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Daniel Lawler AFP

'Oh, gosh': Inside the race to test for cruise ship hantavirus

'Oh, gosh': Inside the race to test for cruise ship hantavirus

It was the start of a long weekend in South Africa on Friday when Lucille Blumberg received an email from a fellow infectious disease specialist about an unknown illness on a cruise ship. She would go on to play an instrumental role in getting samples from people who had been

Mysterious world beyond Pluto may have an atmosphere: astronomers

Mysterious world beyond Pluto may have an atmosphere: astronomers

A tiny, little-known world beyond Pluto appears to have an atmosphere, Japanese astronomers said Monday, defying what had been thought possible for icy objects in our cosmic backyard. If confirmed, the roughly 500-kilometre-wide (310-mile) rock would become just the second world past Neptune in our Solar

Rover discovers more building blocks of life on Mars

Rover discovers more building blocks of life on Mars

A NASA rover has discovered more building blocks of life on Mars after carrying out a chemistry experiment never before conducted on another planet, scientists said Tuesday. The organic molecules are not definitive evidence of past life, the NASA-led team emphasised, because they could also have formed on the

Much-hyped Alzheimer's drugs do not help patients, review finds

Much-hyped Alzheimer's drugs do not help patients, review finds

Drugs once hailed as a breakthrough in the fight against Alzheimer's disease do not meaningfully help patients, a major review found Thursday, however some experts criticised the research. The review by the Cochrane organisation -- which is considered the gold standard for analysing existing evidence -- looked at drugs that

Norwegian effectively cured of HIV after transplant from brother

Norwegian effectively cured of HIV after transplant from brother

A Norwegian man has been effectively cured of HIV after receiving a stem cell transplant from his brother, doctors announced on Monday. The patient's brother happened to carry a rare, virus-blocking genetic mutation. The 63-year-old man, dubbed the "Oslo patient", is the latest

Lost in space: Sperm struggles to navigate during weightless sex

Lost in space: Sperm struggles to navigate during weightless sex

Scientists have used a tiny plastic "obstacle course" to test how much sperm would struggle to navigate during sex in the weightlessness of space. Some particularly resilient sperm still made it through the course, suggesting that conceiving children in space will still be possible, according to research published

Mammals cannot be cloned infinitely, mice study discovers

Mammals cannot be cloned infinitely, mice study discovers

There is a limit on how many times a mammal can be cloned before suffering "mutational meltdown", Japanese scientists have discovered, after making 1,200 clones over two decades that started off with a single mouse. The 58th generation of mice did not survive, establishing for the first