The COVID-19 pandemic and the global response to it reversed some of the most important indicators of human wellbeing, but the upward march of human progress largely resumed in 2023. Consequently, it was of great interest to see if these positive trends continued in 2024. On the plus side, the world’s population is now richer and longer living than ever before. However, trends in violence and autocratic governance have continued to rise from their post-New Millennium lows.

According to the United Nations, the average global life expectancy in 2019 was 72.6 years. It dropped to 70.9 years during the pandemic before climbing to an all-time high of 73.3 years in 2024. The average real, which is to say inflation-adjusted, global gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in 2019 came to $10,946. That fell to $10,454 in 2020. In 2023, it stood at an all-time high of $11,579. The global absolute poverty rate, measured as the share of the world’s population living on less than $2.15 in purchasing power parity-adjusted 2017 dollars, stood at 8.8 percent in 2019 and climbed to 9.7 percent in 2020. The latest estimates from the World Bank put that rate at 8.5 percent in 2024 – an all-time low.

Last year was also the biggest election year in history. Approximately half of the world’s population went to the polls in 74 countries and voted out 32 percent of incumbents. On the downside, “71 percent of the world’s population now live in autocracies – an increase from 48 percent ten years ago.” Most tragically, there was a 25 percent increase in political violence over the last 12 months, with conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and Burma responsible for many of the 233,000 recorded deaths. The bottom line: life continues to improve for many, but (regrettably) not all.

Your favorite team at HumanProgress.org had a busy and productive year. Marian L. Tupy delivered several talks and partook in numerous discussions. Those included: the Festival de las Ideas in Puebla, Mexico; el Fundación Rafael del Pino in Madrid, Spain; the Cato Institute’s conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina; the Freedom Games in Lodz, Poland; and the first-ever Human Progress gathering in Berkeley, California. He has published an essay defending globalization and co-published, with Dr. Gale L. Pooley, the 2024 edition of the Simon Abundance Index. His video with John Stossel, which was shared by Elon Musk, was seen by 60 million people. He intends to start working on a new book in 2025.

Chelsea Follett was hard at work on her second book – you can browse excerpts from some of the books comprising her background research at the Grim Old Days project page – and recording podcasts. She also continued to promote her book Centers of Progress on podcasts and through in-person events, including multiple presentations in Poland. In 2024, she and her husband also welcomed their third child. In 2025, Chelsea plans to complete a draft of Grim Old Days: An Introduction to the Pre-Industrial Past and publish a new edition of the Inequality of Human Progress Index, which she co-authors with George Mason University’s Vincent Geloso.

Malcolm Cochran continued to manage our online presence. This year, under his oversight, our follower base grew by 15 thousand, and our content was seen over 25 million times. He also transitioned our newsletter to Substack, where you can now subscribe to and read our work. Part of Malcolm’s duties include collecting news items that document human progress, 1,066 of which you can browse in his annual news roundup.

Saul Zimet has deployed new AI tools across our website. AI-generated videos now make blog posts more dynamic, and an AI avatar of Chelsea Follett, which clones both her voice and appearance, can be seen discussing her Grim Old Days project and other writings in videos on our social media accounts. Saul has also implemented new features to improve search engine optimization and accessibility across HumanProgress.org, including blog-post summaries at the top of each post and alt text for images.

Finally, we are expanding. In 2025, HumanProgress.org will add three new positions. First, a Research Assistant to help us consolidate, expand, and update our database. Second, an economist to help us analyze and address common criticisms of human progress, including environmental degradation, inequality, materialism and consumerism, the ambiguous or harmful nature of technological advances, the loss of meaningful work and skills, atomization, and alienation. Third, a psychologist to help us investigate the potentially negative psychological impacts of progress, including the rise in anxiety and crisis of meaning in wealthy countries, as well as those aspects of human psychology that hinder widespread acknowledgment of real, measurable progress.

May you have a healthy, happy, prosperous, and peaceful 2025.

Psychologists think that our demeanors are contagious: being around anxious, pessimistic people causes our own moods to tank. Bad news creates a similar phenomenon, with one negative story coloring our perception of other, unrelated events. Good news and cheerful company can have the opposite effect, but the overall battle is tilted toward negativity. As our editor writes, paraphrasing the Harvard University psychologist Steven Pinker:

Ask yourself, how much happier can you imagine yourself feeling? And again, how much more miserable can you imagine yourself to feel? The answer to the latter question is: infinitely. Psychological literature shows that people fear losses more than they look forward to gains; dwell on setbacks more than relishing successes; resent criticism more than being encouraged by praise.

The media amplifies these tendencies. Thanks to humanity’s evolution, which prioritized threats over all other considerations, negative headlines get more clicks—surely one reason why floundering news outlets are producing more and more of them.

It doesn’t help that most good news is not news at all. Everyone knows that thousands of pilots land safely every day, but the next dramatic plane crash will shock us and command our attention. Ironically, progress contributes to this aspect of our negativity bias. Bad things—like disaster deaths, racial intolerance, and, of course, airline accidents—have become more interesting precisely because they have become more unusual.

All this means that, while rational optimism about the world is the more realistic viewpoint to hold, maintaining such a perspective is a constant, uphill struggle. Below is our latest contribution to that valuable endeavor: a list of all the good news we could round up in 2024. And it’s not saccharine stuff, but meaty feats of human ingenuity, heartening trends, and plain good luck. Read and feel your spirits rise!

