private spacewalk missionNasa is expected to announce as early as Saturday whether the US astronauts stuck on the International Space Station (ISS) can come home with the glitchy Boeing Starliner spacecraft that took them there or will need to wait for a SpaceX vehicle - which would be another embarrassment for the embattled rival plane-maker.Then SpaceX plans next week to launch one of its riskiest missions yet, to attempt the first ever private-sector spacewalk, with innovative slim spacesuits and a cabin with no airlock. Continue reading...
First patient in UK gets dose of jab designed to kill most common form of lung cancer - and stop it coming backDoctors have begun trialling the world's first mRNA lung cancer vaccine in patients, as experts hailed its groundbreaking" potential to save thousands of lives.Lung cancer is the world's leading cause of cancer death, accounting for about 1.8m deaths every year. Survival rates in those with advanced forms of the disease, where tumours have spread, are particularly poor. Continue reading...
Geoscientists studying 200m-high wave that hit Greenland coast last year warn of potentially disastrous impactJust under a year ago, the east coast of Greenland was hit by a megatsunami. Triggered by a large landslide entering the uninhabited Dickson Fjord, the resulting tsunami was 200 metres high - equivalent to more than 40 double-decker buses.Luckily no one was hurt, though a military base was obliterated. Now analysis of the seismic data associated with the event has revealed that the tsunami was followed by a standing wave, which continued to slosh back and forth within the narrow fjord for many days. Continue reading...
Over four decades, my father, Kit Hill, who has died aged 94, worked to develop the use of ultrasound in medicine, from the earliest handbuilt scanners with little computational power through to very much higher levels of sophistication. He and his team at the combined Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) and Royal Marsden hospital in London also explored the biological impact and potential for risk from ultrasound exposure, developing safe codes of practice for worldwide application.Kit's career at the ICR started in 1957 when he was a PhD student mapping the concentration of radionuclides in plants, livestock and human organs following nuclear-bomb testing and power-plant failures. On a visit to Kit's lab, Sir Ernest Marsden, who had worked with Sir Ernest Rutherford, was intrigued by the alpha particle spectrometer Kit had built from bits and bobs". Continue reading...
Decision by Nice to rule out drug being available on NHS comes despite medicines licensing body giving green lightThe UK's health regulator has rejected a drug that can slow the progression of Alzheimer's disease, saying its benefits are too small to justify the costs of the therapy and close monitoring of patients for signs of serious side-effects".Lecanemab, which is given twice a month, removes sticky clumps of protein amyloid beta from the brain, believed to be a hallmark of the disease. The drug is not a cure. But in clinical trials, the therapy slowed cognitive decline by 27% in early Alzheimer's patients, compared with a placebo. Continue reading...
Think of Britain's Covid debacle and the Post Office scandal. As a behavioural scientist, I have seen how ruinous blind belief can beConfidence is complicated. Ted talks try to teach you how to get it; parents want it for their children; for those who don't have it, it seems almost impossible to acquire. Entrepreneurs, social-media influencers and job applicants will project certainty even when internally racked with self-doubt - which is perhaps no surprise, given that virtually every talk on confidence is about how to acquire more of it, not less.And yet too much confidence can have serious consequences. It contributed to the 2008 financial crisis and the Post Office scandal. In my years working as a behavioural scientist, I've measured the confidence levels of thousands of civil servants, and created case studies of how overconfident decision-making in government leads to failed policies. I have also seen how it can affect senior decision-making at the highest levels - at the Covid inquiry Matt Hancock, the health secretary in 2020, was described as responding to the crisis with nuclear levels" of overconfidence.Dr Mark Egan is a principal research adviser at the Behavioural Insights Team. He holds a PhD in behavioural science from the University of Stirling Continue reading...
Exclusive: Fellows divided as council reportedly puts forward Sir Paul Nurse for role never held by a womanA row has broken out among fellows of the UK's Royal Society over the prospect of re-electing its former president Sir Paul Nurse as head of the institution.The Guardian understands the society's council has put forward Nurse, a geneticist and Nobel laureate, as its preferred candidate for the role, which would begin after Sir Adrian Smith's term finishes next year. Continue reading...
An associate professor in marine biology explains her fascination with the surprisingly diverse animals - and how they could help to address the climate crisis
by Presented by Ian Sample, produced by Madeleine Fin on (#6Q5AJ)
A record 10,000 research papers were retracted in 2023. In this episode from February 2024, Ian Sample speaks to Ivan Oransky, whose organisation Retraction Watch has been monitoring the growing numbers of retractions for more than a decade, and hears from blogger Sholto David, who made headlines this year when he spotted mistakes in research from a leading US cancer instituteA lot of it is sloppiness': the biologist who finds flaws in scientific papers Continue reading...
