Technology must tackle bias in medical devices | Letter
Engineers need to be sensitive to how exclusion occurs or they risk making health inequity worse, sayProf Steven JohnsonandProf Jonathan EnsorThe independent review on equity in medical devices once again highlights the multiple ways in which medical technology development can lead to solutions whereby the benefits are distributed inequitably across society, or can further exacerbate health inequalities (UK report reveals bias within medical tools and devices, 11 March). While the report is welcome, the challenge facing scientists and engineers is how to innovate medical devices differently to respond to longstanding socie...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 19, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Guardian Staff Tags: Health Artificial intelligence (AI) Technology Inequality Medical research UK news Race Gender Science Computing Source Type: news
AstraZeneca to buy Canadian cancer specialist Fusion for $2.4bn
Britain ’s biggest drugmaker’s latest acquisition will help it to develop new radiotherapy treatmentsBusiness live – latest updatesBritain ’s biggest drugmaker, AstraZeneca, is to buy a Canadian cancer specialist focused on next-generation treatments for $2.4bn (£1.9bn), the latest in a string of acquisitions made to strengthen its portfolio of new medicines.The Anglo-Swedish company struck an agreement to acquire Fusion Pharmaceuticals, which is developing next-generation radioconjugates that offer an alternative to chemotherapy and radiotherapy. It has emerged as a new type of cancer treatment in recent years, a...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 19, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Julia Kollewe Tags: AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals industry Mergers and acquisitions Cancer research Medical research Science Business UK news Source Type: news
Should forests have rights? – podcast
A growing movement of ecologists, lawyers and artists is arguing that nature should have legal rights. By recognising the rights of ecosystems and other species, advocates hope that they can gain better protection. Madeleine Finlay speaks to the Guardian ’s global environment editor, Jonathan Watts, about where this movement has come from and why the UK government has dismissed the concept, and hears from Cesar Rodriguez-Garavito of NYU School of Law about how he is finding creative ways to give rights to natureCould 2024 be the year nature rights enter the political mainstream?UK government can never accept idea nature ...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 19, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Presented by Madeleine Finlay with Jonathan Watts, produced by Holly Fisher, sound design by Joel Cox, the executive producer is Ellie Bury Tags: Science Biodiversity Environment Wildlife Conservation Law Source Type: news
US and Japan push for ban on nuclear weapons in space with UN security council resolution
UN chief Ant ónio Guterres says risk of nuclear war has escalated and that ‘humanity cannot survive a sequel to Oppenheimer’The US and Japan are sponsoring a UN security council resolution calling on all nations not to deploy or develop nuclear weapons in space, the US ambassador has announced.Linda Thomas-Greenfield told a UN security council meeting that “any placement of nuclear weapons into orbit around the Earth would be unprecedented, dangerous, and unacceptable.”Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 19, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Guardian staff and agencies Tags: United Nations Japan US foreign policy Russia Nuclear weapons Space Source Type: news
‘We actually don’t know much’: the scientists trying to close the knowledge gap in trans healthcare
Researchers are running trials on how hormone therapies affect trans people that will also benefit healthcare for the wider populationWhen Cameron Whitley was diagnosed with kidney failure seven years ago, the news came as a shock. But the situation was about to get worse. His doctor decided the diagnosis meant Whitley ’s hormone therapy had to stop.As a transgender man, now 42, who had taken testosterone for 10 years, the impact was brutal.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Nicola Davis Science correspondent Tags: Transgender Medical research Health Science Society Source Type: news
Did you solve it? Lewis Carroll for insomniacs
The answers to today ’s puzzlesEarlier today I set these puzzles by Lewis Carroll, who as well as writing books likeAlice ’s Adventures in Wonderland, was also a prolific puzzle setter.1. The Chelsea PensionersContinue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Alex Bellos Tags: Mathematics Lewis Carroll Books Education Science Source Type: news
Fridge magnets can be cool aid to holiday memory recall, study finds
Some participants in Liverpool University survey said the travel mementoes were more important to them than photographsWhether holding up shopping lists or hastily scrawled messages, fridge magnets are highly functional holiday souvenirs. And a new study suggests these trinkets may also provide an important means of accessing happy – and not so happy – memories of past trips.Pervasive as souvenirs are, surprisingly little research has investigated what happens to them after people ’s holidays have ended, and even less has focused on fridge magnets, even though we interact with them almost every day.Continue reading.....