Agriculture

Farming AI, robots, and drones

1. New Robot Harvests Cotton by Plucking It Like a Lizard’s Tongue
2. AI Spotting Sick Tulips to Reduce Disease in Dutch Bulb Fields
3. Drones and Robots Could Replace Some Field Workers
4. Farmer’s One of First to Use AI Driverless Tractors
5. Rice Farming Gets an AI Upgrade
6. Drones and Driverless Tractors Usher in New Age of Farming
7. AI Could Conquer the Superweeds
8. AI-Powered Weed-Killing Robots Threaten a $37 Billion Market
9. The Kenyan Farmers Deploying AI to Increase Productivity
10. Crop-Spraying Robot Is Designed to Reduce Emissions

Food abundance

11. Coal-Based Feed Uses 1/1000th as Much Land as Farming
12. AI Will Mean Cheaper Food
13. Southern Brazil Reaps Record Soy to Offset Center-West Crop Failure
14. Share of Children Facing Severe Food Poverty Falls in Nigeria
15. Global Food Production Reaching Record Highs
16. Good News from the World’s Farms
17. The “Superfood” Taking over Fields in Northern India
18. Have Swiss Scientists Made a Chocolate Breakthrough?
19. India’s Average Household Food Spending Falls Dramatically
20. More Beef Is Now Farmed with Fewer Cows on Less Land
21. Vegetables Grew Faster than Population over the Last 60 Years

Genetic engineering

22. New Coffee Genetic Map Promises Better Brews
23. Scientists Fine-Tune Iodine and Potassium Levels in Veggies
24. Introducing Meat–Rice: Grain With Added Muscles for Protein
25. Genetically Modified Banana Approved by Regulators
26. Gene-Edited Virus-Resistant Pigs Trot Toward Market
27. Origin Agritech Reveals Corn Yield Breakthrough
28. Rejoice! You Are Living in the Golden Age of Fruit
29. Scientists’ ‘Super Banana’ Could Save Thousands of Lives
30. Company Gets Green Light for GMO Non-browning Apple
31. Genetic Gains Underpinning a Strawberry Green Revolution
32. Why America’s Berries Have Never Tasted So Good
33. In Search of a Healthier Spud
34. Biotech Wants Vegetarians to Eat Its Peas Spliced with Beef DNA
35. Gene-Editing Will Help Us Cope with Climate Change
36. CRISPR Builds a Big Tomato That’s Actually Sweet
37. How Big Data Created the Modern Dairy Cow
38. AI Supercharging Crop Breeding to Protect Farmers from Climate

Pest control

39. Gene Drives May Combat Devastating Screwworms
40. A Seed Treatment to Transform the Agrochemical Market
41. “Murder Hornets” Eradicated in the US, Agriculture Officials Say

Lab-grown produce

42. Israeli Company to Make World’s First Cultivated Beef Steaks
43. From Lab to Plate: No-Kill Dim Sum and Steak Frites
44. Finnish Startup Begins Making Food “From Air and Solar Power”
45. Researchers Find Way to Enhance Taste of Lab-Grown Meat
46. Britain Is First Country in Europe to Approve Lab-Grown Meat
47. Solar Foods Obtains Self-Affirmed GRAS Status for Solein in the United States

Pollination

48. Wait, Does America Suddenly Have a Record Number of Bees?
49. Bee Colonies: Worldwide Population on the Rise

Conservation and Biodiversity

Cats

50. Sighting of Tiger and Cubs Raises Hopes for Species in Thailand
51. Images Raise Hopes of Return of Wild Jaguars to the US
52. Indian Cheetah Family Grows: Kuno Welcomes Five New Cubs
53. Wild Lynx in Spain Is Almost Free of Risk of Extinction
54. One of World’s Rarest Cats No Longer Endangered
55. Wildcats Born outside Captivity in Cairngorms a “Major Milestone”
56. Thai Tiger Numbers Swell as Prey Populations Stabilize
57. Tiger Population Census in Bangladesh Shows Upward Trend

Birds

58. Architects Want to Save Birds from Death by Buildings
59. Kiwi Birds Born in New Zealand’s Capital for First Time in Over a Century
60. The Ulūlu Is No Longer Listed as Critically Endangered
61. How AI Is Helping Us Learn about Birds
62. The Guam Kingfisher Could Soon Return to the Wild
63. AI Analyses Bird Sounds for Somerset Conservation Project
64. Population of UK’s Tallest Bird Hits Record-Breaking High
65. Finches Reintroduced to Galapagos Islands
66. Bearded Vultures Continue Comeback in Southeast France
67. The Incredible Comeback of Britain’s Barn Owls
68. Record Cinereous and Griffon Vulture Pairs Observed in Bulgaria
69. The British Birds Saved from the Brink of Extinction
70. Rare Birds Return Home Due to Unique Conservation Efforts
71. Conservationists Spot Eagle Species after 500-Year Absence
72. The Resurgence of the Florida Grasshopper Sparrow
73. Record Number of Breeding Puffins on Island in Gulf of Maine
74. New Zealand Rushes Vaccination of Endangered Birds
75. This Bird Species Was Extinct in Europe. Now It’s Back
76. Habitat Restoration Leads to Black Grouse Population Increase
77. Hope for North America’s Most Endangered Bird
78. First White-Tailed Eagles Breed in 150 Years
79. “Extinct” Guam Kingfisher Takes Flight Again After Nearly 40 Years
80. Rare Birds Discovered in Western Australia Desert
81. Northern Bald Ibis: Back from the Brink
82. A Wasp Helps Save One of World’s Rarest Birds from Extinction
83. Red-Cockaded Woodpeckers Recover in Southeast US
84. Indian Experts Hail Breakthrough in Bid to Save Huge Native Bird
85. Hawaiian Crows Return to Wild for First Time in More than 20 Years

Turtles

86. In Bangladesh, Olive Ridley Turtles Have Huge Egg Increase
87. The Seagrass Species That Is Not So Slowly Taking over the World
88. After Water Quality Improves, Sea Turtles in Brazil Get Healthier
89. Sea Turtle Nests in Greece Reach Record Numbers
90. Sea Turtles Aren’t Vanishing. In Fact They’re Thriving

Whales

91. A Surprising Success Story for Humpback Whales
92. Scientists Confirm Cetacean’s Presence off New England
93. Gray Whale Die-off Is Officially Declared Over
94. Listen to World’s First “Chat” between Humans and Whales
95. Researchers Hear Whale Songs That Hint at Antarctic Resurgence
96. Scientists Are Learning the Basics of Sperm Whale Language
97. Fin Whales Making Strong Comeback in the Southern Ocean
98. A Whale Makes a Comeback 100 Years after Vanishing
99. Large Number of Whale Sightings off New England
100. The Sperm Whale ‘Phonetic Alphabet’ Revealed by AI
101. North Atlantic Right Whale Seen off Ireland for First Time in 114 Years
102. Canada Authorities Find Narwhals No Longer at Risk
103. Humpback Whales Increasing in Icelandic Waters
104. Whales Are Doing So Well They No Longer Need The International Whaling Commission, Says Former Head
105. Recognizing Whale Vocalizations with AI

