PM wants to see UK take key part in creating international agreement on how to develop AI capabilitiesRishi Sunak will tell Joe Biden next week the UK should become a global hub for developing international regulation of artificial intelligence, as the prime minister rapidly shifts his position on the emerging technology.Sunak will travel to Washington DC on 7 and 8 June for meetings with the US...

Nice approves rimegepant for preventing migraines in cases where at least three previous treatments have failedThousands of people in England who get migraines could benefit from a drug that has been approved on the NHS.The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice), the drugs regulator, said it was recommending rimegepant for preventing migraines in the approximately 145,000 adults...

This week New Yorkers celebrated the first Manhattanhenge of 2023. During the biannual celestial event the setting sun lines up between skyscrapers and bathes the city in a golden glow Continue reading...

The Heege Manuscript which ‘pokes fun at everyone, high and low’ is among the earliest evidence of the life and work of a real minstrelFrom mocking kings and priests to encouraging audiences to get drunk, newly discovered texts at the National Library of Scotland have shed light on the role played by minstrels in medieval society.Containing the earliest recorded use of the term “red...

We are raiding the Guardian Long Read archives to bring you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authorsThis week, from 2020:When he was six, Paul Alexander contracted polio and was paralysed for life. Today he is 74, and one of the last people in the world still using an iron lung. But after surviving one deadly outbreak, he did not expect to find himself...

‘Extraordinary’ sighting may open window on possibility of life beneath Enceladus’s icy outer crustAstronomers have spotted an enormous plume of water vapour blasting out of Enceladus, a tiny moon of Saturn that is considered one of the most promising places to find life beyond Earth.The record-breaking plume reached nearly 6,000 miles into space – covering the distance between Ireland and...

Traces of Yersinia pestis bacteria were found in teeth of people buried at bronze age sites in Cumbria and SomersetThe oldest evidence for the plague in Britain has been discovered in 4,000-year-old human remains unearthed at bronze age burial sites in Cumbria and Somerset.Traces of Yersinia pestis bacteria were found in the teeth of individuals at the Levens Park ring cairn monument near Kendal,...

Virologist George Gao also states for first time that China has investigated claim virus came from a laboratoryThe former director of China’s Center for Disease Control and Protection (CDC) has said the lab leak theory for the origins of Covid-19 should not be discounted.George Gao, an internationally respected virologist, also said another branch of the Chinese government had investigated the...

Biological facilities in the US and around the world suffer breaches, including of potentially pandemic-causing pathogens, but are shrouded in secrecyAt biological research facilities across the United States and around the world, hundreds of safety breaches happen every year at labs experimenting with dangerous pathogens. Scientists and other lab workers are bitten by infected animals, stuck by...

A flood of new research is overturning old assumptions about what animal minds are and aren’t capable of – and changing how we think about our own species Giraffes will eat courgettes if they have to, but they really prefer carrots. A team of researchers from Spain and Germany recently took advantage of this preference to investigate whether the animals are capable of statistical reasoning. In...

Every year, the world’s leaders gather for the UN climate change conference. At Cop28, they will be faced with two stark warnings from scientists: we are likely to breach 1.5C warming above pre-industrial levels in the next five years, and we are on course to reach 2.7C of warming by the end of the century. Progress has never been more critical and this year it lies in the hands of the United...

Research found 71-year-olds with high flavanol consumption had better memory functionPeople who have a diet rich in flavanols, which are found in tea, apples and berries, may be less likely to develop age-related memory loss, research suggests.A three-year study of 3,562 people aged about 71 found those with high regular flavanol consumption had better hippocampal memory function, which includes...

Kate Bingham, who chaired UK’s Covid vaccine taskforce, tells Hay festival she hopes mind-altering drugs could treat mental illnessThe former chair of the UK’s Covid vaccine taskforce has described the use of psychedelics to treat depression as an “area of real excitement” in a talk at the Hay literary festival in Wales.Speaking at a panel event alongside the UK government’s former chief...

The answers to today’s mind-spinnersEarlier today I set you these three puzzles. Here they are again with solutions.1. Roll with it Continue...

This should be comforting, but it is unsettlingWhen I was eight, my mother made a Halloween costume for me for a party I was going to. Even at eight, this seemed like an important party. The costume was beautiful, as the things my mother made often were: more beautiful than a child’s thing ought to be, more beautiful than a mother ought to be able to make after work.It was a skeleton costume: a...

Puzzles to put your head in a spinGather round. Today’s puzzles are all about going in circles. Onward with the revolution!1. Roll with it Continue reading...

Atmospheric methane and industrial pollutants suggested as reasons for lack of noctilucent cloud sightings before 1885Late spring, early summer marks the beginning of noctilucent cloud season in the northern hemisphere. The name derives from Latin, where noctilucent means “night shine”. These beautiful cloud formations can often be seen during the summer months shining with an electric blue...

Recently described as a public health emergency, profound loneliness can affect anyone craving deeper connectionsIn the UK 25 million people report they are occasionally, sometimes, or often lonely, according to the Campaign to End Loneliness. In the US the surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, recently disclosed his own experience of “profound loneliness” as he released his national strategy...

When this newspaper’s photographer and his 25-year-old daughter attempt the rarely climbed 1,700m spire in New Zealand’s Milford Sound the obstacles appear overwhelmingFive years ago, I stood at the end of a knife-edge ridge, a tangle of blue rope at my feet, my 25-year-old daughter Lilidh by my side. I knew we were beaten – we hadn’t made it anywhere near the top. I had pulled back from...

Threat posed by ‘provocative’ Russia and China has left US no choice but to prepare for orbital skirmishesThe US is ready for conflict in outer space, according to a senior military official, after developing anti-satellite technologies to counter the threats posed by “provocative” countries such as Russia and China.Brig Gen Jesse Morehouse at US Space Command, the arm of the military...

The remarkable journey of Ben Abeles will be celebrated next week by the opening of a new archiveBen Abeles’ impact on science was out of this world. He helped develop alloys that were key components of the radioisotope generators that powered US robot space probes on their interplanetary journeys. Nasa was then able to reveal the wonders of the solar system, from the ancient river beds of Mars...

Frederick Cook claimed to have reached the top of the world, but a new book says he was lyingWho was the first person to reach the north pole? According to American adventurer Frederick Cook, it was him. But now a new book will set out the evidence that the explorer’s 114-year-old claim was an instance of fake news on a global scale.In The Explorer and the Journalist, author Richard Evans has...

Despite the demise of Virgin Orbit, the UK’s first spaceports should open in 2024‘Yesterday afternoon, shattering the moorland peace of Inverard, in North Argyll, powered jets burst into action. For the second time in two months a space ship took off, its fiery trail vanishing wisp-like into the blue autumn sky.”Thus Angus MacVicar began his novel Return to the Lost Planet, with words that...

More and more of us suffer from allergies, and medicine is struggling to keep up. Rebecca Seal talks to medical anthropologist Theresa MacPhailWhen Theresa MacPhail was four, her brother was killed in an accident. When she was 14, her mother died in a car crash. And when she was 24, her father died from anaphylactic shock after a bee flew in through the open window of his truck and stung him in...