science wire

Companies around the world are underestimating their total greenhouse gas footprints because of inconsistent accounting standards for methane emissions, finds a new study by researchers from UCL and Imperial College London.

Euclid, the European Space Agency telescope whose massive optical camera was designed and built by an international team led by UCL researchers, has captured a rare phenomenon known as an Einstein ring which reveals the extreme warping of space caused by a galaxy's gravity.

Conversations about parental duties continue to be led by mothers, even if both parents earn the same amount of money, finds a new study by a UCL researcher.

A personalised intervention for hearing care could help protect cognitive health in older adults at risk of dementia, according to a pilot study from UCL and UCLH.

People would be encouraged to eat more healthy and sustainable diets if Value Added Tax (VAT) rates were set based on health and environmental considerations, finds a new study led by UCL researchers.

Providing tuberculosis (TB) patients with advice and money can help them to finish their treatment and recover, finds a new study involving UCL researchers. The research, published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases , demonstrated that patients who received counselling and cash incentives (around $10) for turning up to appointments on time, had a 52% lower relative risk of having an unsuccessful treatment outcome.

Responding to an Nature article that reported the growth of heart muscle patches from precursor cells to mend the damaged monkey hearts, Professor John Martin (UCL Medicine) cautions scepticism in The Conversation. There are many difficulties in converting any biological research into a medicine that will treat patients.

The GLP-1 drug, exenatide, has no positive impact on the movement, symptoms or brain imaging of people with Parkinson's disease, finds a new study led by UCL researchers. The world's largest and longest trial of exenatide in people with Parkinson's disease was funded by the National Institute for Health & Care Research (NIHR) with support for sub-studies from Cure Parkinson's and Van Andel Institute.

Generally, things really do seem better in the morning, with clear patterns across time of day in how we report our mental health and wellbeing, suggest the findings of a large study led by researchers at UCL. The findings, published in the open access journal BMJ Mental Health , suggest that people generally wake up feeling in the best frame of mind in the morning but in the worst around midnight, with day of the week and season also playing their part. But the researchers caution that the findings need to be replicated in other studies to be sure they are a true picture.

Children are nearly three-quarters (71%) more likely to develop mental health problems between the ages of five and 18, if the firstborn child in their family experienced adversity during their first 1,000 days, finds a new study led by UCL researchers.

A quarter of all children in England receive services from children's social care before turning 18, finds a new study by UCL researchers.

Increased use of ventilation and air cleaners, designed to mitigate the spread of viral infections in hospitals, is likely to have unpredictable effects and may cause viral particles to move around more, according to a new study from researchers at UCL and UCLH. In the study, published in Aerosol Science & Technology , researchers investigated the effect of using built-in mechanical ventilation and portable air cleaners (PACs) 1 upon the spread of airborne particles, which are similar to those breathed out by a person with a viral respiratory infection such as SARS-CoV-2 or influenza.

People who exercise throughout their lives have a better chance of avoiding dementia - even if they show signs of diseases like Alzheimer's, finds a new study led by UCL researchers. The research, which is published in Brain Communications , is part of the Insight46 study, which has been collecting health data from over 450 people since their birth in 1946.

Dr Nora Trompeter (UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health), writing with Dr Tom Jewell in The Conversation, describes her research that found calorie labels on restaurant menus can negatively impact people with eating disorders.

A new study is seeking to harness the potential of weight-loss drugs without some of the unwelcome side-effects, in a £1.2 million research The anti-diabetic medication semaglutide, also known

Writing in The Conversation, Ali Akbar Septiandri (UCL Statistical Science) explains how we can prevent bias in the use of AI in the medical world.

There was a 65% increase in the number of children and young people being admitted to general acute medical wards in hospitals in England because of a mental health concern between 2012 and 2022, finds a new study led by UCL researchers.

The remains of the earliest dinosaurs may lie undiscovered in the Amazon and other equatorial regions of South America and Africa, suggests a new study led by UCL researchers. Currently, the oldest known dinosaur fossils date back about 230 million years and were unearthed further south in places including Brazil, Argentina and Zimbabwe.

Doctors could in the future be able to predict individual chances of getting cancer and offer personalised detection and prevention, thanks to a new research The Cancer Data-Driven Detection programm

Wild baboons failed to demonstrate visual self-recognition in a test carried out by anthropologists at UCL. Published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the study found that while the baboons noticed and responded to a laser mark shone on their arms, legs and hands, they did not react when they saw, via their mirror reflection, the laser on their faces and ears.

Just over one in 20 adults in England both smoke and vape, according to a new study by UCL researchers. The study, published in the journal Addiction and funded by Cancer Research UK, looked at survey data between 2016 and 2024. It found that the proportion of people both smoking and vaping rose from 3.5% (about one in 30) to 5.2% (about one in 20) during this period, with a sharp rise from 2021, when disposable e-cigarettes first became popular.

Calorie labelling of food on menus and products leads people to choose slightly fewer calories finds a new Cochrane review co-led by UCL researchers.

A psychedelic drug is being tested as a novel way to reduce problematic alcohol consumption, in an ongoing study led by UCL researchers.

The European Space Agency's Milky Way-mapping space mission Gaia, which involves UCL researchers, has completed its sky-scanning phase, racking up more than three trillion observations of two billion stars and other objects over a decade to revolutionise our view of the galaxy.

Rapid change seen in the Formby squirrels' jaws following the removal of supplementary peanuts may have implications for the conservation of red squirrels and other species argues Dr Philip Cox (UCL Biosciences) in The Conversation.

Professor Carla Figueira De Morisson Faria (UCL Physics & Astronomy) writes in The Conversation about how research into incredibly short laser pulses can have wide ranging impacts across a range of technologies.