Other comebacks

106. African Elephant Populations Stabilise in Southern Heartlands
107. Seagrass Resurgence Offers Hope for Florida’s Manatees
108. Scimitar-Horned Oryx Brought Back from Extinction
109. Coyotes Stage Comeback in Florida
110. Rethinking Monarchs: Does the Beloved Butterfly Need Our Help?
111. Wild Panda Population Nearly Doubles
112. Florida Manatees Rebound to Record-Breaking Winter Numbers
113. From Edge of Extinction to Australia’s Croc “Paradise”
114. Mexican Gray Wolves Boost Their Numbers
115. Giant Redwoods: World’s Largest Trees “Thriving in UK”
116. Near-Extinct Crocodiles Make Comeback in Cambodia
117. Numbers of Rare Sticky Plant Triple in Scottish Hills
118. Good News for Some Threatened Species in Australia
119. Gray Wolves Making Historic Comeback in California
120. Southern Bluefin Tuna Delisted as a Threatened Species
121. India’s One-Horned Rhino Numbers Charging Ahead
122. Gorilla Population Recovery in Rwanda
123. “Green-Listed” Scimitar Oryx Bounces Back
124. Endangered Sierra Nevada Yellow-Legged Frogs Are Making a Comeback

Forests

125. In Brazil, Drones Take Flight in Rio in High-Tech Reforestation Push
126. The World’s Forests Are Doing Much Better than We Think
127. Pakistan Bucks Global Trend with 30-Year Mangrove Expansion
128. India’s Forest Cover Has Increased Consistently over Last 15 Years
129. Uzbekistan Plants a Forest Where a Sea Once Lay
130. Colombia Deforestation Fell to 23-Year Low in 2023
131. Things Are Looking up for Africa’s Upside-down Baobab Trees
132. China’s Desertified Land Shrinks by 4.3 Million Hectares Since 2012
133. China Completes Huge Green Belt Around Its Biggest Desert
134. Cutting-Edge Tech Is Guiding Nature Restoration in UK Forests

Reefs

135. Largest Deep-Sea Coral Reef to Date Is Mapped by Scientists
136. Mapping Corals Reveals More Reefs Than Previously Known
137. How Much Sediment Is Supplied to Coral Islands From the Reef System?
138. A Reef in Cambodia That Filled Scientists with Hope
139. The Australian Oyster Reef Revival
140. New Method Can Help Grow Coral Larvae
141. Could a Multivitamin Help Save Coral Reefs?

Rivers and lakes

142. These Robot Boats Are Cleaning up Asia’s Waterways
143. Han River Shows Recovery After Seoul’s Restoration Initiatives
144. An Endangered Bird Arrival Shows What’s Possible for the LA River

Surveillance and discovery

145. Scientists Photograph Never-Before-Seen Deep Sea Species
146. Scientists Discover 100 New Marine Species in New Zealand
147. Longest Creature Ever Seen Found on Undersea Peaks off South America
148. Meet Two “Lost” Species Rediscovered 50+ Years Later
149. Giant Pangolin Spotted in Senegal after Nearly 24 Years
150. New Tech Aims to Keep Polar Bears and People Apart
151. Giant Millipede Lost to Science Rediscovered in Madagascar
152. AI Is Trying to Keep Swimmers Safe from Sharks
153. AI Technology Keeps 6,000 Deer from Rail Routes
154. App to Reduce Deaths by Elephants Launched in India
155. Rare Moth Found 50 Years after Becoming “Extinct” in Britain
156. 750 New Species Recognized in Australia
157. Rare Frog Rediscovered in Ecuador’s Andes After 100 Years
158. Giant Fish Thought to Be Extinct Is Spotted in the Mekong River
159. New “Ghost Shark” Discovered in New Zealand Waters
160. Marine Biologists Discover New Sea Slug Species off Pacific Coast
161. Scientists Discover World’s Largest Coral—Visible from Space

Rewilding and conservation

162. Colorado Reintroduces Five Gray Wolves
163. Comeback in the Cards for Asian Antelope in Bangladesh
164. How AI Is Being Used to Prevent Illegal Fishing
165. Conservation Slowing Biodiversity Loss, Scientists Say
166. Number of Fish on US Overfishing List Reaches All-Time Low
167. Billionaire-Backed Nonprofit Begins Relocating Key Rhino Herd
168. AI Helping Find “World’s Loneliest Plant” a Partner
169. Macquarie Island Remains Pest Free 10 Years after Eradication
170. Wild Horses Return to Kazakhstan Steppes after Two Centuries
171. Conservation: Rare Caribbean Wildlife Species Saved from Extinction
172. Atlantic Salmon to Return to Heart of the UK
173. After a Century Away, Sturgeons Return to Swedish Waters
174. First Asian Elephant Vaccinated in Fight against Deadly Herpes Virus
175. Beaver Kits Back in the Cairngorms
176. First Baby Beavers Born in Urban London for 400 Years
177. This Cameroon Park Is a Beacon of Hope for the Lion in Central Africa
178. Endangered Species Restored in Yunnan Province
179. Conservation Success in China’s National Parks
180. First Baby Beavers Born in Hampshire for 400 Years
181. Rhino Poaching Plunges in South Africa
182. Pine Martens Return to Dartmoor After 150-Year Absence
183. How Farmers Are Protecting One of the World’s Rarest Reptiles
184. The Global War on Island Rats
185. Canis Aureus Makes Sudden Tracks Into Western Europe
186. Atlantic Sturgeon Reintroduced in Sweden
187. Colorado Slashes Wildlife-Involved Crashes Using Wildlife Crossings

De-extinction and genetic engineering

188. How Bison Herds Came Back from the Brink
189. Svalbard’s Doomsday Vault Gets Record Batch of Crop Seeds
190. Startup Getting Close to Bringing Back the Woolly Mammoth
191. The Plan to Genetically Engineer Endangered Northern Quoll
192. Researchers Reconstruct Mammoth’s Genetic Code in Unprecedented Detail
193. Biblical Tree Resurrected from Mystery Seed in Judean Desert
194. Herd of Tauros to Be Released Into Highlands to Replicate Extinct Aurochs
195. Tasmanian Tiger Genome Pieced Together from 110-Year-Old Pickled Head
196. The Doomsday Plant Vault Gets Thousands of New Seeds
197. A Cloned Ferret Has Given Birth for the First Time in History
198. Engineering Immunity in Frogs to Fight Fungal Disease

