How can I trust that my information will be safe? That’s the question I hear as a young Black doctor working in clinical research when I speak to Black African and Caribbean communities about joining genetic studies. You don’t have to search far to find mistrust – or the reasons for it. Take the infamous…
Ryan Wills for New Scientist/Adobe Stock Rushing to get to work in the morning, we grab our coat, bag and keys and – invariably – steal a glance at the clock to check that we are running on time. The passing of time is so integral to our day-to-day lives that we can’t afford to…
The dark matter distribution observed by the Hubble Space Telescope (left) and by the James Webb Space Telescope (right) Dr Gavin Leroy/Professor Richard Massey/COSMOS-Webb collaboration Scientists have created the best ever map of dark matter using subtle distortions in the shape of about 250,000 galaxies. It could help us understand some of the biggest mysteries…
Menstrual pads can non-invasively collect information on a woman’s fertility Shutterstock/Connect world An at-home test built into a menstrual pad could help women track their fertility using their period blood, offering a non-invasive way to monitor changes over time, without the need for repeated blood tests or clinic visits. For many women, their fertility remains…
The possible game board with pencil marks highlighting the incised lines Het Romeins Museum A mysterious flat stone with a geometric pattern of straight lines carved into it may be a previously unknown Roman board game. Thousands of simulations by artificial intelligence of how sliding stone or glass pieces could have marked the surface suggest…
Objects are full of electrons that can interact to cause friction Quality Stock/Alamy Parts of devices that are perfectly smooth can still experience friction because of the electrons within them, but a new method may enable researchers to turn it down or fully turn it off. Controlling this electronic friction could help build more efficient…
I was so excited for my first job after university that even the physical assessment – required for my work as a field geologist – came with a certain thrill. That was until the doctor glanced at my chart and told me to lose 10 to 15 pounds. The proof, he said, was my body…
Gut bacteria that we barely know anything about may be essential for good health 3DMEDISPHERE/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY A mysterious group of bacteria seems to thrive in the gut microbiomes of people without illness, hinting that they may be crucial to good health. More than 4600 species of bacteria are estimated to reside in our gut,…
Artist’s impression of a black hole collision that produced GW250114 A. Simonnet/Sonoma State University; LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration; University of Rhode Island The loudest collision ever recorded between two black holes has allowed scientists to test Einstein’s theory of general relativity in unprecedented detail, showing that the physicist’s predictions were once again correct. In 2025, an international…
Mathematician Paul Erdős (left) and actor Jeff Goldblum have an uncanny resemblance Public Domain; Matt Baron/BEI/Shutterstock I come to you with something a little different for my latest maths column – a plea to Hollywood to make a comedy biopic about one of the greatest mathematicians of all time, Paul Erdős. Why is Erdős (pronounced…
