Clik here to view.
Industrial Revolution left a damaging psychological ‘imprint’ on today’s...
People living in the former industrial heartlands of England and Wales are more disposed to negative emotions such as anxiety and depressive moods, more impulsive and more likely to struggle with...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Billingford Hutch and the moonwort fern – a medieval mystery solved
A visitor to the Parker Library at Corpus Christi College may have solved the puzzle of a curious decorative detail on a chest dating from the early 15th century. The massive oak chest is known as the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Presenting facts as ‘consensus’ bridges conservative-liberal divide over...
In the murk of post-truth public debate, facts can polarise. Scientific evidence triggers reaction and spin that ends up entrenching the attitudes of opposing political tribes.Recent research suggests...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Mistletoe and (a large) wine: seven-fold increase in wine glass size over 300...
Both the types of alcoholic drink and the amount consumed in England has fluctuated over the last 300 years, largely in response to economic, legislative and social factors. Until the second part of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Ancient faeces reveal parasites described in earliest Greek medical texts
Ancient faeces from prehistoric burials on the Greek island of Kea have provided the first archaeological evidence for the parasitic worms described 2,500 years ago in the writings of Hippocrates – the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Calf’s foot jelly and a tankard of ale? Welcome to the 18th century Starbucks
Customers today may settle for a flat white and a cinnamon swirl, but at coffee shops 250 years ago, many also expected ale, wine, and possibly a spot of calf’s foot jelly, a new study has...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Birds learn from each other’s ‘disgust’, enabling insects to evolve bright...
Many animals have evolved to stand out. Bright colours may be easy to spot, but they warn predators off by signalling toxicity or foul taste.Yet if every individual predator has to eat colourful prey...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Mindfulness training reduces stress during exam time
While the prevalence of anxiety and depression among first year undergraduates is lower than the general population, it increases to overtake this during their second year. The number of students...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Habitable planets could exist around pulsars
Pulsars are known for their extreme conditions. Each is a fast-spinning neutron star - the collapsed core of a massive star that has gone supernova at the end of its life. Only 10 to 30 kilometres...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Political instability and weak governance lead to loss of species, study finds
A vast new study of changes in global wildlife over almost three decades has found that low levels of effective national governance are the strongest predictor of declining species numbers – more so...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Researchers chart the ‘secret’ movement of quantum particles
One of the fundamental ideas of quantum theory is that quantum objects can exist both as a wave and as a particle, and that they don’t exist as one or the other until they are measured. This is the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Cambridge in the 2018 New Year Honours List
Professor Sir Keith Peters, who was first honoured as a Knight Bachelor in the 1993 New Year’s Honours list, was awarded a GBE (Knights Grand Cross of the British Empire) for Services to the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
New brain mapping technique highlights relationship between connectivity and IQ
In recent years, there has been a concerted effort among scientists to map the connections in the brain – the so-called ‘connectome’ – and to understand how this relates to human behaviours, such as...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Direct genetic evidence of founding population reveals story of first Native...
The data, which came from archaeological finds in Alaska, also points to the existence of a previously unknown Native American population, whom academics have named “Ancient Beringians”.The findings...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Advances in brain imaging settle debate over spread of key protein in...
An estimated 44 million people worldwide are living with Alzheimer’s disease, a disease whose symptoms include memory problems, changes in behaviour and progressive loss of independence. These symptoms...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Harnessing the power of algae: new, greener fuel cells move step closer to...
As the global population increases, so too does energy demand. The threat of climate change means that there is an urgent need to find cleaner, renewable alternatives to fossil fuels that do not...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Astronomers detect ‘whirlpool’ movement in earliest galaxies
An international team led by Dr Renske Smit from the Kavli Institute of Cosmology at the University of Cambridge used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile to open a new...
View ArticleClik here to view.
How incurable mitochondrial diseases strike previously unaffected families
Mitochondrial diseases caused by mutations in mitochondrial DNA are rare, affecting approximately 1 in 10,000 births, but can cause severe conditions. For example, Leigh Syndrome is a severe brain...
View ArticleClik here to view.
AI 'scientist' finds that toothpaste ingredient may help fight drug-resistant...
When a mosquito infected with malaria parasites bites someone, it transfers the parasites into their bloodstream via its saliva. These parasites work their way into the liver, where they mature and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Unusually sophisticated prehistoric monuments and technology revealed in the...
New work at the settlement of Dhaskalio, the site adjoining the prehistoric sanctuary on the Cycladic island of Keros, has shown this to be a more imposing and densely occupied series of structures...
View Article