13th September 2021

mRNA cancer therapy enters human trials after success in mice

BioNTech, the company that partnered with Pfizer to develop a COVID-19 vaccine, is now testing whether mRNA can be used to treat cancer. A recent trial halted tumour growth and caused a complete regression of cancer in 85% of mice.

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7th September 2021

Competition winners!

The following people have each won a copy of The Science and Technology of Growing Young, a new book on aging and longevity research by Sergey Young.

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28th August 2021

Book Competition: The Science and Technology of Growing Young

A new book, published this week, explains where aging and longevity research is heading – and what you can do right now to extend your healthspan. We are giving away copies to three lucky readers.

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26th August 2021

Dust-sized supercapacitor has voltage of AAA battery

Scientists have developed the smallest microsupercapacitors to date, which can function in blood vessels and could provide an energy source for tiny sensors.

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17th August 2021

Brain organoids develop optic cups that respond to light

Human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) can be used to generate brain organoids containing an eye structure called the optic cup, according to a study published today in the journal Cell Stem Cell.

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9th August 2021

Monkey brain mapped in 3D at micron resolution

Chinese scientists have produced a 3D map of an entire rhesus monkey brain, which is 200 times larger than a mouse brain, at a resolution of just 0.001 mm (1 micron).

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2nd August 2021

Omega-3 can boost life expectancy

High blood concentrations of omega-3 fatty acids, which oily fish such as salmon are known to be rich in, can increase your life expectancy by nearly five years.

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31st July 2021

DeepMind AI predicts 350,000 protein structures

Artificial intelligence company DeepMind has mapped the structures of 350,000 proteins, and made the data freely available.

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27th July 2021

Next-generation artificial heart implanted in first U.S. patient

Surgeons at Duke University Hospital have successfully implanted a next-generation artificial heart in a 39-year-old man with heart failure, becoming the first medical team in North America to perform the procedure.

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18th July 2021

$315m biotech company emerges from stealth

Prime Medicine, a U.S. company with a powerful new gene editing technique, has this week announced its official launch with $315 million in financing.

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17th June 2021

New method cuts dengue fever cases by 77%

A trial of mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia bacteria resulted in a 77% reduction of dengue fever incidence and 86% reduction of hospitalisations.

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3rd June 2021

Multi-strain vaccine blocks COVID-19 in monkeys

A pan-coronavirus mRNA nanoparticle vaccine with activity against all major SARS-CoV-2 variants has been described in the journal Nature, showing 100% effectiveness in macaques.

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29th May 2021

Humans could live to 150, according to study

A longitudinal analysis of blood markers has found a theoretical maximum lifespan for humans of between 120 and 150.

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17th May 2021

BCI decodes neural signals for handwriting

Researchers have, for the first time, decoded neural signals associated with writing letters, then displayed typed versions of these letters in real time. They hope their invention could one day help people with paralysis communicate.

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30th April 2021

3D biomaterial used as 'sponge' for stem cell therapy to reverse arthritis

A new biomaterial scaffold, designed to slowly release stem cells, has worked to ensure implanted stem cells can stick around to relieve pain and reverse arthritis in mice knee joints.

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25th April 2021

Malaria vaccine is first to exceed 75% efficacy

Researchers have completed a Phase II trial of R21/Matrix-M, a candidate malaria vaccine, which demonstrated an efficacy of 77% over 12 months of follow-up.

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11th April 2021

Monkey uses brain implants to play Pong

Neuralink, which Elon Musk co-founded in 2016, has revealed a macaque with chips embedded on each side of its brain, playing a mind-controlled version of the 1972 video game, Pong.

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10th April 2021

"Neutrobots" deliver cancer drugs to the brain

Researchers in China have designed a new bio-hybrid microbot, able to cross the blood-brain barrier and deliver drugs directly to brain tumours.

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3rd April 2021

Artificial life can grow and divide normally

A breakthrough in synthetic biology could shed new light on mechanisms controlling the most basic processes of life.

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2nd April 2021

First high-bandwidth wireless brain-computer interface for humans

Researchers have created a brain-computer interface (BCI) with 200 electrodes providing 48 megabits per second (Mbit/s) of neural signals.

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15th March 2021

Engineers design "lunar ark" to save Earth's species

An ambitious project designed by a University of Arizona team aims to preserve humankind – and animal-kind, plant-kind and fungi-kind – in the event of a global crisis.

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12th March 2021

"Camera-in-a-pill" helps to spot cancer

The NHS in England has begun trials of a new miniature camera device that a patient can swallow, to check if they have bowel cancer, as an alternative to traditional colonoscopy.

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3rd March 2021

Nanoparticle cuts cholesterol by 57%

Scientists have used lipid nanoparticles to deliver CRISPR genome editing into mouse livers, resulting in a 57% reduction of cholesterol levels.

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1st March 2021

Hydrogel could repair heart attack damage

Researchers have developed an injectable hydrogel that could help repair and prevent further damage to the heart muscle after a heart attack.

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26th February 2021

Holographic touchscreens could improve public hygiene

Two companies from Japan have partnered to develop a new holographic display system that could eliminate the need to touch physical surfaces in public environments.

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