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A new and less invasive treatment developed by Cancer Research UK researchers is safer than standard major surgery for early-stage rectal cancer, giving patients a better quality of life with fewer life-altering side effects, results from a pilot study show. Results from the TREC trial show that a combination of local keyhole surgery and radiotherapy, rather than major surgery that removes the whole rectum, prevents debilitating side effects, such as diarrhoea, or the need for a permanent colostomy bag.

A service that predicts passenger intent to travel can be used across the UK rail network to reduce overcrowding and help people maintain social distancing. Researchers from the University of Birmingham's Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education (BCRRE) worked in collaboration with British technology start-up Zipabout to validate the data powering the service, which was designed by Zipabout.

Particulate emissions from cooking stay in the atmosphere for longer than previously thought, making a prolonged contribution to poor air quality and human health, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Birmingham succeeded in demonstrating how cooking emissions - which account for up to 10 per cent of particulate pollution in the UK - are able to survive in the atmosphere over several days, rather than being broken up and dispersed.

A new review of research bringing together patient, carer and public views of cell and gene therapies has highlighted a need for appropriate education to better inform people including how clinical trials work and the risks and benefits of various treatments. Over the last decade, new cell, gene and tissue-engineered therapies have been developed to treat various cancers, inherited diseases and some chronic conditions.

Expectations are rising that the 2021 Northern Ireland census may act as a trigger for a referendum on Irish unification, but 'new' census questions on religious background and national identity are likely to shape the debate about Northern Ireland's constitutional future, a new study reveals. While 'sectarian head-counting' has featured in Northern Irish politics since partition in 1921, the 1998 Good Friday Agreement (GFA) introduced a mechanism for a 'border poll' on Irish unification.

Elite athletes can be persuaded not to take banned substances - either by appealing to their sense of morality or educating them about the risks of using performance-enhancing drugs, according to a new study. Researchers developed two separate intervention programmes - one targeting moral factors associated with doping likelihood, the other introducing doping and providing information about the health consequences of banned substances and the risks of sport supplements.

Human fingerprints have a self-regulating moisture mechanism that not only helps us to avoid dropping our smartphone, but could help scientists to develop better prosthetic limbs, robotic equipment and virtual reality environments, a new study reveals. Primates - including humans, monkeys and apes - have evolved epidermal ridges on their hands and feet with a higher density of sweat glands than elsewhere on their bodies.

People with Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) could soon benefit from a new drug treatment that not only suppresses inflammation but also significantly reduces patient reported pain scores. Otilimab is a monoclonal antibody, biologic drug, which targets and suppresses the inflammatory cytokine GM-CSF. In a multicentre, dose-ranging trial, led by Professor Chris Buckley at the Universities of Oxford and Birmingham, and sponsored by the Pharmaceutical company GSK, researchers explored the clinical effects of otilimab to prevent inflammation, tissue damage and pain in people with RA.

Increased consumption of flavanols - a group of molecules which occur naturally in fruit and vegetables - can increase your mental agility, according to new research. A team at the University of Birmingham has found that people given a cocoa drink containing high levels of flavanols were able to complete certain cognitive tasks more efficiently than when drinking a non-flavanol enriched-drink.

A new approach to treating cancers and other diseases that uses a mechanically interlocked molecule as a 'magic bullet' has been designed by researchers at the University of Birmingham. Called rotaxanes, the molecules are tiny nanoscale structures that resemble a dumbbell with a ring trapped around the central post.

Scientists at the University of Birmingham have developed a new sensor to measure weak magnetic signals in the brain, which has the potential to increase understanding of connectivity in the brain, and detect signs of traumatic brain injury, dementia and schizophrenia. Magnetic signals in the brain are measured by magnetoencephalography (MEG).

Researchers studying a group of UK healthcare workers discovered that non-white individuals recovering from COVID-19 displayed higher antibody levels than white individuals, with significantly greater levels observed in Asian individuals. Led by experts at the University of Birmingham, the researchers studied a cohort of 956 UK healthcare workers who self-isolated between March and June 2020 because of COVID-19.

New insights into the mechanisms behind how cancer-causing agents in the environment activate genetic recombination in DNA could help to explain some of the effects of exposure as well as predicting which individuals may be more susceptible to developing the disease, a new UK study has suggested. Everyone is exposed to low levels of carcinogens (substances or radiation that promote the formation of cancer) in the environment.

Routine testing patients for COVID-19 before major surgery could reduce the risk of respiratory complications and save lives, a new study reveals. Researchers working together around the world found that using a nasal swab test to confirm that asymptomatic patient were not infected with SARS-CoV-2 was associated with a lower rate of post-operative complications.

People across the Global South living with cardiovascular diseases and their risk factors may be missing potentially life-saving treatments because measures used to gauge their quality of healthcare are inadequate, a new study reveals. Conditions such as diabetes and hypertension, along with their risk factors, are major causes of death and disability, especially in Lowand Middle-income Countries (LMIC).

An international team of security researchers, including experts from the University of Birmingham, is presenting new side-channel attacks, which use fluctuations in software power consumption to access sensitive data on Intel CPUs. Power side-channel attacks are attacks that exploit fluctuations in power consumption to extract sensitive data such as cryptographic keys.

India's transition to clean cooking fuels may be hampered by users' belief that using firewood is better for their families' wellbeing than switching to Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), a new study reveals. Women are considered primary family cooks in rural India and those featured in the study feel that both fuels support wellbeing.

Primary care networks need to increase the engagement of GP practices and wider primary care teams, and strengthen their leadership and management, to become firmly established to meet the challenges ahead, says a new study by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) BRACE Rapid Evaluation Centre undertaken by researchers at the University of Birmingham and RAND Europe.

The capacity of the Amazon forest to store carbon in a changing climate will ultimately be determined by how fast trees die - and what kills them. Now, a huge new study has unravelled what factors control tree mortality rates in Amazon forests and helps to explain why tree mortality is increasing across the Amazon basin.

T cells form a crucial part of the immune system and work by detecting fragments of viruses, bacteria and cancer cells using their T cell receptors (TCRs). A comparison of two key research tools used by immunologists to study different types of T-cell receptor signals has identified important features of existing technologies that could allow scientists to better understand immune responses, in a new study led by scientists at the University of Birmingham.