Culture and tolerance

Gender equality

199. Turk Women Can Now Use Solely Own Surnames after Marriage
200. Zambia Passes Legislation Setting Marriageable Age at 18
201. Women’s Financial Inclusion Boosted in Sub-Saharan Africa
202. Sierra Leone Outlaws Child Marriage in New Legislation
203. Gambia Upholds Its Ban on Female Genital Cutting
204. Colombia Outlaws Child Marriage After 17-Year Campaign
205. Young Bihari Women Are India’s Brave New Coders

LGBT

206. Estonia’s Marriage Equality Law Takes Effect
207. Greece’s Government Set to Legalize Same-Sex Marriage
208. Greece Legalises Same-Sex Marriage
209. Liechtenstein Legalizes Same-Sex Marriage in Near-Unanimous Vote
210. Study: Same-Sex Marriage in 20 Years Had No Negative Effects on Marriage Rates
211. Namibia Strikes Down Law against Same-Sex Relationships
212. Namibia Court Decriminalizes Consensual Same-Sex Conduct
213. Thai King Signs Same-Sex Marriage Bill Into Law
214. Countries Increasingly Supportive of Same-Sex Relationships

Treatment of animals

215. McDonald’s Eggs in the US Now All Come from Cage-Free Hens
216. Dog Cancer Vaccine Increases Survival Rates in Clinical Trial
217. AI Decodes Oinks and Grunts to Keep Pigs Happy

Energy and natural resources

Fission

218. NRC Approves First Non-water-Cooled Reactor in over 50 Years
219. UK Government Plans Further Nuclear Power Expansion
220. Nuclear Power Generation to Reach Record High Next Year
221. Welding Method Cuts Time to Make Mini Nuclear Reactors
222. The Nuclear Project Aimed at Revolutionizing Power Generation
223. Constellation Energy Looks to Restart Three Mile Island
224. Chinese Nuclear Reactor Is Completely Meltdown-Proof
225. Swiss Plan to Allow Construction of New Nuclear Plants
226. Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant to Help Power Data-Centers
227. Molten Salt Nuclear Reactor Gains Historic Permit from US Agency
228. Major Global Banks to Show Support for Nuclear Power
229. Nuclear Plant Finalizes Loan to Support First US Reactor Restart
230. Big Tech Has Cozied up to Nuclear Energy
231. Amazon to Invest $500 Million to Develop Small Modular Reactors
232. Google Backs Buildout of Small Nuclear Reactors in Kairos Deal
233. Small Reactors Coming to Virginia, Says Appalachian Power
234. Kenya Moves Forward with Its First Nuclear Power Plant
235. Meta Joins the Nuclear-Powered AI Fray

Fusion

236. Scientists Just Set a Nuclear Fusion Record
237. Scientists Say They Can Use AI to Solve Key Fusion Energy Problem
238. Fusion Energy Project Sited at Former TVA Coal-Fired Power Plant
239. Nuclear Fusion Experiment Overcomes Two Key Hurdles
240. Fusion Tech Finds Geothermal Energy Application
241. Fusion Power Might Be 30 Years Away but Will Benefit Us Sooner
242. Nuclear Fusion Start-up Claims Reactor Milestone
243. Fusion Start-Up Plans to Build Its First Power Plant in Virginia

Fossil fuels

244. Electricity and Air Converted into Synthetic Natural Gas
245. Oil Was Written Off. Now It’s the Most Productive US Industry

Geothermal

246. Iceland Will Tunnel into a Volcano to Tap Into Geothermal Power
247. New Results Show Rapid Geothermal Advancement
248. Frackers Are Now Drilling for Clean Power
249. BLM Expedites Geothermal Energy Permitting
250. The Untapped Potential of Geothermal Energy
251. The World’s Biggest Geothermal Power Purchase Agreement
252. Texas’s Geothermal Deal Puts Clean-Energy Battery on Coal Facility Land
253. Facebook Looks to a New Type of Geothermal Clean Energy
254. Fervo Energy Showcases Rapid Scale Up of Enhanced Geothermal
255. Geothermal Energy Could Outperform Nuclear Power
256. BLM Approves Geothermal Project, Moves to Ease Permitting

Solar

257. Turning Skyscrapers into Power Generators
258. “World-Changing” Solar Tech Could Mean the Death of Batteries
259. Solar Is Going to Be Huge
260. A Solar Microgrid Will Directly Power an Industrial Plant
261. Solar Panels Could Be “Ink-Jetted” onto Your Phone for Cheap Clean Energy
262. Meet the AI That’s Helping Build Amazon-Backed Solar Farms
263. Solar Power Is Shattering Global Records
264. Solar Power Is Bringing Light – And TV – To Amazon Villages

Batteries

265. What If You Never Had to Charge Your Gadgets Again?
266. Lithium-Free Sodium Batteries Enter US Production
267. China Switches on First Large-Scale Sodium-Ion Battery
268. Apple Supplier TDK Claims Solid-State Battery Breakthrough
269. Solid-State Batteries Enter Pilot Production

Recycling and resource efficiency

270. This Enzyme Can Recycle Single-Use Plastics within 24 Hours
271. “Super Gut” Made from Superworm’s Microbiome Devours Problem Plastics
272. California Startup Creates Key Electric Vehicle Battery Material from Methane
273. Scientists Genetically Engineer Fly Species to Eat More Waste
274. Strange Compound Can Extract Metals at 99 Percent Efficiency
275. Japan Is Recycling Food Waste Back into Food with Fermentation

