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  • Why we may crave dessert even when we are full from dinner
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    You always have room for a sugary treatMarioGuti/iStockphoto/Getty ImagesEven after eating a large meal, most people can still find room for sweets. Now, research in mice shows that the neurons responsible for feelings of fullness are also those that trigger sugar cravings. In other words, there seems to be a neurological basis for our love of dessert.Previous studies have shown that naturally occurring opioids in the brain play a crucial role in sugar cravings. The main producers of these opioids are neurons located in a brain region that regulates appetite, metabolism and hormones, called the arcuate nucleus of the hypothalamus. These cells, known as pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) neurons, also control feelings of satiety after eating. AdvertisementTo understand whether the cells have a role in sugar cravings, Henning Fenselau at the Max Planck Institute for Metabolism Research in Germany and his colleagues traced the opioid signals the POMC cells send in the brain. They did so by bathing brain slices from three mice in a fluorescent solution that binds to receptors of these opioids.The brain region with the highest density of these receptors was the paraventricular nucleus of the thalamus (PVT), known to regulate feeding and other behaviours. That suggested that sugar cravings were related to communication between these two brain regions the arcuate nucleus of the hypothalamus and the PVT.So, the researchers monitored the activity of neurons in these regions as mice ate their usual food. After 90 minutes, the animals seemed to be full they only nibbled at additional food. At that point, the team gave them a dessert of sugary chow.On average, neuronal activity between the brain regions roughly quadrupled while mice ate their dessert compared with when they ate their regular meal. The spike began before they even started eating the sweets, suggesting this brain pathway dictates sugar cravings.The researchers confirmed this using a technique to switch cells on and off with light, called optogenetics. When they inhibited signals from POMC neurons to the PVT, the mice consumed 40 per cent less dessert.The cell types, which are extremely well known for driving satiety, also release signals that cause the appetite for sugar, and they do so particularly in the state of satiety, says Fenselau. This would explain why animals humans over-consume sugar when theyre actually full.We dont know why this pathway evolved in animals. It may be because sugar is more easily converted into energy than other sources like fats or proteins, says Fenselau. Eating dessert could thus be almost like topping up your gas tank.He hopes this research could lead to new treatments for obesity, though he acknowledges that hunger and cravings are complicated in day-to-day life. There are so many other pathways in the brain that, of course, could override this. We have found this pathway, but how it plays together with many others is something we dont know at the moment.Journal reference:Science DOI: 10.1126/science.adp1510 Topics:
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  • Rewilding is often championed, but could it be bad for biodiversity?
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    A Eurasian beaver that was reintroduced in Devon, UKNature Picture Library/AlamyBetween 1990 and 2014, forests in Europe expanded by 13 million hectares, an area roughly equivalent to the size of Greece but that came with a cost. Crops consumed in the European Union had to be grown somewhere, so, in other countries mainly tropical nations around 11 million hectares of forest was chopped down to make up for the drop in EU production.Such biodiversity leakage is a major problem with conservation and rewilding projects, particularly schemes in higher-income, industrialised countries that tend to have lower biodiversity, says
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  • Californias groundwater drought continues despite torrential rain
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    The Los Angeles river, with the downtown LA skyline in the distanceEkaterina Chizhevskaya/Getty ImagesIn 2023, a parade of atmospheric rivers brought months of heavy precipitation to much of California, filling reservoirs and raising snowpack far above average levels. This flood of water was a major relief after nearly two decades of drought. But a seismic study has now revealed that water on the surface did little to restore the states depleted reserves underground.There was very limited recovery, compared to the groundwater lost over the recent droughts, says Shujuan Mao at the University of Texas at Austin.
