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A new research project led by the University of Glasgow will trace how Scotland's traditional regional dialects are changing and help map our linguistic future. The project is investigating the growth of 'bidialectalism', looking at what it will mean to the long term future of linguistics in Scotland.

A team of academics from the University of Glasgow and University of Strathclyde have formed a network designed to drive forward mental health breakthroughs. The Glasgow Psychosis Research Network will bring together expertise from a range of organisations, with the aim of improving the diagnosis and treatment of mental health condition.

Scientists have taken a major step towards developing new treatments for certain cancers by disrupting the internal cellular signals that lead to the uncontrolled growth of cancerous cells. It is hoped that this breakthrough will open the door to a new generation of therapies that specifically target fast growing cancer cells without the need for heavy doses chemotherapy or radiotherapy.

Those diagnosed with schizophrenia are less likely than the general population to have a recorded diagnosis of heart disease, a new report published in BMJ Open has found. This is of significance because on average, people with schizophrenia die between 15-20 years earlier than the general population and the most common cause of death is cardiovascular disease.

The humble salamander may provide evidence to support a controversial claim that North and South America were joined together much early than previously thought. The two continents are generally believed to have been joined together around three million years ago by the formation of a land bridge - what is now Panama - that sealed up the sea channel between them.

Astrophysicists at the University of Glasgow are looking to the Northern and Southern Lights to expand our understanding of solar flares. In a new paper published in the Astrophysical Journal, researchers from the University's School of Physics and Astronomy suggest magnetic waves, which contribute to the formation of auroras on Earth, could help energy from solar flares travel tens of thousands of kilometres in under a second.

The papers of the pioneers of modern genetics, including former Glasgow professors Guido Pontecorvo, Malcom Ferguson-Smith and James Harrison Renwick, have been collected together for the first time and made freely available in a £3.9million digitisation project by the Wellcome Library.

Survival of patients with prostate cancer has improved since 1990, a new study has found, but socio-economic inequalities are still widening. Men from the most deprived areas had poorer survival compared with men from the least deprived areas, according to research from scientists at the University of Glasgow which is published in the journal ' PLOS ONE' .

Almost everyone (98 per cent) who had the new bowel cancer test - soon to become part of the national screening programme - said they were glad to have gone through the experience, according to a study* published today (Monday) in the Journal of Medical Screening. Cancer Research UK scientists asked 1020 people** who had had a flexible sigmoidoscopy test about any side-effects they experienced and their satisfaction with the procedure.

Scientists at the University of Glasgow together with the Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre and the Natural History Museum (London) have discovered the first evidence of water dissolving the surface of Mars. In a paper published in the Meteoritical Society's journal MAPS , the research team outline the results of tests on a 1.7-gram fragment of a Martian meteorite known as Nakhla, which was provided by the Natural History Museum.

A new weight-loss programme available on the NHS for severely-obese individuals offers a safer, more cost-effective remedy than gastric surgery, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Glasgow evaluated the success and costs of the Counterweight Plus weight-loss programme which is aimed at people with a BMI greater than 40 and available through GP and Primary Care facilities.

A Scottish researcher has unearthed seven long lost manuscripts, including correspondence between Robert Burns and his close friends, which throw significant new light on the life and work of the poet. The manuscripts are believed among some of the most important findings concerning Burns in recent years, and this research offers academics and scholars new resources through which to study his life and works.

Scottish researchers have developed methods to synthesize and change the genome of a recently discovered virus, in a bid to understand how it induces disease among livestock such as cattle, sheep and goats. The research, led by Massimo Palmarini and Alain Kohl at the MRC Centre for Virus Research at the University of Glasgow, has laid bare important ways by which the Schmallenberg virus (SBV) causes disease and has paved the way for future development of new vaccines.

New research led by the Karolinska Instituet, Sweden and the University of Glasgow, Scotland, has identified a link between a human gene and the composition of human gastrointestinal bacteria. In a study published as a letter to the journal Gut today, the team outline new evidence suggesting that the human genome may play a role in determining the makeup of the billions of microbes in the human gastrointestinal tract collectively known as the gut microbiota.

Current thinking on how the Toxoplasma gondii parasite invades its host is incorrect, according to a study published today describing a new technique to knock out genes. The findings could have implications for other parasites from the same family, including malaria, and suggest that drugs that are currently being developed to block this invasion pathway may be unsuccessful.

In the wake of the publication of the Energy Bill, experts from the Glasgow Media Group at the University of Glasgow and Chatham House are today calling on the scientific community to take a more decisive lead in the debate on energy policy. The recommendations aim to avoid the issue becoming mired in party politics and controversy, as has happened with climate change.

New research from the University of Glasgow suggests that lifespan is affected by the rate at which bodies grow early in life. A paper published today in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B outlines how manipulating growth rates in stickleback fish can extend their lifespan by nearly a third or reduce it by 15 percent.

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) provided alongside drug treatment can help reduce the symptoms of depression and improve patients' quality of life, according to new research. Depression is a very common illness which has a major impact on a patient's life. In the UK between five and ten per cent of the population has the illness at any one time.

Scientists at the University of Glasgow and the Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute in Northern Ireland have established the first direct evidence that tuberculosis epidemics in badgers and cattle are related at a local scale. Using next-generation genome sequencing technology (NGS), the team from the Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health and Comparative Medicine were able to trace mutations in the bovine TB bacteria - Mycobacterium bovis - as it passed from animal to animal.

A mathematician at the University of Glasgow is helping to find an answer to one of the last unsolved problems in classical mechanics. Andrew Baggaley, of the University's School of Mathematics and Statistics, has published a paper in the journal Physical Review Letters ,which extends our understanding of the chaotic motion of fluids, commonly known as turbulence.