Resource abundance

276. Startup Discovers Large-Scale Copper Deposit in Zambia
277. A Startup Wants to Harvest Lithium from the Great Salt Lake
278. Wyoming Hits the Rare-Earth Mother Lode
279. The Largest Flow of Natural Hydrogen Gas Ever Found
280. New Helium Discovery May Be Biggest Ever in North America
281. A Vast Source of Lithium Has Just Been Found in the US
282. Lab-Grown Gemstones Revolutionize Diamond Industry
283. Deposit of Rare Earth Elements Discovered in Norwegian Volcano
284. AI Helped Find Vast Source of the Copper That AI Needs to Thrive
285. Massive Helium Reservoir in Minnesota Is Even More ‘Mind-Boggling’ Than We Thought, New Data Suggest
286. Fertilizer Prices Edge Lower amid Lower Input Costs and Improved Production Prospects
287. New Reactor Could More than Triple the Yield of Highly Valuable Chemical
288. Massive Helium Reservoir in Minnesota Could Solve US Shortage
289. Arkansas May Have Vast Lithium Reserves, Researchers Say
290. AI Helps Uncover Metals in Australia Critical for Clean Energy

Water and desalination

291. How Our Drinking Water Could Come from Thin Air
292. The GCC’s Journey Towards Water Security
293. Taiwan to Build Large-Scale Municipal Desalination Plant
294. Namibia Initiates Construction of Second Desalination Plant amid Severe Drought
295. Acciona Starts Work on Africa’s Biggest Desalination Plant
296. Making Water from Air Could Be a Key Climate Tool: Green Daily
297. Solar-Powered Desalination System Requires No Extra Batteries
298. Algeria Has $5.4 Billion Plan to Make Drinking Water from Sea

Environment and pollution

Climate change

299. Global Land Area Growing Despite Sea Level Rise
300. Trees Stalling Effects of Global Heating in Eastern US
301. US Emissions Fell 17 Percent from 2005 Levels
302. China’s Falling Emissions Signal Peak Carbon
303. Study Finds Earth Warming, but No Evidence of Climate Change Accelerating
304. Climeworks Captures Double the CO2 for Half the Energy
305. The Vanishing Islands That Failed to Vanish
306. New Tech Will Trap CO2 from Cargo Ships and Store It in the Ocean
307. Rate of Global Warming Projected to Decline under Current Policy
308. Thwaites Glacier Won’t Collapse Like Dominoes as Feared
309. Plants Are Absorbing More CO2 than Previously Thought
310. Per Capita CO2 Emissions Have Peaked Globally

Emissions reduction, climate adaptation, and geoengineering

311. How Electricity Could Help Tackle a Surprising Climate Villain
312. Clean Jet Fuel Startup Fires up New CO2 Converter
313. A Carbon Removal Startup Powered by Sunlight and Seawater
314. Google Joins Mission to Map Methane from Space
315. Australia Is Using AI to Breed Climate-Resistant Kelp
316. The Startup Building a Plant to Zap Seawater and Grab CO2
317. Lab Grown Algae Could Be Pivotal in Reducing Global Emissions
318. Tiny Organism Can Reduce Greenhouse Gas in Farm Fields
319. Nonprofits Are Fund-Raising to Cap Abandoned Oil Wells
320. New Technology Aims to Rev up Oceans’ Power to Cool the World
321. Anti-methane Vaccine Could Reduce Impact of Cow Burps
322. This Startup Will Sell Methane-Eating Microbes to Whole Foods
323. The Breakthrough That Could Unlock Ocean Carbon Removal
324. The Startup Using Balloons to Cool the Planet
325. Frontier Buyers Sign Carbon Removal Deal with CarbonRun
326. Changing the DNA of Living Things to Fight Climate Change
327. Scientists Found a New Ally in the Fight to Clean Up CO2 Emissions

Weather and disaster resilience

328. Watching Beavers from Space Can Protect against Droughts
329. Floods Have Become Less Deadly: An Analysis of Flood Fatalities
330. Weather Forecasts Have Become Much More Accurate
331. “Digital Twin” of Earth Could Make Super Fast Weather Predictions
332. Plants Signal NASA Satellites with Waning ‘Glow’ Ahead of Drought
333. Mozambique’s Cyclone Warning Network to Protect Millions
334. Microsoft AI Is First to Predict Air Pollution for the Whole World
335. AI and Satellite Imager Can Spot Fires 500x Faster than On-Ground
336. AI Takes to the High Seas to Battle Walls of Water
337. An AI Breakthrough in Weather and Climate Forecasting
338. Artificial Intelligence Gives Weather Forecasters a New Edge
339. Google Backs Privately Funded Satellites for Wildfire Detection
340. The Fight to Save Sri Lanka’s Natural Flood Buffers
341. More People Are Surviving Avalanches than Decades Ago
342. How New Technology Will Help Save Earth from Asteroids
343. Hurricane Helene Just Made the Case for Electric Trucks
344. Why Scientists Are Drilling into Volcanos
345. Hurricane Forecasting to Get Major Machine Learning Upgrade
346. Google AI Weather Model Beats Most Reliable Forecast System

Air pollution

347. Air Pollution Levels Have Improved in Europe over 20 Years
348. Toxic Chemical Releases Declined 21 Percent in 10 Years in USA
349. The World Has (Probably) Passed Peak Pollution
350. Decline in Nitrogen Oxides Emissions from Human Activities in China
351. The Last Ozone-Layer Damaging Chemicals Are Finally Falling
352. Child Air Pollution Deaths Down 53 Percent since 2000
353. Delhi Wants Artificial Rain to Tackle Worsening Air Pollution

Water pollution

354. Oil Spills from Tankers Have Fallen by More than 90% since the 1970s
355. Plastic-Choked Rivers in Ecuador Are Being Cleared with Conveyor Belts
356. The Plastic-Eating Fungi That Could Help Clean up Oceans
357. Great Pacific Garbage Patch Could Be Eliminated in 10 Years

Growth and development

Education

358. Could Elite Colleges Embrace the SAT Again?
359. Transforming the Lives of Girls in Eastern and Southern Africa
360. How Machine Learning Is Helping Us Learn to Read
361. Morehouse to Use AI Teaching Assistants This Fall
362. Children Not in School Declined Nearly 40 Percent since 2000
363. Two Centuries Ago, Only 1 in 10 Adults Could Read. Today, It’s Almost 9 in 10
364. Schools Have Grown Less Violent since COVID
365. AI Tutors Are Already Changing Higher Ed
366. College Is Actually Getting More Affordable
367. AI Tutors for Every Student: Here’s How It Works at an Indiana School
368. Developing Regions Are Far More Schooled than 20 Years Ago

