news 2023

Temperature influences how badly pesticides affect bees' behaviour, suggesting uncertain impacts under climate change, according to a new study. The findings indicate that future extreme temperature events under climate change could increase the impact of pesticides on bee populations and their pollination services.

Scientists have gleaned new insights into how psychedelics alter conscious experience via their action on brain activity. In a study at Imperial College London, detailed brain imaging data from 20 healthy volunteers revealed how the potent psychedelic compound, DMT (dimethyltryptamine), alters brain function.

Some people have a genetic predisposition to being an 'evening person' and new research led by University of Oxford's Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science , published in the journal Sleep, finds this protects regular night shift workers against sleep penalties. Up to 25% of public sector employees in the UK do some form of night work.

Preterm infants do not get used to repeated pain in the way that full-term infants, children and adults do habituate to pain, finds a study led by UCL researchers. The authors of the new Current Biology paper say that if preterm infants have not yet developed the mechanism that enables people to get used to moderate pain, medical procedures in their first few weeks of life could potentially impact their development.

Research published in Nature Ecology & Evolution shows that complexity can happen by chance without natural selection. Major changes in the spinal columns of mammals have been shaped by their highly variable numbers of vertebrae, according to new evidence from a team of international scientists, including researchers from the Milner Centre for Evolution at the University of Bath.

Researchers at the University of Oxford, in collaboration with 25 teams across the world, have published the largest study to date of the genetic basis of endometriosis. Their study included DNA from 60,600 women with endometriosis and 701,900 without. It revealed compelling evidence of a shared genetic basis for endometriosis and other types of pain seemingly unrelated to endometriosis, including migraine, back pain and multi-site pain.

Cambridge researchers have observed a highly unusual behaviour in the endangered freshwater mussel, Unio crassus. Who'd have thought that a mussel, that doesn't even have a head or a brain, knows to move to the river margin and squirt jets of water back into the river during springtime? David Aldridge In spring, female mussels were seen moving to the water's edge and anchoring into the riverbed, with their back ends raised above the waterline.

Researchers have built the first ever map showing every single neuron and how they are wired together in the brain of the fruit fly larva. Now we can start gaining a mechanistic understanding of how the brain works. Marta Zlatic This will help scientists to understand the basic principles by which signals travel through the brain at the neural level and lead to behaviour and learning.

A new study shows that sparrows with more opposite-sex friends contribute more to the gene pool, but 'average' friendliness wins out in the long term. Scientists have assumed for a long time that traits associated with how social an animal is - such as shyness or extraversion - have a genetic basis.

Research shows the peptide called PEPITEM could provide a revolutionary approach to reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes and other obesity-related diseases Research published today shows that a peptide (small protein) called PEPITEM could provide a revolutionary approach to reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes and other obesity-related diseases such as hepatic steatosis (fatty liver).

A mystery about how a chemical compound found in nature could be synthesised in the lab may have been solved, scientists say - a breakthrough which could unlock new developments in medicine. Scientists from universities and research institutions in Scotland and Germany are behind the discovery, published in the journal Nature Chemistry .

Replaying prior experiences when learning something new can improve the brain's ability to make future plans and preserve memories of the past, finds new research by UCL neuroscientists. The study, published in PNAS , used brain imaging techniques to detect activity in the brains of 24 participants, while taking part in a maze task.

Testing a population for multiple genes at once will be limited in its ability to accurately predict disease risk, argues a new paper involving UCL's Professor Aroon Hingorani. DNA sequence commonly varies between individuals at many different points throughout the genome. Some of these genetic variants influence individual risk of common diseases such as dementia, cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, through effects on the expression or function of the encoded proteins.

Researchers from the University of Sheffield's Institute of Translational Neuroscience have discovered how to prevent the death of nerve cells and protect nerves from neurodegeneration in the most common genetic forms of MND and frontotemporal dementia The researchers used a peptide, a small assembly of amino acids or protein bricks, with a cell-penetrating module to stop mutant repeated RNA molecules being transported from the cell's nucleus to

Rare diseases are varied and life-threatening, yet most still remain undiagnosed and have no effective treatments. Now, scientists at the UCL Neurogenetics Lab are focusing on these conditions, to find diagnoses and treatments that could be crucial for scientific discovery. There is a common misconception that rare diseases only affect a small number of people.

DNA helix, gene molecule spiral loop, 3D genetic chromosome cell. DNA molecule spiral of blue light on black background for molecular genetic science, genome biotechnology and health medicine Researchers will tell an international conference today (24/02/23) that an investigational gene therapy for Sanfilippo syndrome - which leads to a form of childhood dementia - has shown promising early results in a proof-of-concept study.

A decade-long international study into kidney cancer has shown that doctors can predict the likelihood of a patient's disease returning by looking at DNA mutations in their tumours. The research, undertaken by a team of 44 researchers at 23 institutions across Europe and Canada, and published today, is the largest to link the genetic changes that occur in kidney cancer to patient outcomes.

Researchers from the UCL Cancer Institute have provided important molecular understanding of how injury may contribute to the development of a relatively rare but often aggressive form of brain tumour called a glioma. Previous studies have suggested a possible link between head injury and increased rates of brain tumours, but the evidence is inconclusive.

A study using fruit flies, led by researchers at The Universities of Manchester and Leicester, supported by the National Physical Laboratory, has suggested that the animal world's ability to sense a magnetic field may be more widespread than previously thought. The paper, published in Nature today (22/02/23) makes significant advances in our understanding of how animals sense and respond to magnetic fields in their environment.

A UCL-led research team has, for the first time, identified a specific region of chromosome 21, which causes issues with memory function and anxiety in a mouse that models Down syndrome, a finding that provides valuable new insight into the condition in people. Most people have 46 chromosomes in each cell, divided into 23 pairs: people with Down syndrome (DS) have an extra copy of chromosome 21, which carries over 200 genes.