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Researchers develop a blood test to identify individuals at risk of developing Parkinson's disease Research carried out at Oxford's  Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences  has led to the development of a new blood-based test to identify the pathology that triggers Parkinson's disease before the main symptoms occur.

Remote teams are less likely to make breakthrough discoveries compared to those who work onsite, according to published in Nature [29 Nov], led by the universities of Oxford and Pittsburgh into the international rise of remote collaborations among scientists and inventors. The researchers' key finding was that, while remote collaboration has the potential to deliver new and creative scientific ideas through easier access to a global knowledge pool, it is harder for such teams to integrate effectively to deliver breakthroughs.

Study of two million individuals' psychological well-being from 2005 to 2022 in 168 countries, in relation to country-level internet-use and mobile broadband statistics Negative and positive experiences had increased on average, but little to no evidence suggesting (mobile) internet use was associated with these changes Links between internet adoption and psychological well-being are small at most, despite popular assumptions about the negative

Luminous fast blue optical transients are characterized by their intense blue light and are amongst the brightest known optical phenomena in the universe. They evolve rapidly, reaching peak brightness and fading again in a matter of days, unlike supernovae which take weeks or months. Image credit: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/M.

Self-monitoring blood pressure after giving birth could help to cut new mothers' risk of future heart disease and strokes, according to new research by Oxford researchers. The study, funded by the BHF and supported by the NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) , could be the first step towards blood pressure self-monitoring becoming routinely recommended for women who have high blood pressure during pregnancy, to prevent future health problems.

How doctors communicate with patients with obesity can have a significant impact on their weight loss success, according to a new University of Oxford study published in Annals of Internal Medicine . This pioneering study dives into uncharted waters by investigating not just that words matter, but how they matter over the short and long-term in a medical context.

Professor Yadvinder Malhi (right) with the BBC Countryfile team, including presenters Hamza Yassin and Ellie Harrison, in front of the Flux Tower in Wytham Woods. BBC's Countryfile visited scientists from Oxford's Environmental Change Institute (ECI), at the University-owned Wytham Woods, to learn about the threat of ash dieback and the work at the site of special scientific interest - known as one of the most researched woodlands in the world.

The first digital atlas showing how the human brain develops in the womb has been published by a global research team led by the University of Oxford. A team of over 200 researchers around the world, involving multiple health and scientific institutions, led by the University of Oxford, has today published, in the journal Nature , the first digital atlas showing the dynamics of normative maturation of each hemisphere of the fetal brain between 14 and 31 weeks' gestation - a critical period of human development.

An estimated 95,000'167 ,000 inpatients at English National Health Service (NHS) hospitals caught SARS-CoV-2 while in hospital during England's 'second wave' of COVID-19, between June 2020 and March 2021, reports a study in Nature . The findings reveal the scale of hospital transmissions and highlight contributing factors, such as a limited number of single rooms.

The NHS ADOPT study has now begun to automatically identify patients with vertebral fracture, by using Nanox.AI an Artificial Intelligence (AI) programme to review thousands of hospital computed tomography (CT) scans. The patients are now being fast-tracked for bone health assessment by an NHS osteoporosis team.

The MBRRACE-UK collaboration , co-led by Oxford Population Health's National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit , has published the full Saving Lives, Improving Mothers' Care report on women who died during, or up to a year after, pregnancy between 2019 and 2021. The data from this report were published by the collaboration in May 2023.

A team of researchers from the University of Oxford has shown for the first time that it is possible to track the progression of Parkinson's Disease accurately using specially trained machine learning algorithms to analyse data derived from sensor devices worn by patients. The novel methods described in this study led by Professor Chrystalina Antoniades in Oxford's Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences can be used by clinicians alongside the more traditional clinical rating scales to not only improve the accuracy of diagnosis, but also track progression of Parkinson's Disease.

Researchers from the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Oxford, along with colleagues at Cambridge University and Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry, have shown the potential of a new gene therapy approach to silence human sensory neurons (nerve cells) as a means of treating persistent pain.

A study looking at the longer-term impact of COVID-19 has found that nearly a third of patients displayed abnormalities in multiple organs five months after infection, some of which have been shown through previous work to be evidence of tissue damage. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of patients on the trial showed a higher burden of abnormal findings involving the lungs, brain and kidneys compared to controls.

Young people's mental health deteriorated during COVID-19, with higher levels of depression and social, emotional and behavioural difficulties than before the pandemic hit, a comprehensive new study has shown. Researchers led by Professor Willem Kuyken at Oxford University's Department of Psychiatry compared the mental health difficulties and well-being of thousands of UK secondary school pupils who experienced three lockdowns, with a group of students who participated in the same study before the coronavirus pandemic emerged in 2020.

An international group of scientists, including botanists at the University of Oxford's Botanic Garden, has issued an urgent call for coordinated action to save the iconic genus Rafflesia , which contains the world's largest flowers. This follows a new study published this week which found that most of the 42 species are severely threatened, yet just one of these is listed in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)'s Red List of Threatened Species.

One of the world's biggest ecological experiments, co-led by the University of Oxford on the island of Borneo, has revealed that replanting logged tropical forests with diverse mixtures of seedlings can significantly accelerate their recovery. The findings , published today in the journal Science Advances,  emphasise the importance of preserving biodiversity in pristine forests and restoring it in recovering logged forest.

A new Cochrane review of methods to increase chances of successful conception suggests that timed intercourse using urine ovulation tests probably improves live birth and pregnancy rates in women under 40 who had been trying to conceive for less than 12 months, compared to intercourse without ovulation prediction.

High levels of two proteins at the time of COVID-19 have been found in patients who later experienced cognitive problems, including 'brain fog', giving a major clue as to one cause of their symptoms: blood clots. Dr Max Taquet and colleagues from the University of Oxford, along with the University of Leicester looked at blood tests from 1,837 people who had been hospitalised with COVID-19 to find potential proteins (biomarkers) associated with subsequent cognitive problems, with symptoms including serious and persistent problems with thinking, concentration and memory.

A team of researchers at the University of Oxford, led by the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences , have developed a new model that reliably predicts a woman's likelihood of developing and then dying of breast cancer within a decade. The study, published today in The Lancet Digital Health , analysed anonymised data from 11.6 million women aged 20-90 from 2000 to 2020.