Wealth

369. Income Growth Over Five Generations of Americans
370. Generation Z Is Unprecedentedly Rich
371. It Turns Out despite Avocado Toast, Millennial Wealth Is Booming
372. The State of the American Middle Class from 1970 to 2023
373. The Dramatic Turnaround in Millennials’ Finances

Poverty

374. Long-Run Decline in US Poverty Continued in Recent Years
375. India Eliminates Extreme Poverty
376. PHL Could Hit Single-Digit Poverty Years Ahead of Schedule
377. Number of Poor in Indonesia Down 3.06 Million in the Last 10 Years
378. The World’s Poor Get Richer
379. Poverty Is Falling in Latin America
380. The Philippines Makes Significant Progress in Poverty Reduction
381. Global Poverty Update: Revised Estimates up to 2024
382. Poverty in Latin America Has Fallen to Historic Low

Productivity and economic growth

383. African Nations Dominate Top 10 Economic Growth Spots in 2024
384. Productivity Surge Helps Explain US Economy’s Resilience
385. America Is in the Midst of an Extraordinary Startup Boom
386. Economic Growth Expected to Increase through 2025
387. US Productivity Surges 2.3 Percent, Beating Forecasts
388. Victory in Sight—but the War on Global Inflation Isn’t Won Yet
389. How AI Can Help Start Small Businesses
390. India Is the Next Great Cheese Frontier
391. Can AI Help Africa Close the Development Gap?

Housing, infrastructure, and urbanization

392. US Cities Are Changing Zoning Rules to Allow More Housing
393. How AI Is Helping to Prevent Future Power Cuts
394. Kenya’s Substantial Progress in Providing Access to Electricity
395. US DOE Finalizes Rules to Speed Transmission Permitting
396. Argentina Scrapped Rent Controls. The Market Is Thriving
397. Barcelona Is Turning Subway Trains Into Power Stations
398. Chinese Safe Water Access Skyrocketed Since 2000
399. Electricity Access Continues to Improve in 2024
400. New York Clears the Way for 80,000 Homes

Labor and employment

401. Chart: Wage Growth Is Beating Inflation
402. Remote Work Is Here to Stay, Mostly for the Better
403. Average Worker Now Logs off at 4 p.m. On Fridays
404. There Are Fewer Low-Wage Workers in the US Now
405. Working Hours in Wealthy Countries Declined by Half over Last 150 Years
406. The Typical US Worker Out-Earned Inflation by $1,400 a Year
407. US Incomes Climbed Last Year, Census Bureau Says
408. Amazon Warehouses Benefit Local Economies, Study Finds

Health

Brain cancer

409. New Blood Test for Brain Cancer May Increase Survival Rates
410. World First: 13-Year-Old Child Cured of a Deadly Brain Cancer
411. A New Strategy to Attack Aggressive Brain Cancer
412. New Vaccine Triggers Immune Response to Fight Brain Tumor
413. AI Tool Speeds up Brain Tumor Classification
414. Immunotherapy Is Changing Cancer Treatment Forever
415. Researchers Develop Promising Potential Glioblastoma Therapy

Breast cancer

416. Breast Cancer Death Rate Dropped 58 Percent over 44 Years in US
417. NHS AI Test Spots Tiny Cancers Missed by Doctors
418. AI Could Spot Breast Cancer Earlier
419. Scientists Make Potential Breast Cancer Breakthrough
420. Breast Cancer Mortality Continues Three Decade Decline

Cervical cancer

421. An Alternative to the Pap Smear Is Here, No Speculum Required
422. New Cervical Cancer Treatment Cuts Risk of Dying from Disease by 40 Percent
423. Major Progress Made Against Cervical Cancer in Last Four Years
424. Mali Rolls Out Cancer-Blocking Jab

Colon cancer

425. A Blood Test for Colon Cancer Performed Well in a New Study
426. Colon Cancer Test Could Move a Step Closer to FDA Approval
427. FDA Approves Blood Test to Screen for Colon Cancer

Lung cancer

428. AstraZeneca Unveils Successes in Treatment of Lung Cancer
429. Trial Results for New Lung Cancer Drug Are “Off the Charts”
430. AstraZeneca’s Tagrisso Greatly Slows Cancer for Some People
431. Lung Cancer Vaccine Trials Launched across Seven Countries
432. A Drug Combination Stops Lung Cancer Advancing for Longer

Prostate cancer

433. Scientists Develop Cheap and Quick Test for Prostate Cancer
434. AI Outperforms Radiologists in Detecting Prostate Cancer on MRI

Skin cancer

435. Moderna’s mRNA Cancer Vaccine Works Even Better than Thought
436. Melanoma Jab Trial Results “Extremely Impressive”
437. Advanced Melanoma Patients Benefit from Double Treatment
438. Skin Cancer Incidence in Young Adults Declines in Sweden

Other cancers

439. Exciting New Cancer Drug Kinder than Chemotherapy
440. Scientists May Have Discovered a “Kill Switch” for Cancer
441. Drug Offers Breakthrough in Cancer Treatment
442. Long Term Decrease in Age-Adjusted Rate of Cancer Deaths
443. UK Cancer Study Shows Big Fall In Death Rates Since Early 1990s
444. New Car-T Cancer Therapy Is Now Made At One-Tenth the Cost
445. Cancer Signs Could Now Be Spotted Years before Symptoms
446. Moderna Inches Nearer to Successful Cancer Vaccine
447. Blood Test Hailed as ‘Incredibly Exciting’ Cancer Breakthrough
448. Cancer-Fighting Antibodies Inject Chemo Directly into Tumor Cells
449. Weight-Loss Drugs Cut Cancer Risk by a Fifth, Research Shows
450. How Cancer Vaccines Could Keep Tumors from Coming Back
451. Ozempic and Similar Drugs Lower Cancer Risks, Study Suggests
452. 11 New Breakthroughs in the Fight against Cancer
453. Weight-Loss Drugs Like Wegovy May Help Stave off Some Cancers
454. “New Era” in War on Cancer: 29.2% Drop In Death Rates since 1999
455. Lab-Grown Stem Cells Could Be a Breakthrough for Cancer Treatment
456. Treating Aggressive Cancers by Zapping Rogue DNA
457. Pancreatic Cancer Surge May Be Less Worrisome than It Seemed
458. Americans Far Safer from Cancer at Same Ages as in 1990