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  • Carbon-neutral hydrogen can be produced from farm waste
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    Farm waste could be turned into hydrogen fuelImageryBT/ShutterstockHydrogen could be made using agricultural waste under a new production process that uses less energy than existing methods and emits no greenhouse gases.The novel process turns bioethanol into clean hydrogen and acetic acid, a substance found in vinegar that is also used in the chemicals, food and pharmaceutical industries. AdvertisementMost hydrogen is produced from natural gas; the process is energy-intensive and expensive. Hydrogen can also be produced from water using renewable electricity, but this approach is even more expensive than using natural gas.Graham Hutchings at the University of Cardiff, UK, and his colleagues have developed an alternative method that relies on a catalyst made of platinum and iridium to extract hydrogen from bioethanol and water, without releasing any carbon dioxide. The bioethanol used in the process can be made from waste plant material, Hutchings says.We dont make CO2, and so we are not making something that is an environmental burden, says Hutchings. We are taking a biologically sustainable source of carbon and hydrogen, and we are turning that into renewable hydrogen and renewable acetic acid. Thats quite neat. Unmissable news about our planet delivered straight to your inbox every month.Sign up to newsletterThe team says the process is likely to be scalable and commercially viable, requiring much less energy to run than making hydrogen from natural gas. The next step is to attract commercial investment to set up a demonstration plant, says Hutchings.Clean hydrogen production will need to scale up radically to enable global decarbonisation, with industries such as steel, chemicals and long-haul transportation expected to need hydrogen fuel.But the world uses only around 15 million tonnes of acetic acid a year, limiting the potential role this new process could play in meeting demand for zero-carbon hydrogen.On a molecule basis we make twice as much hydrogen as acetic acid, says Hutchings. But acetic acid is much heavier than hydrogen. That means producing 15 million tonnes of acetic acid the worlds entire annual demand in this way would yield only just over 1 million tonnes of hydrogen, far less than the demand of a net-zero world. In terms of scale, theres a bit of a mismatch, says Klaus Hellgardt at Imperial College London.Rather, the new process could offer a potential path to decarbonising part of the chemicals industry, with clean hydrogen production an attractive byproduct, says Hutchings. Acetic acid at the moment is effectively made from fossil carbon. And here we are, we can make it from sustainable sources of carbon, he says.Journal reference:Science DOI: 10.1126/science.adt0682Topics:
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  • How the future rise of AI lawyers could force Big Oil to pay up
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    Fossil fuel companies were never going to voluntarily admit to their role in the climate crisis An oil refinery at twilight.Samart Boonyang/AlamyFossil fuel companies were never going to voluntarily admit to their role in the climate crisis. By the late 2020s, people turned to two methods to force the issue. Illegal means involved sabotage, destruction of oil infrastructure and more. Legal methods focused on litigation to force governments to comply with emissions targets and on corporations to pay reparations for past damage. If the energy policies of the 47th US president, Donald Trump, were drill, baby, drill,
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  • Tiny dwarf galaxy might house a supermassive black hole
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    The Large Magellanic Cloud may have its own supermassive black holeAlan Dyer/VWPics/Universal Images Group via Getty ImagesA supermassive black hole in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) may be the source of nine stars zooming through our galaxy a surprising hint that dwarf galaxies can host large black holes.This is the first compelling evidence for a supermassive black hole in [a dwarf] galaxy, says Jiwon Jesse Han at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Massachusetts. He estimates the mass of the black hole inside the LMC would be about 600,000 times that of the sun. For comparison,
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  • Mouse brain slices brought back to life after being frozen for a week
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    Reviving samples of mouse brain could bring us closer to freezing whole brainsBSIP SA / AlamySlices of mouse brain that were kept at -150C for up to a week have shown near-normal electrical activity after being warmed up. The results could take us a step closer towards cooling and reviving entire brains for purposes such as putting people in suspended animation for space flights.At the moment, it is not possible, but I think there are existing techniques that can be combined to achieve this, and there is room for careful optimism, says Alexander German at
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  • Most Europeans may have had dark skin until less than 3000 years ago
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    A model of Cheddar Man, a person who lived in Britain 10,000 years ago, based on analysis of his DNASusie Kearley / AlamyA study of ancient DNA from people who lived in Europe between 1700 and 45,000 years ago suggests that 63 per cent of them had dark skin and 8 per cent had pale skin, with the rest somewhere in between. It was only around 3000 years ago that individuals with intermediate or pale skin started to become a majority.Until a few years ago, it was assumed that the modern humans who moved into
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  • Dating apps should fix their problems before saddling us with new ones
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    Simone RotellaFrom lawsuits to fumbled advertising campaigns, are we falling out of love with online dating? Recent Ofcom data showed a decline in UK users, and Gen Z seems to increasingly hanker after in-person romantic spontaneity. More broadly, the rise of online dating has been accompanied by growing social isolation and loneliness, as well as polarisation of attitudes between younger men and women on topics like the value of feminism or ideals of healthy masculinity.To understand these changes, we need to recognise that dating apps have transformed how we connect in two ways: they make our search for intimacy
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  • Virgin Money flusters chatbot, but just try living in Scunthorpe
