Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome (HGPS) is a rare genetic disorder that causes children to show signs of accelerated aging. Those affected often develop early skin wrinkling, loss of skin elasticity, reduced body fat, hair loss, hardened arteries, and insulin resistance. Scientists have found that about 90% of HGPS cases result from a defective protein known as…
Molecular biologist James Watson helped reveal DNA’s hidden shape Everett Collection Historical / Alamy Stock Photo James Watson, one of the discoverers of the structure of DNA, has died in a New York hospice facility at the age of 97. Along with fellow researchers Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins, he won the 1962 Nobel Prize…
Nobel Prize-winning American scientist James Watson has died aged 97. His co-discovery of the structure of DNA opened the door to help explain how DNA replicates and carries genetic information, setting the stage for rapid advances in molecular biology. But his honorary titles were stripped in 2019 after he repeated comments about race and intelligence….
Getty Images In February 1953, two men walked into a pub in Cambridge and announced they had found “the secret of life”. It was not an idle boast. One was James Watson, an American biologist from the Cavendish laboratory; the other was his British research partner, Francis Crick. Their discovery – of the structure and…
Plumes of ice particles, water vapour and organic molecules spray from Enceladus’s south polar region NASA/JPL-Caltech The liquid water ocean hidden underneath the icy crust of Enceladus has long made this moon of Saturn one of the best prospects in the hunt for extraterrestrial life – and it just got even more promising. The discovery…
Simulation of the large scale structure of a galaxy cluster Illustris Collaboration/ESO The cosmic web is killing a galaxy. Galaxies can only continue to form stars when they are full of gas, and one dwarf galaxy nearly 100 million light years away is being stripped of its stellar fuel by the enormous web of matter…
An international group of researchers led by the University of Oxford has achieved a world-first by generating plasma “fireballs” with the Super Proton Synchrotron accelerator at CERN in Geneva. Their goal was to investigate how plasma jets from distant blazars remain stable as they travel through space. The team’s results, published on November 3 in…
It’s bad luck for those living on Adjumir, which is set to be obliterated DETLEV VAN RAVENSWAAY/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY Slow GodsClaire North, Orbit Claire North is a successful and prolific novelist, writing under three separate names, but this is their first shift into classic science fiction, i.e. a novel with spaceships in it. I loved…
The Universe’s most massive stars typically end their lives in spectacular explosions known as supernovae before collapsing into black holes. But one enormous star seems to have met a very different fate. Instead of exploding, it strayed too close to an immense black hole, which tore it apart and consumed it piece by piece. That…
An intricate mechanical model created in 1775 to capture the explosive beauty of Italy’s Mount Vesuvius has erupted to life for the very first time, 250 years after it was first imagined. The recreation was made possible through modern engineering and the creative problem-solving of two University of Melbourne students. The idea originated with Sir…
