Bianca Nogrady

‘You mean there’s nothing?’ The families fighting for their children with dementia

June 29, 2023No Comments

From the Guardian, 15 May 2023: In many ways, Ronin and Ethan are typical young boys. They love Hot Wheels toy cars, Shaun the Sheep, rude noises and pizza nights. Nine-year-old Ethan dotes on the family pets. Ronin, seven, is always booting a soccer ball around the back yard. “They’re two absolutely lovable friendly kids, … Continue reading ‘You mean there’s nothing?’ The families fighting for their children with dementia

Ocean Currents Are Slowing, With Potentially Devastating Effects

June 29, 2023No Comments

From WIRED, 8 June 2023: IN THE CRUSHING, cold depths of the oceans, something unimaginably huge flows inexorably, barely a few centimeters per second, along a path it has traveled for millennia. Dense, dark rivers of water toil ceaselessly around the world, making up around 40 percent of the total volume of the deep oceans. … Continue reading Ocean Currents Are Slowing, With Potentially Devastating Effects

The Planet Can’t Sustain Rapid Growth Much Longer

May 23, 2023No Comments

From WIRED, 22 May 2023: Half a century ago, a small group of esteemed thinkers that called itself the Club of Rome got together to chew over a thorny question: What would happen if humanity continued to consume the world’s finite resources as if they were limitless? Their efforts generated the now-famous 1972 paper “The … Continue reading The Planet Can’t Sustain Rapid Growth Much Longer

‘Hollywood skinny jab’: what do we know about anti-obesity drugs such as Ozempic in Australia?

May 23, 2023No Comments

From the Guardian, 8 April 2023: Dr Kathryn Williams has had patients cry when they go on anti-obesity drugs. “[They] say, ‘oh my God, this is the first time I haven’t felt hungry,’” says Williams, an endocrinologist at the University of Sydney, “because hunger is just something they have to live with every single day.” … Continue reading ‘Hollywood skinny jab’: what do we know about anti-obesity drugs such as Ozempic in Australia?

Australia bans all vapes except on prescription to stem use in children

May 5, 2023No Comments

From the BMJ, 4 May 2023: The importation and sale of all e-cigarettes, regardless of whether they are labelled as containing nicotine or not, will soon be banned in Australia, unless they are supplied by prescription through a licensed pharmacist. The crackdown by the Australian government was announced amid concerns that a growing black market … Continue reading Australia bans all vapes except on prescription to stem use in children

Forget cars, green hydrogen will supercharge crops

May 5, 2023No Comments

From WIRED UK, 24 April 2023: In the dry, red dust of Western Australia’s vast Pilbara region, something green is growing. In October 2022, construction began on a massive solar photovoltaic and battery installation, around 40 soccer fields in size, that will soon power a 10-megawatt electrolyzer—a machine that uses electricity to convert water into … Continue reading Forget cars, green hydrogen will supercharge crops

Enzyme loss linked to age related muscle wasting

May 5, 2023No Comments

From Nature Middle East, 22 March 2023: Deficiency of an enzyme vital for the integrity of the membranes that encase muscle fibres is behind age-related muscle wasting and an inherited genetic disorder that causes severe neurological and muscle problems, researchers have found.In humans, genetic mutations affecting the function of the enzyme phosphatidylethanolamine cytidyltransferase (PCYT2) lead … Continue reading Enzyme loss linked to age related muscle wasting

The plain truth about North America’s horse history

May 5, 2023No Comments

From Nature Middle East, 6 April 2023: Horses have long held a special place in the culture, spirituality and day-to-day lives of North America’s Indigenous people, such as the Lakota and Comanche of the American southwest and Great Plains.Until recently, horses were thought to have been introduced to North America by European colonisers. Now, an … Continue reading The plain truth about North America’s horse history

Climate freeloaders are destroying the planet

March 24, 2023No Comments

From WIRED UK, 23 March 2023: Alaska isn’t supposed to be an inferno—but its summers are now so warm that apocalyptic wildfires are almost inevitable. In June 2022, lightning strikes set the drought-stricken land ablaze, winds whipped up flames, and long curtains of fire soon ripped through previously untouched tundra, pushing plumes of thick smoke … Continue reading Climate freeloaders are destroying the planet

What now?

March 6, 2023March 6, 2023No Comments

I’ve just listened to the first Longform podcast interview with legendary science journalist Ed Yong, which took place in the first weeks of the pandemic in New York, when the honks and rumbles of ordinary traffic had been replaced by the banshee wails of sirens, and temporary morgues were being set up in New York’s … Continue reading What now?