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    Josie FordFeedback is New Scientists popular sideways look at the latest science and technology news. You can submit items you believe may amuse readers to Feedback by emailing feedback@newscientist.com NDCs TBCEverythings a bit quiet in the fun world of international climate negotiations at the moment. The last big news was Novembers COP29 meeting in Azerbaijan, which was a roaring success for the fossil fuel companies promoting their wares on the sidelines. Then came Donald Trumps return to the White House as US president. He promptly ordered the country to withdraw from the Paris Agreement that governs international climate action. Negotiators could be excused for being a bit shell-shocked.Nevertheless, the wheels of the climate bureaucracy grind on. This year, Paris Agreement signatories are required to submit updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), which are essentially a list of promises to take action to deal with climate change. The deadline was 10 February, and most countries missed it. Climate strategist Ed King noted in his newsletter that three small, hilly countries with lots of sheep (the UK, New Zealand and Switzerland) had managed to submit theirs, but that we would have to wait till later in 2025 for China, India and the EU.AdvertisementNo rush folks; you take your time. Its not like half of Los Angeles just burned to the ground. Have a cup of tea, put your feet up, live your best life. Itll be done when its done.The V-wordReporter Matthew Sparkes draws our attention to the experience of one David Birch, who went online with Virgin Money to discuss some savings accounts, asking its chatbot: I have two ISAs with Virgin Money, how do I merge them? The chatbot responded: Please dont use words like that. I wont be able to continue our chat if you use that language.It seems the online assistant had been programmed to avoid certain words and phrases that had been deemed discriminatory or otherwise offensive, including virgin. After Birch posted angrily about this on LinkedIn, there was some media coverage and Virgin Money apologised and withdrew the chatbot (which was an outdated model anyway).This was yet another example of a recurring problem in online discussions: context is crucial. It is certainly possible to use the letter string V-I-R-G-I-N to be insulting, but it is also the name of a multinational corporation. Tools that simply filter for certain letter strings are liable to block a lot of innocuous messages, while also missing abuse that doesnt rely on obvious slurs.The problem goes back to at least 1996, when AOL refused to allow residents of Scunthorpe in England to create accounts. The towns name contains a letter string that many people find offensive hence the term Scunthorpe problem for such technological mishaps.The virgin incident is just the latest example. The Wikipedia page for the Scunthorpe problem is a treasure trove of inadvertent potty-mouthed humour and, more importantly, surprises. You will probably be able to guess the issues faced by promoters of a certain mushroom with a Japanese name, but we defy readers to anticipate why the New Zealand town of Whakatne, a software specialist and even a London museum fell foul of similar context-blind controls.Readers are welcome to submit their own stories but Feedback cant guarantee our email filters will let them through.Is it finally happening?On 26 January, the website of the Daily Express newspaper issued a major alert: Yellowstone warning as supervolcano could be gearing up to explode. Good gravy, we thought. Could it be that the supervolcano under Yellowstone is going to cease its perennial rumbling and finally let rip, blanketing North America in ash and blotting out the sun?Upon closer inspection, the story was merely reporting the existence of a short YouTube documentary entitled What If the Yellowstone Volcano Erupted Tomorrow? This was released on a channel called What If in March 2020. Feedback felt, and readers may agree, that this did not entirely justify the Expresss headline.Still, it does fill pages. Feedback found a half-dozen articles from early January on exactly this theme, with headlines like Yellowstone crater movement sparks fears of supervolcano explosion as scientists assess risk. This noted that some scientists had found movement deep in the crater and that this was alarming, before quietly noting that the main source was a paper in Nature that used a new imaging technique to determine that the volcano doesnt contain anywhere near enough magma to erupt. Others said this study sparks new debate on where and when it will erupt, which is certainly one way of interpreting a study that says no eruption is imminent.Lurching further back in time: on 23 July last year, there was a small hydrothermal explosion in the Biscuit Basin area of Yellowstone, essentially trapped steam blowing out debris as it escaped the ground. Cue the headline Is Yellowstone going to erupt? This was handily answered by a geophysicist, who explained that volcanoes only erupt if there is enough eruptible magma and pressure, and that neither condition is in place at Yellowstone right now.We tried to go further back, but after the 50th article with pretty much the same headline, Feedbacks brain broke. At this point, there have been so many stories proclaiming a Yellowstone eruption is imminent, were not sure we will believe it even if we see it go off on live TV.Got a story for Feedback?You can send stories to Feedback by email at feedback@newscientist.com. Please include your home address. This weeks and past Feedbacks can be seen on our website.
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  • Oil firms' plans for net-zero oil extraction labelled as 'PR spiel'
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    An oil drilling rig in Californias Central ValleyAshley Cooper / AlamyFossil fuel companies are experimenting with using carbon dioxide captured from the air in oil extraction to usher in a new era of planet-friendly net-zero oil but the idea is an illusion, according to researchers.In enhanced oil recovery (EOR), crude oil is extracted by injecting CO2 underground to squeeze out any remaining oil from a depleting reservoir. Combining EOR with CO2 sucked out of the air by direct air capture (DAC) plants will result in net-zero oil, some oil firms claim, a process they hope can
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  • The story of ancient Mesopotamia and the dawn of the modern world
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    The Great Zigguratof Ur, in presentday IraqMohammed Al ali/AlamyBetween Two RiversMoudhy Al-Rashid (Hachette (UK, 20 February); W. W. Norton (US, 12 August))A new and spellbinding book tells the history of the very ancient past of Mesopotamia, the land between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris. Between Two Rivers by Moudhy Al-Rashid, a researcher at the University of Oxford, weaves together the many strands of the story of the region, which covers much of what is now Iraq.Ancient Mesopotamia has languished in obscurity, at least compared with the better-known Greek, Roman and Egyptian civilisations. So
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  • Competition opens to find the world's most perplexing computer code
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    A 2011 entry to the International Obfuscated C Code Contest, designed to look like a manga characterPGM/PPM images and ASCII art by Don, YangComputer programmers are being challenged to write the worlds sneakiest and most confusing code in a competition that opens next week. To win, entrants must find ways to write programs in the C language that baffle judges on first reading, then perform unusual, unexpected or catastrophic tasks when run.The International Obfuscated C Code Contest (IOCCC) began in 1984 and its co-founder, Landon Noll, says it is the longest-running online competition of any kind.
