Generative AI might be a powerful tool in making research more accessible for scientists and the broader public alike.Credit: Getty Thinking back to the early days of her PhD programme, Esther Osarfo-Mensah recalls struggling to keep up with the literature. “Sometimes, the wording or the way the information is presented actually makes it quite a … Read more
China wants to use and manufacture more of its own medical equipment.Credit: VCG via Getty Images As a sinology student in the early 1990s at Nanjing University, Elisabeth Staudinger “got a flavour of what health care felt like for the people in China”. As part of her studies, she had to venture more than 2,000 … Read more
Michel Talagrand studies stochastic processes, mathematical models of phenomena that are governed by randomness.Credit: Peter Bagde/Typos1/Abel Prize 2024 A mathematician who developed formulas to make random processes more predictable, and helped to solve an iconic model of complex phenomena, has won the 2024 Abel Prize, one of the field’s most coveted awards. Michel Talagrand received … Read more
One in four Black men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer.Credit: Getty Olugbenga Samuel Oyeniyi’s research at the University of Sunderland, UK, explores why many Black men do not seek help for symptoms of prostate cancer and uses Black peer educators to change mindsets in the community. March is Prostate Cancer Awareness Month in the … Read more
Researchers are investigating plutonium traces in the sediment of Crawford Lake in Canada as a marker for the start of the Anthropocene.Credit: Peter Power/AFP/Getty For 15 years, geologists have been involved in a complicated technical process to determine whether human impacts on Earth systems amount to a new geological epoch. Earlier this month, 12 members … Read more
Since the 1950s, scientists have had a pretty good idea of how muscles work. The protein at the centre of the action is myosin, a molecular motor that ratchets itself along rope-like strands of actin proteins — grasping, pulling, releasing and grasping again — to make muscle cells contract. The basics were first explained in … Read more
The Perseverance rover drills a rock core from the edge of the ancient river delta in Jezero Crater on Mars.Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech The Woodlands, Texas Scientists are on edge as they wait for NASA to answer two of the most consequential questions in Mars exploration. Where on the red planet will the Perseverance rover collect its … Read more
Lise Korsten (left) and Peggy Oti-Boateng are steering the African Academy of Sciences’ new strategy.Credit: AAS Kenya “We have a renewed mission,” the executive director of the African Academy of Sciences (AAS), Peggy Oti-Boateng, proudly declared at the launch of the academy’s strategic plan on 29 February. “In our previous mission, we were leveraging our … Read more
Antibodies (pink) bind to influenza virus proteins (yellow) (artist’s conception).Credit: Juan Gaertner/Science Photo Library Researchers have used generative artificial intelligence (AI) to help them make completely new antibodies for the first time. The proof-of-principle work, reported this week in a preprint on bioRxiv1, raises the possibility of bringing AI-guided protein design to the therapeutic antibody … Read more
Hello Nature readers, would you like to get this Briefing in your inbox free every day? Sign up here. Avian flu has been detected sub-Antarctic king penguins.Credit: Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Some researchers in Antarctica are halting work after the global spread of deadly H5N1 avian influenza finally reached the continent. Bird flu … Read more