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Linda Geddes Tags: Memory Psychology Science UK news Life and style Travel Source Type: news
Star wars: Sri Lanka ’s powerful astrologers split over auspicious dates
Group employed by government divided for first time over best date for new year ritualsSri Lanka ’s government-backed traditional astrologers have failed to unanimously agree on the best date for new year rituals, with squabbling seers warning of “disaster” and accusing rivals of misinterpreting the position of stars.Astrologers are hugely influential figures consulted by the island ’s Buddhist and Hindu communities, and their advice for auspicious dates guides everything from marriages to business deals – and even national elections.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Staff and agencies in Colombo Tags: Sri Lanka South and central Asia World news Source Type: news
‘Holy grail of shipwrecks’: recovery of 18th-century Spanish ship could begin in April
The San Jos é, sunk in 1708, has been at the center of a dispute over who has rights to the wreck, including $17bn in bootySince the Colombian navy discoveredthe final resting place of the Spanish galleon San Jos é in 2015, its location has remained a state secret, the wreck – and its precious cargo – left deep under the waters of the Caribbean.Efforts to conserve the ship and recover its precious cargo have been caught up in acomplicated string of international legal disputes, with Colombia, Spain, Bolivian indigenous groups and a US salvage company laying claim to the wreck, and the gold, silver and emeralds onboar...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Luke Taylor in Bogot á Tags: Colombia Caribbean Bolivia Americas US news Spain Source Type: news
Can you solve it? Lewis Carroll for insomniacs
It ’s not all about AliceTodays puzzles are all penned by Lewis Carroll, the author of Alice ’s Adventures in Wonderland, and appear in a delightful miscellany of his non-Alice scribblings,Lewis Carroll ’s Guide for Insomniacs, curated by LC superfan Gyles Brandreth. They may be oldies, but they are goodies!1. The Chelsea PensionersContinue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Alex Bellos Tags: Lewis Carroll Mathematics Books Science Source Type: news
Starwatch: March equinox is upon us as sun crosses celestial equator
Length of day and night roughly equal as longer summer days draw nearThe sun crosses the celestial equator this week, meaning that the March equinox is upon us.The celestial equator is the projection of the Earth ’s equator up into the sky. Because Earth rotates on a tilted axis, which always points in the same direction, our orientation to the sun changes throughout the year. When we are in the hemisphere tilted towards the sun, our parent star appears higher in the sky than the celestial equator and we e xperience summer with its longer days. Likewise, when the axis is pointed away, the sun never rises as high as the c...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Stuart Clark Tags: The sun Science Source Type: news
UK scientists working on breast cancer monitor fitted in bra
Researchers at Nottingham Trent University hope device used at home will improve tracking of tumoursScientists are developing a device that fits inside a bra and could monitor whether a breast cancer tumour is growing.Researchers hope the device will provide a new non-invasive method of detecting tumour growth that patients can use “in the comfort of their own homes”.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Alexandra Topping Tags: Breast cancer Health Medical research Society Science UK news Source Type: news
UK researchers find way of diagnosing bowel cancer without biopsies
PET scans can examine entire bowel before and during treatment, avoiding risks associated with taking tissue samplesResearchers in Glasgow have identified a new means of diagnosing and treating bowel cancer with imaging technology, avoiding the need for biopsies.Biopsies require an invasive procedure with a number of health risks, such as infection, and are limited in what they can capture within a patient ’s bowel.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 18, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Jamie Grierson and agencies Tags: Bowel cancer Medical research Society Scotland UK news Science Source Type: news
Feeling empty inside, one sociologist found answers by exploring his own traumatic childhood
Along the way Corey Keyes developed concepts of languishing and flourishing which others have found helpfulWhen he was 16, Corey Keyes was finally doing well after a brutal childhood. He got high grades at school, played quarterback on the football team, and was living with his loving grandmother in Wisconsin, USA.But, the sociologist and professor emeritus of Emory University writes in his new book,Languishing:HowToFeelAliveAgain in a WorldThat Wears Us Down, he was living on autopilot, throwing himself into every activity going. Whenever he slowed down, everything felt “drained of colour”. A feeling of “restless em...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 17, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Genevieve Fox Tags: Psychology Life and style Science Health & wellbeing Source Type: news
Cosmic cleaners: the scientists scouring English cathedral roofs for space dust
Mini missions are being launched amid the spires – a haven for dust particles that may contain clues about the cosmos and the early EarthOn the roof of Canterbury Cathedral, two planetary scientists are searching for cosmic dust. While the red brick parapet hides the streets, buildings and trees far below, only wispy clouds block the deep blue sky that extends into outer space.The roaring of a vacuum cleaner breaks the silence and researcher Dr Penny Wozniakiewicz, dressed in hazmat suit with a bulky vacuum backpack, carefully traces a gutter with the tube of the suction machine.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - March 17, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Sarah Wild Tags: Science Asteroids Astronomy Space Geology Comets Source Type: news