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  • Using common painkiller in pregnancy might raise ADHD risk in children
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    Microscopic view of paracetamol crystalsHenri Koskinen/ShutterstockChildren whose mothers used paracetamol, also known as acetaminophen, during pregnancy are more likely to develop ADHD than those whose mothers didnt, suggests a small study. While far from conclusive, the finding lends weight to the contested idea that the widely used pain reliever may affect fetal brain development.Previous studies on paracetamol and neurodevelopmental conditions have provided conflicting findings. For instance, a 2019 study involving more than 4700 children and their mothers linked use of the painkiller in pregnancy with a 20 per cent greater risk of children developing ADHD. However, an analysis published last year of nearly 2.5 million kids showed no such association when comparing siblings who either were or were not exposed to paracetamol before birth. AdvertisementOne issue is that most of these studies rely on self-reported medication use, a significant limitation given that people may not remember taking paracetamol while pregnant. For example, only 7 per cent of participants in the 2019 study reported using paracetamol during pregnancy far below the 50 per cent seen in other studies. A lot of people take [paracetamol] without knowing it, says Brennan Baker at the University of Washington in Seattle. It could be the active ingredient in some cold medication youre using, and you dont necessarily know.So, Baker and his colleagues used a more accurate metric instead. They looked for markers of the medicine in blood samples collected from 307 women, all of whom were Black and lived in Tennessee, during their second trimester. None of them were taking medications for chronic conditions or had known pregnancy complications. The researchers then followed up with participants once their children were between 8 and 10 years old. In the US, about 8 per cent of children between 5 and 11 years old have ADHD.On average, children whose mothers had markers of paracetamol in their blood were three times as likely to be diagnosed with ADHD than children born to mothers who did not even after adjusting for factors like the mothers age, pre-pregnancy body mass index (BMI), socioeconomic status and mental health conditions among their immediate family members. This suggests that using paracetamol during pregnancy may raise childrens risk of developing ADHD. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterIt is, however, also possible that the actual factor raising ADHD risk is whatever led someone to take paracetamol in the first place, rather than the drug itself. They havent been able to account for things like the mothers reason for taking [paracetamol], such as headaches or fevers or pains or infections, which we know are risk factors for adverse child development, says Viktor Ahlqvist at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.But Baker believes it is the drug itself that is responsible. A subsequent analysis of tissue samples from 174 of the participants placentas showed that those using paracetamol had distinct metabolic and immune system changes. These changes are similar to those seen in studies that tested the effects of paracetamol in pregnant animals without an infection or underlying health condition.The fact we see the immune upregulation in animal models as well, I think, really strengthens the case for causality, says Baker. There is a lot of prior work showing that elevated immune activation during pregnancy is linked with adverse neurodevelopment.Still, these findings are far from conclusive. For one thing, the study included a small number of participants, all of whom were Black and lived in the same city limiting the generalisability of the findings. For another, it only measured blood markers of paracetamol at one moment in time. These markers stick around for about three days, so the study probably captured more frequent users, and there may be a dose-dependent effect, says Baker.[Paracetamol] is currently the first-line therapeutic option for pain and fever in pregnancy, says Baker. But I think agencies like the [US Food and Drug Administration] and different obstetric and gynaecology associations need to be continually reviewing all available research and updating their guidance.Meanwhile, people should talk with their doctors if they are uncertain whether they should take paracetamol during pregnancy, says Baker.Journal reference:Nature Mental Health DOI: 10.1038/s44220-025-00387-6 Topics:
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  • Dancing turtles help us understand how they navigate around the world
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    Some turtles flap about when a magnetic field suggests they are about to be fedGoforth et al., Nature (2025)Baby loggerhead turtles dance when they are expecting food, a behaviour that researchers have used to investigate their navigation abilities. By learning to associate a magnetic field with a food, this cute display has helped indicate that the sea turtles have two distinct geomagnetic senses to help them navigate during their epic ocean journeys.The turtle dance is a strange pattern of behaviour that emerges quickly in young captive sea turtles when they figure out that food comes from above, says Ken Lohmann at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They would get very excited and raise their heads up out of the water and come swimming over, and often if the food wasnt dropped in immediately, they would begin to flap their flippers and spin around. AdvertisementLohmann and his colleagues realised that there might be a way to use this behaviour to reveal how turtle navigation works. They put juvenile loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta) in tanks surrounded by coil systems that created magnetic fields in the water, replicating those in their natural habitats.The juveniles spent an equal amount of time in two magnetic fields, but were only fed in one of them. Soon, when they were in a magnetic field they associated with food, the turtles started to dance in anticipation, a learned behaviour reminiscent of Ivan Pavlovs famous dog experiment. We demonstrated that the turtles can learn to recognise magnetic fields, says team member Kayla Goforth at Texas A&M University. The latest science news delivered to your inbox, every day.Sign up to newsletterThe researchers then reproduced a magnetic field near the Cape Verde islands, an area where loggerheads tend to turn south-west when migrating. The team demonstrated that the juvenile turtles also did this. Then the researchers trained other turtles to associate the Cape Verde field with food.One of the ideas about how some animals sense magnetic fields is that there is a complex set of chemical reactions, possibly taking place in the eye, that are influenced by Earths magnetic field.To try to affect any such system, the team used