Brain implants

459. Musk Says First Neuralink Patient Received Implant in Brain
460. Neuralink Patient Can Move Computer Mouse by Thinking
461. Doctors Test a Revolutionary Brain-Computer Implant
462. Brain Implant Translates Thoughts to Computer Command
463. ALS Patient’s Brain Implant Translates Thoughts to Computer Commands
464. A Profile of Neuralink’s First Patient
465. Brain-Reading Device Is Best Yet at Decoding “Internal Speech”
466. Neuralink to Test Brain Implant on Second Patient
467. Bilingual AI Brain Implant Helps Stroke Survivor Communicate
468. Elon Musk’s Neuralink Device Is Implanted in a Second Patient
469. Brain Implants to Treat Epilepsy, Arthritis, or Even Incontinence?
470. Brain-Computer Interface Allows Man with ALS to “Speak”
471. Patient in Trial for Neuralink Uses Design Software, Videogames
472. This Brain Implant Lets People Control Alexa with Their Minds
473. Musk’s Neuralink Gets FDA’s Breakthrough Device Tag
474. PRIMA Implant Restores Vision in Preliminary Clinical Trial Results
475. Neuralink to Test Whether Brain Implant Can Control a Robot Arm

Other disability treatments and assistive technologies

476. New App Could Reduce Debilitating Impact of Tinnitus
477. Your iPhone Will Soon Be Able to Quickly Replicate Your Voice
478. Experimental Gene Therapy Allows Kids with Inherited Deafness to Hear
479. The “Mind-Bending” Bionic Arm Powered by AI
480. Neuralink Shows Brain-Chip Patient Playing Online Chess
481. Blood Plasma Donations Help Man Walk Again
482. Gene Therapy Restores Vision in Patients with Inherited Blindness
483. Spinal Cord Implant Helps Parkinson’s Patient Walk in New Study
484. UK Toddler Has Hearing Restored in World First Gene Therapy Trial
485. Illness Took Away Her Voice. AI Created a Replica
486. AI Is Teaching Bionic Limbs How to Learn
487. Neuralink Rival Sets Brain-Chip Record with 4,096 Electrodes
488. Gene Therapy Trial Gives Deaf Children Hearing in Both Ears
489. World First Epilepsy Device Fitted in UK Boy’s Skull
490. Bionic Leg Allows Amputees to Walk Naturally
491. A Rare Voice Box Transplant Helped a Cancer Patient Speak
492. Brain Stimulation May Give More Relief from Parkinson’s Symptoms
493. Apple Has a Hot New Product. It’s a Hearing Aid.
494. The Quest to Build Bionic Limbs That Feel Like the Real Thing
495. World-First Stem-Cell Treatment Restores Vision in People

Dementia and Alzheimer’s

496. Test Could Detect Alzheimer’s 15 Years before Symptoms Emerge
497. Early Dementia Diagnosis: Blood Proteins Reveal At-Risk People
498. The New, More-Hopeful Face of Alzheimer’s Disease
499. Ten-Minute Brain Scan Could Detect Dementia Early, Study Suggests
500. FDA Approves Eli Lilly’s Treatment for Early Alzheimer’s Disease
501. A 90 Percent Accurate Way of Testing for Alzheimer’s
502. Drugs Like Ozempic Could Slow the Effects of Alzheimer’s Disease

Diabetes

503. First Cow to Produce Human Insulin in Its Milk Created in Brazil
504. New Technique to Measure Blood Glucose Using Smartphone
505. “Smart” Insulin Responds to Changing Blood Sugar Levels
506. Lilly’s Zepbound Cut Risk of Diabetes in Obese People
507. Diabetes Took over Her Life, until a Stem Cell Therapy Freed Her
508. Stem Cells Reverse Woman’s Diabetes — A World First
509. Could AI Help Prevent Diabetes-Related Sight Loss?

Heart disease and stroke

510. New Procedure Allows Heart Repairs to Grow with Children
511. FDA Approves Wegovy to Reduce Heart Attack and Stroke Risk
512. US Improvements in Cholesterol Screening and Lipid Levels
513. Rate of Deadly STEMI Heart Attack Falls among Americans
514. “Space Hairdryer” Regenerates Heart Tissue in Study
515. Eli Lilly’s Tirzepatide Cuts Heart Failure Risks, Company Says
516. Drug Inspired by Spider Venom to Reverse Heart Attack Damage
517. Science Is Finding Ways to Regenerate Your Heart

Other non-communicable diseases

518. “Gamechanging” Drug to Prevent Hot Flushes Wins Approval in UK
519. FDA Clears First CRISPR Treatment for Beta Thalassemia
520. Angiodema: Gene Therapy Blocks Painful Hereditary Disorder
521. The Cystic-Fibrosis Breakthrough That Changed Everything
522. FDA Approves Merck’s Drug for Rare, Deadly Lung Condition
523. Paralyzed Stem Cell Treatment Patients Could Regain Movement
524. Seeing a Path to Nerve Regeneration
525. mRNA Drug Offers Hope Against a Devastating Childhood Disease
526. Diabetes Drug May Slow Progression of Parkinson’s
527. “Game Changer” UTI Vaccine Stops Infection for Nine Years
528. Newest Experimental Epilepsy Treatment: Brain-Cell Transplants
529. Patient Begins Newly Approved Sickle Cell Gene Therapy
530. Major Cause of Inflammatory Bowel Disease Found
531. Deaths from Tetanus Have Been Reduced Massively
532. New Blood Test May Detect Parkinson’s Years before Onset
533. Polycystic Ovary Syndrome Could Be Treated with a Malaria Drug
534. Scientists Say They Have Identified a Root Cause of Lupus
535. Scientists Uncover Genetic Disorder That May Affect Thousands around World
536. Cell Therapy Offers Hope to Autoimmune Disease Patients
537. Breakthrough Parkinson’s Treatment Enters Human Trials
538. Guinea Celebrates the Elimination of Maternal and Neonatal Tetanus
539. The Next Frontier for mRNA Could Be Healing Damaged Organs
540. The Mysteries of Inflammatory Bowel Disease Are Being Cracked
541. New Therapies Give Hope Against Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy
542. First Day of a “New Life” for a Boy with Sickle Cell
543. New Therapy Sends Autoimmune Diseases Into Remission
544. Lupus Was Considered Incurable. New Breakthroughs Fuel Hope.
545. Advanced Genome-Editing Therapies Head for the Clinic

