Scotland has become the first part of the UK to screen newborn babies for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), a rare genetic condition that causes progressive muscle wastage. Campaigners, who have long advocated for newborn testing because early detection is critical for treatment outcomes, hope the Scottish pilot will result in approval for the heel prick…
For more than 30 years, the United Nations World Meteorological Organization has told us how terrible things are getting with global climate change. Their annual “State of the Climate” report is a compendium of climate change facts and figures collected throughout the previous 365 days. It’s an authoritative look at the state of our global…
A team of astronomers led by the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard and Smithsonian have for the first time used galactic archaeology, the study of detailed chemical fingerprints in deep space, to trace the history of a galaxy outside the Milky Way. The study, published in Nature Astronomy, demonstrates a new way to reconstruct the…
Leaked keys could have let attackers take control of a company’s digital infrastructure Vertigo3d/Getty Images Critical security credentials are inadvertently being exposed on thousands of websites – including those run by some banks and healthcare providers. The leaked details could have given snoopers access to sensitive data like RSA private keys, which allow attackers to…
Researchers have created an unusually twisted molecule with a never-before-seen electronic structure. The new molecular architecture, dubbed half-Mӧbius topology, “is another knob that we can turn in order to make and manipulate matter,” and expands our fundamental understanding of physics and chemistry, co-lead author Igor Rončević, a lecturer in computational and theoretical chemistry at the…
Predatory feral ferrets have been removed from an island for the first time ever, in a boost for Northern Ireland’s largest seabird colony. Rathlin Island is ferret-free after a £4.5m five-year partnership led by RSPB NI involving islanders, charities, volunteers and a red labrador called Woody. The invasive, non-native ferrets were believed to have been…
This story is a partnership between Grist and WBEZ, a public radio station serving the Chicago metropolitan region. Illinois is in the midst of a public health crisis. Nearly 1.5 million service lines — the pipes that carry drinking water to homes and businesses — contain or are suspected to contain lead, a neurotoxin linked to cognitive, reproductive, and…
MOSCOW, March 23 (Reuters) – An unmanned Russian cargo spacecraft has a problem with an antenna so it will have to be manually docked when it reaches the International Space Station (ISS), Russia’s Roscosmos state space corporation said in a statement. A Soyuz-2.1a rocket launched the Progress MS-33 cargo spacecraft on Sunday from Baikonur in…
There is something unexpectedly thrilling about watching one celestial object pass in front of another, an eclipse being the obvious example. On the evening of 29 March, the moon will briefly blot out one of the brightest stars in the spring sky. Such an event is known as an occultation, and this week the occulted…
Our home planet is struggling with a record energy imbalance, which is warming oceans to unprecedented levels, making weather more extreme and threatening health and food supplies, the World Meteorological Organization has warned. The United Nations body confirmed 2015 to 2025 were the hottest 11 years ever measured, but a still bleaker message was that…