an additional magnetic field that oscillates at a radio wave frequency, which should interfere with that cascade of chemical reactions.Regardless of whether the oscillating field was turned on, the turtles could detect the underlying Cape Verde magnetic signature and would dance, which suggests their map sense isnt dependent on this chemical reception mechanism. But the oscillating field did make them turn in random directions, rather than south-west.Scientists tested for this behaviour via a series of experiments in tanksGoforth et al., Nature (2025)This is good evidence that there are actually two different magnetic senses in the turtles: one that is used for the map sense, one that is used for the compass sense, says Lohmann. The simplest explanation would be that the magnetic map sense does not depend on this chemical magnetoreception process, but the magnetic compass sense does.The magnetic map sense is a positional sense, kind of like a GPS, and their compass sense tells them which way to go, says Goforth. This is probably how theyre getting back to important ecological locations such as feeding grounds and nesting areas.Its a new way of thinking about how turtles are using the magnetic field to navigate, says Katrina Phillips at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Whats really fascinating is we still dont understand how theyre even perceiving the magnetic field. So, this is getting at what is going on mechanistically.Journal reference:Nature DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-08554-yTopics:animal behaviour
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  • Strongest evidence yet that Ozempic and Wegovy reduce alcohol intake
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    People report lower alcohol cravings when on semaglutideShutterstock/David MGSemaglutide really does seem to help people who are addicted to alcohol reduce their intake, according to the first randomised clinical trial of the drug for this purpose.Sold under brand names including Wegovy and Ozempic, semaglutide works by mimicking a gut hormone called glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), hence the technical term for it is a GLP-1 receptor agonist. The drug was first used to treat type 2 diabetes, but because it reduces appetite, Wegovy has now also been licensed for weight loss in eight countries. Semaglutide has also shown hints of helping an extraordinary number of medical conditions. AdvertisementWhen it comes to alcohol use, a 2024 study of 84,000 people linked injecting Ozempic or Wegovy with a lower risk of alcoholism. Promising as that result was, it showed correlation rather than causation.But now, Christian Hendershot at the University of Southern California and his colleagues have completed the first randomised clinical trial of semaglutides effect on alcohol use disorder, a type of study that can tease out causation.Their trial involved 48 people in the US who had been diagnosed with the condition, of whom 34 were women and 14 were men. Half received weekly low-dose injections of semaglutide for nine weeks and the rest had placebo injections. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterThose on semaglutide consumed fewer drinks per drinking session and had reduced weekly alcohol cravings compared with those on placebo.We didnt have any evidence of significant adverse effects or safety concerns with the medication in this population and we found overall that across several different drinking outcomes it reduced the quantity of alcohol that people consumed, says Hendershot.The results are promising, says Rong Xu at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Ohio. Despite the small sample size, this randomised clinical trial highlights the therapeutic potential of semaglutide in treating alcohol use disorder.Ziyad Al-Aly at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, says the study adds yet another piece of evidence that GLP-1RAs [GLP-1 receptor agonists] may be helpful in addiction disorders.Larger studies are needed to corroborate the work, he says, and to answer questions about whether people increase their drinking if they come off semaglutide and what its longer-term effects might be, especially given concerns around loss of bone and muscle mass.The study should be treated as promising initial evidence, says Hendershot, but more research is needed. People shouldnt start taking semaglutide for alcohol problems, he says.This is the first study like this and people are excited about it, but we do have approved and effective medication for alcohol use disorder, so until more research has been done, people are advised to pursue existing medications that are out there and approved right now, says Hendershot.Journal reference:JAMA Psychiatry DOI: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2024.4789 Topics:
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  • 'Sexome' microbes swapped during sex could aid forensic investigations
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    Male and female genitals offer distinct environments for microbesArtur Plawgo/Getty ImagesSexual partners transfer their distinctive genital microbiome to each other during intercourse, a finding that could have implications for forensic investigations of sexual assault.Brendan Chapman at Murdoch University in Perth, Western Australia, and his colleagues collected swabs from the genitals of 12 monogamous, heterosexual couples, then used RNA gene sequencing to identify microbial signatures for each participant. The researchers asked the couples to abstain from sex for between two days and two weeks, and took follow-up samples a few hours after intercourse. AdvertisementWe found that those genetic signatures from the females bacteria were detectable in their male partners and vice versa, says Chapman. This change in a persons sexome, as the team has dubbed it, could prove useful in criminal investigations, he says.The amount of transfer varied from couple to couple, and the team also found that not even condom use completely prevented the movement of the sexome from one partner to another. However, one major limitation of the results was that the female sexome changed significantly during a period.Chapman says that even though there may be some homogenisation of the microbiomes of long-term, monogamous couples, the bacterial populations clearly differ between the sexes. