Tag Archives: Scientists

A new treatment has been shown to significantly lower blood pressure in people whose levels stay dangerously high, despite taking several existing medicines, according to the results of a Phase III clinical trial led by a UCL Professor. Globally around 1.3 billion people have high blood pressure (hypertension), and in around half of cases the condition is uncontrolled or treatment …

The joint European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA Solar Orbiter spacecraft has tracked electrons traveling at nearly the speed of light back to the sun, finding they originated in different types of solar outbursts. Solar Orbiter detected these so-called Solar Energetic Electrons (SEEs) in space after being accelerated to high energies, and researchers were able to pinpoint their source in …

Rapid warming in the Arctic is melting glaciers and sea ice, driving sea-level rise and disrupting human and animal habitats at a pace challenging adaptation. What’s happening? The Arctic is heating up faster than any other region on Earth, with average temperatures rising at nearly four times the global average. This accelerated heating is reshaping the region and sending ripple …

Mitochondria may be best known for fueling cells, but new research reveals they also play a surprising role in the spread of cancer. Credit: Stock Rockefeller researchers have discovered that the antioxidant glutathione, acting within mitochondria, plays a crucial role in allowing breast tumors to spread to the lung. Mitochondria are best known as the cell’s powerhouse, but growing evidence …

One of the strongest indicators of this limit is the cosmic microwave background radiation, faint afterglow from the Big Bang. It was released when the Universe was just 3,80,000 years old, before which matter and energy were too tightly coupled for light to travel freely. Today it appears across the entire sky at a temperature of 2.7 degrees above absolute …

Learning to play a musical instrument can protect your brain from aging, building up a defense against cognitive decline that lasts a lifetime. Researchers from Canada and China discovered older adults who had spent years playing music were better at understanding speech in noisy environments, like a crowded room, compared to those who didn’t play music. Their brains worked more like younger …

buradaki/Shutterstock Scientists have just made a fascinating discovery on Mars: a new mineral called ferric hydroxysulfate. The name is a mouthful, but the implications it brings are exciting. This particular mineral hints at a watery, chemically active past on the Red Planet. And this time, it wasn’t the rover that made the …

Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story: Scientists have discovered which animal was the first to branch off from our collective common ancestor. For years, debate had raged over whether the first to diverge was the sea sponge or the comb jelly. Thanks to new chromosomal analysis techniques, we finally have an answer. All animals on Earth share …

The annual clock of the seasons – winter, spring, summer, autumn – is often taken as a given. But our new study in Nature, using a new approach for observing seasonal growth cycles from satellites, shows that this notion is far too simple. We present an unprecedented and intimate portrait of the seasonal cycles of Earth’s land-based ecosystems. This reveals …

Researchers have discovered a strange-looking skull that does not appear to be human in nature. It’s not every day you get to find a new species, and with this discovery come many questions about our ancestry and history. The strange skull was found by scientists in the Petralona Cave in Greece and is thought to be less than 300,000 years …