Healthy baby born to woman who was given naturally occurring hormone kisspeptin to stimulate egg productionThe first baby in the world to be born to a woman who was given a naturally occurring hormone to stimulate egg production instead of the usual fertility drugs could herald a safer era of IVF treatment, scientists believe.The baby,…
Falling ill is a very common occurrence. Luckily for most it is a short-term, self-limited thing. But exactly what you're meant to do about it or how you're meant to behave are more complicated concerns in modern timesI've been ill lately. I used to rarely get ill, probably because of my job embalming cadavers for…
US policymakers love discussing it, but the debate on food aid reform is getting tedious. Emergency interventions will always be necessary, but it is time to shift our focus to long-term solutionsSince the global food price spikes of 2008-09 and the widespread riots that ensued, the world has begun to pay more attention to food…
For every 'designer drug' the authorities ban, clandestine labs are churning out a new version. No wonder the law can't keep up…The term "designer drug" became popular with the acid house and ecstasy boom in the 1990s, but it was never really accurate. The main ingredient in ecstasy pills – MDMA – was first synthesised…
Bertolt Meyer's amazing bionic hand controlled by an iPhone app is a glimpse of the advances being made in prosthetics. But in years to come, will everyone want one?Bertolt Meyer is used to being viewed as not fully human. Born with a stump where his left hand should have been, he spent his childhood wearing…
Festival curator Pat Kane explains the thinking behind the event and what visitors can expect to see and hearThe idea of a "festival of the future" has an interesting history. Go back to the Great Exhibition of 1851, and alongside the giant Koh-i-Noor diamond and mountains of impressive imperial produce, you find some intriguing harbingers…
'For those of you without an anxiety disorder, what it feels like is someone is inside your face, sandpapering your nerves'Dr Robert Leahy whistles doubtfully when I tell him about the 5:2 experiment. "Is it possible to stop, or drastically cut down, the amount I worry two days a week, while carrying on as normal the other…
We are seeing a dramatic shift in favour of drug decriminalisation and unlocking the therapeutic potential of psychedelicsThe past two months have been an incredibly busy and productive time for global drug policy reform and scientific research into psychedelic drugs. Never in my 15 years as director of the Beckley Foundation have I seen such…
Prof Rama Singh warns that Michael Douglas and Rod Stewart wannabes have stacked the Darwinian deck of cards against older women remaining fertileMen who behave like Michael Douglas, Rod Stewart and Ronnie Wood are to blame for women ending their reproductive life early, according to a new theory. All three celebrities are famous for wooing…
Ethics: the questions posed by our bionic bodies | Observer editorial
Science is sending us towards a posthuman future. We need to decide if that's where we should be goingIn the cult 1970s television show, The Six Million Dollar Man, astronaut Steve Austin (Lee Majors) is shown crash-landing on Earth, then being whisked into an operating theatre. "Gentleman, we have the capability to make the world's…
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