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterThe great benefit we have with the penile and vaginal microbiomes is that because of the vast difference in the two environments, we observe very different bacteria types on each, says Chapman. For example, the penis is mostly a skin-like surface and thus reflects similarities with the skin microbiome. We see anaerobic bacteria types in the vagina and aerobic types on the penis.As such, many of these bacteria cant persist indefinitely in the opposite environment, he says. Its a bit like comparing land and sea animals there are some that exclusively live in one or the other location and would die if removed, but also some that happily move between and persist.Having established the transfer of bacteria during intercourse, the team is now hoping to prove that an individuals sexome is unique, like a fingerprint or DNA. I think theres enough diversity and uniqueness contained within everyones sexome, but theres still a bit of work to do in order for us to demonstrate that with a technique that is robust enough to meet the challenges of forensic science, says Chapman.If the researchers are able to prove this, it could aid in sexual assault investigations, particularly ones in which a male suspect doesnt ejaculate, has had a vasectomy or uses a condom. Bacterial genetic profiles might be able to corroborate or oppose propositions or testimonies about what happened in alleged sexual assault cases, says Dennis McNevin at the University of Technology Sydney, Australia.Standard profiles of human DNA will always be prioritised in such cases because of their great power to differentiate between individuals, he says, but the sexome could offer a useful alternative. Bacterial genetic profiles may one day complement DNA evidence or may even help point to a perpetrator of a sexual assault in the rare cases where DNA profiles are not available, says McNevin.Topics:
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  • Why AI firms should follow the example of quantum computing research
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    Leader and TechnologyWhile artificial intelligence and quantum computing insiders have both been guilty of hyping up their products, only the latter group appears to still be applying proper scientific rigour to their field 12 February 2025 David Parker/Science Photo LibraryWhat is the difference between artificial intelligence and quantum computing? One is a sci-fi-sounding technology that has long promised to revolutionise our world, providing researchers can sort out a few technical wrinkles like the tendency to make errors. Actually, so is the other.And yet, while AI appears to have breathlessly and inescapably taken over, well, everything, the average person has had no experience with quantum computing. Does this matter?Practitioners in both fields are certainly guilty of hyping up their wares, but part of the problem for would-be quantum proponents is that the current generation of quantum computers is essentially useless. As we detail in our special report on the state of the industry (see Quantum computers have finally arrived, but will they ever be useful?), the race is now on to build a machine that can actually do useful computations of a kind not possible on regular computers.AdvertisementThe lack of a clear use case hasnt prevented tech giants from forcibly injecting AI into the software we use every day, but bringing quantum computing to the masses in the same way is much more difficult due to the finicky nature of this hardware. You will probably never own a personal quantum computer instead, the industry is targeting businesses and governments.Practitioners in both the AI and quantum computing fields are guilty of hyping up their waresPerhaps that is why quantum computer builders seem to be retaining a foot in science, publishing peer-reviewed research while also drumming up business. The big AI firms seem to have all but given up the publishing part why bother, when you can simply charge people a monthly fee to use your tech, whether or not it actually works?The quantum approach is the right one. If you are promising a technology that will transform research, industry and society, explaining how it works in the most open way possible is the only means of actually convincing people to believe the hype.It may not be showy, but in the long run it is substance, not style, that really matters. So, by all means, aim to revolutionise the world but please, do show your working.Topics:
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  • Waste surveillance at just 20 airports could spot the next pandemic
    www.newscientist.com
    A network of airports like Hong Kong International Airport could effectively detect disease outbreaksYuen Man Cheung / AlamyA global early-warning system for disease outbreaks and even future pandemics is possible with minimal monitoring: testing the waste water from a fraction of international flight arrivals at just 20 airports around the world.When passengers fly while infected with bacteria or viruses, they can leave traces of these pathogens in their waste, which airports collect from a plane after the flight lands. If youre going to the bathroom on an aircraft, and if you blow your nose and put that in the toilet or if you do whatever you have to do theres some chance that some of the genetic material from the pathogen is going into the waste water, says Guillaume St-Onge at Northeastern University in Massachusetts. AdvertisementSt-Onge and his colleagues used a simulator called the Global Epidemic and Mobility model to analyse how airport waste-water surveillance networks could detect emerging variants of a virus like the one that causes covid-19. By testing the model using different numbers and locations of airports, they showed that 20 strategically placed sentinel airports worldwide could detect outbreaks nearly as quickly and efficiently as a network involving thousands of airports. The larger network was just 20 per cent faster but cost much more.To detect emerging threats from anywhere in the world, the network should include major international airports in cities such as London, Paris, Dubai and Singapore. But the team also showed how networks involving a different set of airports could provide more targeted detection of disease outbreaks that were likely to originate in certain continents.This modelling study is the first to provide the actual number of sentinel airports required to support effective global surveillance while optimising resource use, says Jiaying Li at the University of Sydney in Australia. Receive a weekly dose of discovery in your inbox.Sign up to newsletterAirport-based networks could also provide useful information about disease outbreaks early on during an epidemic, including estimates of how quickly the disease can spread from person to person and how many people are likely to be infected from exposure to a single case, says St-Onge.Such waste-water surveillance could provide early warning for known diseases and possibly track new emerging threats too if the bacteriums or viruss genomic data is available. I dont think wed be able to look in the waste water and say: There is a new pathogen thats out there, says Temi Ibitoye at Brown University in Rhode Island. But when a new pathogen is announced, you can very quickly look at that previous waste-water data and say: Is this present in our sample?A map of sentinel airports, with colours indicating how long this network would take to detect a disease outbreak at various sites around the worldNortheastern UniversityThere are still some nuances to work out, such as how often to take waste-water samples to track