Simulated study shows southern ecosystems could be compromised by objects from South Africa, South America, New Zealand and Australia as global heating continues
Sharing increasingly crowded spaces could result in greater risk of pandemics, human and animal conflicts and loss of nature, say researchersOver the next 50 years, people will push further into wildlife habitats across more than half the land on Earth, scientists have found, threatening biodiversity and increasing the chance of future pandemics.Humans have already transformed or occupied between 70% and 75% of the world's land. Research published in Science Advances on Wednesday found the overlap between human and wildlife populations is expected to increase across 57% of the Earth's land by 2070, driven by human population growth. Continue reading...
People of ancient Clovis culture could have impaled huge animals on pikes rather than throwing spears, finds studyWhen it came to taking down giant animals, prehistoric hunters would quite literally have faced a mammoth task. Now researchers have shed fresh light on how they might have done it.Experts studying sharp stone points made by the Clovis people, who lived in the Americas from about 13,000 years ago, say that rather than hurling spears at enormous animals such as giant bison, mammoths or ground sloths, the tribes could have planted their weapons point-up in the ground to impale charging creatures. Continue reading...
Twenty-four brain samples collected in early 2024 measured on average about 0.5% plastic by weightA growing body of scientific evidence shows that microplastics are accumulating in critical human organs, including the brain, leading researchers to call for more urgent actions to rein in plastic pollution.Studies have detected tiny shards and specks of plastics in human lungs, placentas, reproductive organs, livers, kidneys, knee and elbow joints, blood vessels and bone marrow. Continue reading...
These new proteins could be our best hope of averting catastrophe. But governments are trying to have them bannedFor many years, certain car manufacturers sought to obstruct the transition to electric vehicles. It's not hard to see why: when you have invested heavily in an existing technology, you want to extract every last drop before disinvesting. But devious as in some cases these efforts were, they seem almost innocent in comparison with the concerted programme by a legacy industry and its tame politicians to suppress a far more important switch: the essential transition away from livestock farming.Animal farming ranks alongside fossil fuel production as one of the two most destructive industries on Earth. It's not just the vast greenhouse gas emissions and the water and air pollution it causes. Even more important is the amount of land it requires. Land use is a crucial environmental metric, because every hectare we occupy is a hectare that cannot support wild ecosystems.George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...
Cambridge-led study of 2m people globally is most comprehensive evidence yet of red meat link to diabetesEating processed or red meat increases the risk of type 2 diabetes, with just two slices of ham a day raising the danger by 15%, the largest study of its kind suggests.Research led by the University of Cambridge and involving 2 million people worldwide provides the most comprehensive evidence yet of a link between meat and the disease that presents one of the most pressing dangers to global health. Continue reading...
The corporate takeover of veterinary practices has been underregulated. Low pay and high charges need addressingNow revived for a new generation, the classic television series All Creatures Great and Small offered an unashamedly romantic take on the life of a 1930s rural veterinary practice. Sadly, in a sector that has been corporatised at a dizzying pace, the modern reality is far less edifying.In south Wales, vets, nurses and support staff working for surgeries owned by the VetPartners group have just extended an ongoing strike until the end of this month. This unprecedented industrial action has been prompted by anger at low wages that are reportedly driving some employees to food banks. There are also widespread concerns that profit-driven calculations by corporate giants are pushing customer charges too high.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...
Supercentenarian who died in her sleep had lived through two world wars and Spain's civil warThe world's oldest known person, Spain's Maria Branyas Morera, who was born in the US in 1907 and lived through two pandemics and two world wars, has died at the age of 117, her family said.Maria Branyas has left us. She died as she wished: in her sleep, peacefully and without pain," her family wrote on her account on X on Tuesday. We will always remember her for her advice and her kindness." Continue reading...
by Presented and produced by Madeleine Finlay with ad on (#6Q3HN)
We all know the cliches about older siblings being responsible, younger ones creative, and middle children being peacemakers. But is there any evidence our position in the family affects our personality? In this episode from March 2024, Madeleine Finlay meets Dr Julia Rohrer, a personality psychologist at the University of Leipzig, to unpick the science behind birth order Continue reading...
by Sally Weale Education correspondent on (#6Q3AW)
Essential experiences' recommended to improve science education include kneading dough and planting vegetablesLicking an ice lolly should be an essential part of the national curriculum for primary schoolchildren in England, according to scientists at the Royal Society of Chemistry.Whether it's an old-fashioned Fab, a Twister or a Calippo, not only does it taste nice, it teaches children vital scientific concepts such as heating, cooling and how temperature works, scientists say. Continue reading...
Rocket Factory Augsburg says anomaly' led to the loss of the stage', adding that there were no injuriesA rocket company has vowed to return to regular operations as soon as possible" after an explosion during a test at the UK's new spaceport in Shetland.The test was carried out by German company Rocket Factory Augsburg (RFA) which hopes to make the first UK vertical rocket launch into orbit. Continue reading...
Science | The Guardian