Medics celebrate success 'beyond our wildest dreams' on haemophilia
British medics say they have achieved results “beyond our wildest dreams” in efforts to treat the most serious form of haemophilia.
05/01/2020 Telegraph
2020
Best News of 2020
Despite the ongoing pandemic good things happen every month. Hence in the tradition of the year in review we like to remind you of three randomly selected news articles of each month.
January
February
Bring biodiversity back to your garden to help save the planet
The disastrous drop in insect numbers is not inevitable – each of us can help them to thrive
29/02/2020 The Independent
March
The ozone layer is healing and redirecting wind flows around the globe
The hole in the ozone layer is starting to recover thanks to regulations banning ozone-depleting substances, and this is now leading to changes in Earth’s atmosphere
25/03/2020 NewScientist
Stopping the rot: the fight to save fresh food
Ten years ago, James Rogers was driving through some of the most productive farmland on the planet, thinking about food.
15/03/2020 The Guardian
‘No-waste’ Japanese village is a peek into carbon-neutral future
The residents of a remote village on the Japanese island of Shikoku have spent almost two decades reusing, recycling and reducing, united behind a mission to end their dependence on incinerators and landfill as the world struggles to tackle the…
20/03/2020 The Guardian
April
GMOs Could be a Key to Sustainable Farming
If we want to feed a growing population without fueling global warming, we need to redefine what we think of as good food.
01/04/2020 Wired
Psychedelic mushrooms for depression: "This is the one that changed things"
Psychedelic drugs like psilocybin are back in human trials to treat people with mental health conditions. It's a second revolution for a class of drugs shunned by 1960s society. But more research is needed. Here's why.
24/04/2020 Deutsche Welle
May
NASA Names Dark Energy Telescope for Nancy Grace Roman
Dr. Roman was a pioneer at NASA, joining the agency in its early days and becoming its first chief astronomer.
20/05/2020 New York Times
June
Three people with inherited diseases successfully treated with CRISPR
Two people with beta thalassaemia and one with sickle cell disease no longer need blood transfusions after their blood stem cells were gene edited and put back in their bodies
12/06/2020 NewScientist
The Swedish Startup Cutting Down on Methane Emissions by Curbing Cow Burps
When people think environmentally damaging emissions, their minds often conjures up images of automobiles and smoke belching factories. However, a much more literal type of belching also has a major impact - the burps of cows.
03/06/2020 Reset.org
'Food will be a by-product': the Irish farmers creating nature-friendly fields
Michael Davoren shudders when he thinks of the 1990s. He’d been in charge of his 80-hectare farm in the Burren, Co Clare, since the 1970s, and the place was in his blood. The Davorens had worked these hills for 400 years.
06/06/2020 The Guardian
July
How Harvard’s Star Computer-Science Professor Built a Distance-Learning Empire
Eren Orbey on how Harvard’s David Malan has worked to perfect online teaching, and what lessons his introductory course, CS50, might hold for the future of higher education, both during and after the coronavirus pandemic.
21/07/2020 The New Yorker
The UAE has successfully launched the Arab world's first Mars mission
The United Arab Emirates successfully launched its Mars-bound Hope Probe on Sunday, marking the the Arab world's first interplanetary mission -- and the first of three international missions to the Red Planet this summer.
20/07/2020 CNN
August
Robot boat completes three-week Atlantic mission
A UK uncrewed ocean-going vessel provides a glimpse of the future of robotic maritime operations.
14/08/2020 BBC
September
Robots and magnetic soap: scientists rethink oil spill clean-ups
Special sponges, magnetic soap and autonomous robots are among the latest wave of inventions aimed at tackling oil spills.
29/09/2020 The Guardian
The Ocean Farmers Trying to Save the World With Seaweed
In a cove in Bamfield, a coastal community in British Columbia, Canada, Louis Druehl steers his boat, The Kelp Express, a mile along the mountainous coastline. For 51 years, this boat has taken Druehl to the fortuitously named Kelp Bay where beneath…
04/09/2020 Time Magazine
October
SkyTruth: Using the Power of Satellites to Hold Oil, Fracking and Fishing Companies to Account
With a focus on oil spills, natural gas fracking and illegal fishing networks, SkyTruth’s work empowers NGOs and members of the public to become watchdogs with a bird’s eye view.
26/10/2020 Reset.org
The maps that show life is getting better
Maps are not just informative, they are empowering. They can help provide a new perspective to age-old problems. But maps are not necessarily fixed – they often need renewing. As Albert Einstein said, “You can’t use old maps to explore a new…
17/10/2020 The Guardian
November
UK’s first robot delivery vehicle completes landmark journey in London
Transporting medical supplies from pharmacy to care home shows how driverless vehicles could become common sight on UK streets
10/11/2020 The Independent
The Xenobot Future Is Coming—Start Planning Now
We're on the cusp of being able to program biological systems like we program computers. That raises some thorny questions.
04/11/2020 Wired
It's only fake-believe: how to deal with a conspiracy theorist
Unless you’ve been on a silent retreat for the past year, you will have almost certainly heard the rumours – that the pandemic is an elaborate hoax, or that the virus was created as a Chinese weapon, or that dangerous elites are trying to kill off…
29/11/2020 The Guardian
December
‘I was in prison at 20 - and a music executive by 28’
As he faced jail, the life Niyah Smith had once dreamed of looked impossible. But then came a chance to turn his fortunes around.
13/12/2020 BBC
Experimental brain implants in monkeys offer hope for restoring vision in blind people
Scientists are a step closer to restoring the sight of blind people using brain implants, researchers from the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience said, after a series of successful experiments on monkeys.
03/12/2020 CNN