different pathogens. Other challenges include figuring out the most efficient ways to sample waste water from aircraft and evaluating the systems real-world effectiveness, says Li.A long-term monitoring programme would also require cooperation from airlines and airports, along with a consistent source of funding, she says.Individual airports could hesitate to participate because of perceived risk to their operations if infectious disease statistics are made widely available unless data-handling agreements could assuage such concerns, says Trevor Charles at the University of Waterloo in Canada. He emphasised the importance of coordinated international funding to offset local political considerations.But even coordination through an international body like the World Health Organization carries its own political complications, given that President Donald Trump has initiated the USs withdrawal from the organisation, says Ibitoye. Still, research such as this contributes towards making [the monitoring network] a reality sooner rather than later, she says.Journal referenceNature Medicine DOI: 10.1038/s41591-025-03501-4Topics:
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  • Older people in England are more satisfied after covid-19 pandemic
    www.newscientist.com
    The pandemic may have changed peoples outlook on lifeDisobeyArt / AlamyThe covid-19 pandemic gave older people in England a stronger sense of purpose and greater life satisfaction, possibly because it deepened their appreciation for the simple things in life.We already knew that some peoples well-being and life satisfaction dipped during the early years of the pandemic, but what happened later on, after most restrictions had been lifted, is less well understood. Unfortunately, most of the studies that were carried out did not continue [in the later years of] the pandemic, so there was a big gap in the research, says Paola Zaninotto at University College London. AdvertisementTo address this, Zaninotto and her colleagues analysed data from surveys on the well-being and depressive symptoms of nearly 4000, mainly white, people in England, all of whom were aged 50 or older at the time of the study.Each participant completed a survey in the two years running up to the pandemic, a second one in the first year of the pandemic in 2020 and a final one between the end of 2021 and early 2023. More than 85 per cent of participants filled in this last survey in 2022, after most infection-control measures in England had ended.The team found that, before the pandemic, the participants rated their sense of purpose in life with an average score of 7.5 out of 10. This dropped to 7.2 in 2020, before rising to 7.6 above pre-pandemic levels in the final survey. Get the most essential health and fitness news in your inbox every Saturday.Sign up to newsletterSimilarly, the participants reported an average life satisfaction score of 7.3 before the pandemic, and although this dipped to 6.9 early in the pandemic, it rose to 7.5 in the final survey.While these are small shifts in well-being at a population level, some individuals will have experienced larger changes that affect their work and relationships, says Rebecca Pearson at the University of Bristol, UK.It may be that the global outbreak reminded people of what is important in life, says Zaninotto. The pandemic brought some challenges, but also a more broad appreciation for our lives maybe for social connections and other meaningful activities, she says.The team also found that average rates of depression defined as having at least four depressive symptoms, such as feeling lonely more than doubled from the first period to the second one. Rates fell in the final survey, but remained above pre-pandemic levels.People may feel we got through it, Ive gone back to work, Ive been able to see my family again and all that stuff, which is purposeful and satisfying, but, at the same time, you might find yourself low at times, you might not be able to feel pleasure in the same way, says Pearson. Further studies should explore what exactly is driving these increased rates of depression, she says.Additional research should also explore how the results translate to people elsewhere, says Kelsey OConnor at the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies in Luxembourg. The pandemic policies and severity of the pandemic was so dramatically different in other countries, he says. You cant really generalise to younger people, ethnic minority or marginalised groups either.Journal reference:Aging & Mental Health DOI: 10.1080/13607863.2025.2450260Topics:pandemic
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  • How the megaquop machine could usher in a new era of quantum computing
    www.newscientist.com
    TechnologyJohn Preskill has been guiding the growing quantum computing industry for decades, and now he has set a new challenge to build a device capable of a million quantum operations per second, or a megaquop 11 February 2025 John Preskill has set a challenge for the quantum computing industryGregg SegalThe past decade has seen significant advances and investment in quantum computing, and yet the devices we have today essentially have no practical purpose. That is down to two main reasons the first being that the qubits, or quantum bits, that make up todays machines still struggle with noise, or errors, that we are only just learning to correct. The second is that devices that could solve practical problems are expected to require many more qubits than even the biggest quantum computers currently have.In 2018,
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  • Maybe NASAs SLS should be cancelled but not by Elon Musk
    www.newscientist.com
    The Space Launch System at Kennedy Space Center in Florida in 2022NASA/Joel KowskyNASAs enormous rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), seems to be in danger. It has been controversial for decades thanks to its high cost and many delays, but now there are hints that it may finally be on the chopping block. The trouble is, there arent any comparable alternatives no other rockets can carry as much mass as SLS can into space and the only operational backup is built by Elon Musks firm SpaceX. Given Musks current position embedded within the US
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  • Why quantum computers are being held back by geopolitical tussles
    www.newscientist.com
    Both China and the US are aiming to pull ahead with quantum computingShutterstock/Niphon SubsriQuantum computers were once nothing more than a plaything for physicists, but as their capabilities have grown, so too has the attention from governments. The US, China and European nations are all racing to develop these exotic machines, while carefully balancing national security needs with commercial opportunities. But have they got the balance right?The first nation to develop a sufficiently powerful quantum computer will be able to crack many encryption algorithms in use today and gain access to the rest of the worlds
