The UK's rivers are in a shocking state, which could get worse with climate change and ongoing pollution. Researcher Joseph Holden at the University of Leeds is digging into these key issues | Continue reading
A thin material made from seaweed can handle high temperatures but only takes a few weeks to break down in a composting bin | Continue reading
Children who go to bed later on the weekends than they do midweek have a larger waist circumference and a higher body mass index than those with a consistent bedtime | Continue reading
Fungus farming by ants has evolved independently in populations separated by the Atlantic Ocean – the latest example was observed in cocktail ants in Cameroon, which cultivate fungus to build their nests | Continue reading
By quickly analysing where and when NBA players take their shots, an artificial intelligence could help their opponents gain an advantage | Continue reading
A report from the US Environmental Protection Agency found that routine releases of toxic chemicals were on the rise recently, though they are trending downward in the long term | Continue reading
Under the laws of quantum mechanics, information about what has fallen into a black hole cannot be destroyed, and now researchers claim they have figured out how it is preserved | Continue reading
By consuming oxygen near to tumours, the battery makes a class of experimental drugs target oxygen-free cancerous cells more effectively | Continue reading
Simple calculations, such as factorising low numbers, can be made by mixing together differently shaped strands of DNA | Continue reading
Details of how the UK government is planning to reach net zero by 2050 reveal that the five biggest policy areas include decarbonising power and ramping up heat pumps - but will these bets actually pay off? | Continue reading
An explosive filled with gaps can only detonate after a liquid is poured into it, which could make it unusually safe for transportation and storage | Continue reading
Using a model of a human small intestine, researchers found that microplastics in high-fat foods significantly increase the absorption of fat | Continue reading
The New York start-up Amogy has already created an ammonia-powered drone, tractor and semi-truck. Now, it’s turning its attention to ships | Continue reading
Extra cerebrospinal fluid – which normally flushes out waste - was pumped into the brain after people watched intense visual stimuli | Continue reading
Just about every popular depiction of predatory dinosaurs is wrong, because their teeth were probably mostly obscured from view rather than being bared ready to strike | Continue reading
Observations from five spacecraft over 40 years have shown that as Saturn’s rings slowly disintegrate, the particles fall into the planet’s atmosphere and heat it | Continue reading
The wellness industry tells us we can be healthier and more productive through quick fixes and supplements. Author Colleen Derkatch investigated why, even when we know it sounds too good to be true, wellness can be irresistible | Continue reading
The thalamus is the brain's relay station for sensory information, but a study in mice has found it may also play a role in memory processing | Continue reading
An analysis of flood data from 101 rivers in Germany and the US has identified clues that indicate a danger of unprecedented extreme flooding | Continue reading
Older cells may fail to make proteins or may make proteins that don't function as they should, in a discovery that could lead to new drug targets to slow the ageing process | Continue reading
Mapping the volcanoes of Venus is surprisingly easier than doing the same on Earth, because many of the volcanoes on our planet are hidden beneath the sea | Continue reading
The ease with which artificial intelligence can generate and paraphrase language means that detectors to spot AI content will only be as accurate as flipping a coin | Continue reading
The discovery of a black hole that formed just 570 million years after the big bang could help us understand the evolution of these cosmic behemoths | Continue reading
Carbon emissions within the next 50 years could lead to a tipping point where large parts of the Greenland ice sheet melt over the next 10,000 years | Continue reading
OpenAI’s ChatGPT labelled text samples used in AI training with more accuracy than people did. The approach could automate some of the human labour involved in AI development | Continue reading
[tbc] The record for the maximum human lifespan has stayed unbroken since the 1990s but that might change, according to a new way of analysing mortality records | Continue reading
Nestled within the faintest of the zodiacal constellations, the Beehive cluster can be tricky to find, but these stars are worth the effort, says Abigail Beall | Continue reading
Research suggesting that wrinkles could be a driver of ageing means we need to rethink the beauty industry – and who pays for it | Continue reading
These images from a companion book to David Attenborough's new documentary series celebrate the wildlife of Britain and Ireland | Continue reading
Sarah Hart's engaging book about how central maths is to literature by authors from George Eliot to Georges Perec is a homage to both subjects | Continue reading
Many people feel an uncanny "presence" when no one is there. Ben Alderson-Day explores why this is, in a lively and comprehensive book | Continue reading
It would be the ultimate in personalised medicine: a digital version of your body, which doctors could use to predict what diseases might befall you and your future health. A new book from Peter Coveney and Roger Highfield asks if it is possible | Continue reading
Carl Sagan's novel Contact, in which Ellie Arroway searches for alien intelligence, has been an inspiration and a guide, says Chanda Prescod-Weinstein | Continue reading
Poor diet is the biggest cause of avoidable illness and premature death in high-income countries. Our food system is broken, say Henry Dimbleby and Jemima Lewis | Continue reading
In the past two decades, death rates from drug overdoses have dramatically increased among adults 65 years and older living in the US | Continue reading
An experiment that probed particles called gluons, which contain most of the mass of a proton, has revealed that a proton’s radius alters depending on whether you look at the particle's charge or mass | Continue reading
Researchers have tweaked structures made by bacteria so that they can target human cells and inject proteins into them, a trick that could lead to targeted medical treatments | Continue reading
A hydrogel battery that can perform well at below-freezing temperatures and survive all sorts of damage could keep phones working even when conditions get tough | Continue reading
The number of people under 50 with cancer is increasing in many countries and for many different tumour types. Why this is occurring isn't entirely clear, but may be due to some people eating more processed red meat | Continue reading
When loud helicopters or fighter jets pass overhead, Colorado checkered whiptail lizards spend less time moving around and more time eating and their levels of the stress hormone cortisol rise | Continue reading
Advisers to the UK government warn that failure to plan for the effects of climate change is putting the country at risk of threats such as food shortages and power blackouts | Continue reading
Fibrous protein threads hold together the mucus in hagfish slime, giving it up to 1000 times the clogging power of common thickeners like xanthan gum when dissolved in water | Continue reading
A gamma ray burst observed in 2022 was brighter than any explosion ever spotted before, and follow-up observations are threatening to break our understanding of how these blasts work | Continue reading
How a pioneering canopy researcher unlocked the mysteries of an extraordinary ecosystem and the unlikely tree-dwelling plants it depends on | Continue reading
Forget vanity, there is a much better reason to care about your laughter lines – wrinkles may be driving ageing in your body and brain via zombie-like senescent cells | Continue reading
Male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are attracted to people despite not drinking blood, suggesting they hang around us to find thirsty females | Continue reading
Researchers and start-ups are exploring a variety of ways of locking up carbon in the sea, from seaweed farming to fertilising the oceans with iron – but we know little about the implications | Continue reading
People who have obesity and lose weight through behavioural weight loss programmes have lower risks for heart disease and type 2 diabetes years later, despite regaining some weight | Continue reading