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  • Fossil proteins may soon reveal how we're related to Australopithecus
    www.newscientist.com
    Reconstruction of Lucy, the most famous skeleton of Australopithecus afarensisMLouisphotography/AlamyThis is an extract from Our Human Story, our newsletter about the revolution in archaeology.Sign up to receive it in your inbox every month.Whenever we think about the process of evolution, theres a risk of falling into the trap of telling stories. Human minds are prone to interpret the world in terms of stories: its just one of our biases, along with the one that causes us to see faces in clouds and on pieces of toast. So we always have to be
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  • How studying babies' minds is prompting us to rethink consciousness
    www.newscientist.com
    MindThe debate over when consciousness arises has been revitalised by new tests of awareness in infants raising the possibility that it emerges just before birth 11 February 2025 Peter ReynoldsMy first memory is of my family moving house when I was 3 years old. I can picture the removal van at the gate with my brother in the front seat, and I remember worrying about how his pet rabbit would fare on the journey.Before this moment, my autobiography is a blank page. At some point between my conception and that morning we moved house, I must have gained the ability to think, with an awareness of my body and its surroundings all knitted together into something we loosely call consciousness but I have no idea when that occurred.Most parents would assume that their newborn is conscious from the moment they hold them in their arms, but how do we really know? It is a problem that has been troubling philosophers for decades. Theres this general issue of, when did we begin? When did this stream of consciousness first emerge, if I cant remember it? says Tim Bayne at Monash University, Australia.The answers, however, havent been forthcoming, with some researchers claiming it is already present at birth and others arguing it arises after our first year or later. Now, improvements to infant brain imaging are bringing clarity to the debate suggesting an early origin of consciousness, perhaps even emerging just before birth.Besides helping us imagine what life is like during those first moments of infant awareness, these insights help us to understand what consciousness is. If you know when consciousness emerges, you can know what type of brain structures are necessary and sufficient, says Claudia
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  • Cybersecurity experts fear Elon Musk's DOGE may enable quantum hackers
    www.newscientist.com
    Elon Musk heads the Trump administrations government efficiency task force, DOGEKen Cedeno/UPI/ShutterstockCybersecurity experts are racing to preserve vital documents produced by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a government agency charged with developing standards for a range of fields including quantum-proof encryption, after fears they could be lost as part of Elon Musks government efficiency drive.Musk heads a task force called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is not a government department but was created by an executive order from US President Donald Trump with the stated aim of modernizing Federal technology
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  • How PsiQuantum plans to build world's largest quantum computer by 2027
    www.newscientist.com
    TechnologyWith an investment of AU$1 billion, PsiQuantum is planning to build a photonic quantum computer with a million qubits, far larger than any in existence today - and the firm says it will be ready in just two years 11 February 2025 A PsiQuantum silicon wafer containing thousands of quantum devicesPsiQuantumOn a large table in front of me is some of the worlds most advanced photonic hardware, which may soon drive one of the great technological revolutions of our time. I can see tiny microchips that look like precious jewels, with nanoscale patterns that make them glow like rainbows, along with detectors, filters and switches connected by fibre-optic cables, laid out on smartphone-sized circuit boards. These are the fundamental components of a massive photonic quantum computer that could be up and running in just a few years though to
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  • Quantum computers have finally arrived, but will they ever be useful?
    www.newscientist.com
    TechnologyHundreds of quantum computing firms around the world are racing to commercialise these once-exotic devices, but the jury is still out on who is going to pull ahead and produce a machine that actually does something useful 11 February 2025 The race is on to build a useful quantum computerThere has never been a better time to be in the quantum computing business. Some 10 years ago, it was not obvious that quantum computing was more than an interesting lab experiment. Since then, an entire globalised ecosystem has emerged, says Laurent Prost at French quantum computing start-up Alice & Bob, one of hundreds of firms in the sector. Krysta Svore at Microsoft puts it even more succinctly: Quantum computers are working.But working on what? Practical uses for quantum computers remain limited, with no sign yet of the long-promised ability
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  • People are starting to trust AI more and view it as more human-like
    www.newscientist.com
    People are trusting AI more and moreJ Studios/Getty ImagesPeople are becoming more trusting of and warm towards AI models, according to a year-long survey of those living in the US.Myra Cheng at Stanford University in California and her colleagues gathered this information on the crowdsourcing platform Prolific. Between May 2023 and August 2024, roughly 1000 participants a month completed the researchers questionnaire, although due to technical issues with the platform only 12 months of data was collected over the 16-month period surveyed.The participants, who
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  • UK facility starts sucking CO2 out of seawater to help the climate
    www.newscientist.com
    EnvironmentStripping carbon dioxide out of the ocean could be much more efficient than capturing it from the air. Researchers are hoping to show its potential at a pilot plant in Weymouth 11 February 2025 Weymouth Bay on Englands south coast, where SeaCURE is sucking carbon dioxide out of seawaterHeidi Stewart/AlamyAt the back of the Sea Life aquarium in Weymouth on Englands south coast, a hangar resounds with the rush of water into tanks. Three reef sharks and a nurse shark are cruising around in one. A stingray is hiding somewhere in another. But a closed rectangular tank of stainless steel holds an entirely different beast: carbon dioxide bubbling out of seawater as part of a process scientists hope could someday help reverse climate change. A red line on a computer screen shows
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