Dengue

546. New Single-Dose Dengue Vaccine Shows 80 Percent Protection
547. Brazil to Release Millions of Anti-dengue Mosquitoes
548. WHO Prequalifies New Dengue Vaccine
549. Novel Way to Beat Dengue: Deaf Mosquitoes Stop Having Sex

HIV/AIDS

550. HIV Among Pregnant South Africans at Lowest Since 2002
551. Long-Acting Drugs May Revolutionize HIV Prevention and Treatment
552. More Caribbean Countries Eliminate Mother-to-Child HIV
553. HIV Vaccine Triggers Rare and Elusive Antibodies in Humans
554. Zimbabwe Turns Tide on HIV
555. Gilead’s Shot to Prevent HIV Succeeds in Late-Stage Trial
556. New HIV Prevention Drug Shows 100 Percent Efficacy in Clinical Trial
557. Engineered Virus Steals Proteins from HIV, Pointing to New Therapy
558. HIV Progress Raises Life Expectancy in Africa – UN
559. HIV Antiretroviral Therapy Saves over a Million Lives Each Year
560. Gilead Agrees to Allow Generic Version of HIV Shot in Poor Countries
561. India Sees Huge Drop in AIDS Deaths, HIV Infections Since 2010

Malaria

562. Cape Verde Reaches Malaria-Free Milestone
563. Cameroon Starts World-First Malaria Mass Vaccine Rollout
564. Cambodia on Track to Eradicate Malaria by 2025
565. Malaria Vaccine Rollout in Africa Expands Dramatically
566. New Mosquito Nets Prevented 13 Million Malaria Cases in Pilot Programs
567. Major Step in Malaria Prevention in Three West African Countries
568. Newest Malaria Vaccine Shipment Marks Child Survival Milestone
569. New Fronts Are Opening in the War against Malaria
570. Mosquito-Fighting Drone Takes Flight in Broward
571. GMO Mosquitoes Released in Djibouti to Fight Malaria
572. Ivory Coast Receives First Malaria Vaccines
573. Children Receive First Doses of New Malaria Vaccine
574. Bangladesh Is Gunning for Zero Malaria Deaths by 2027
575. Mozambique Introduces Malaria Vaccines into Routine Immunization
576. Africa: Malaria Vaccine Breakthrough for Pregnant Women
577. Zipline Drones Wing Vaccines to Malaria-Prone Western Kenya
578. Egypt Declared Malaria-Free After 100-Year Effort

Polio

579. Novel Type 2 Oral Polio Vaccine Secures WHO Prequalification
580. Wild Poliovirus Transmission Halted in Southern Africa
581. WHO Exceeds Target for Gaza Polio Vaccinations
582. Cross-Border Polio Vaccination Reaches 6.5 Million Children

Trachoma

583. Zimbabwe Strides Towards Elimination of Trachoma
584. Trachoma Eliminated as a Public Health Problem in Pakistan
585. Elimination of Trachoma as a Public Health Problem in India
586. Vietnam Eliminates Trachoma as a Public Health Problem

Tuberculosis

587. Guyana Reports Decline in Filaria, Leprosy and TB Cases
588. Rate of TB Diagnosis, Treatment in Africa Increasing
589. Cambodia Sees Significant Drop in TB Deaths in Last Two Decades
590. Tuberculosis in Ethiopia: A Drastic Decline
591. Global Tuberculosis Deaths Fall Below Pre-Pandemic Level
592. WHO Recognizes India’s “Remarkable” Progress Against TB
593. Several African Countries have Significantly Reduced TB-Related Deaths

Other communicable diseases

594. Scientists Hail New Antibiotic That Can Kill Drug-Resistant Bacteria
595. Treatment for Acute Sleeping Sickness Was Brutal — Until Now
596. India on the Verge of Eliminating “Black Fever” Kala-Azar
597. “Potent” Antibiotic Drug Boosts Fight Against Superbugs
598. Hepatitis C Cases Dropped in the US in 2022
599. Chlamydia Vaccine Shows Promise in Early Trial
600. WHO Approves Updated Cholera Vaccine to Combat Surge in Cases
601. Nigeria Becomes First Country to Roll out New Meningitis Vaccine
602. EU Approves New Antibiotic to Tackle Rise of Superbugs
603. Visceral Leishmaniasis Drug Enters Phase II Trial in Ethiopia
604. “Smart” Antibiotic Kills Bacteria While Sparing the Microbiome
605. Chad Ends Sleeping Sickness as a Public Health Problem
606. How Does Bird Flu Spread in Cows? “Good News” Revealed
607. Scientists to Launch Human Tests of Marburg Virus Vaccine
608. Flu Jab: Single-Shot Vaccine Could Stop Future Pandemic
609. Reports Show Threefold Drop in Annual Diarrheal Cases in Nepal
610. Merck Ebola Vaccine Shown to Offer Substantial Protection
611. First 100,000 Doses of Mpox Vaccine Reach DRC
612. Researchers Discover Cheap Way to Shorten Children’s Colds
613. Jordan Receives WHO Verification for Eliminating Leprosy
614. Brazil Eliminates Lymphatic Filariasis as a Public Health Problem
615. Elimination of Lymphatic Filariasis as a Public Health Problem in Timor-Leste
616. Doctors Trial mRNA Vaccine Against Vomiting Bug Norovirus
617. An “Unprecedented” Good News Story About a Marburg Outbreak
618. Measles Vaccines Saved over 90 Million Lives in the Last 50 Years
619. India’s “Blockbuster” Drugs to Take On Deadly Superbugs

Maternal care

620. “Rising US Maternal Mortality Rates” Are Due to Flawed Data
621. Saving More Mothers and Babies in Nepal
622. US Maternal Mortality Rate Declines, New CDC Data Shows
623. Anaemia among Pregnant Women Dropped in Mumbai
624. A Pill for Postpartum Depression Is Finally Getting to Patients
625. Researcher Finds Mothers Live Longer as Child Mortality Declines
626. The AI Transforming Pregnancy Scans in Africa
627. Big Declines in US Teen Births
628. Thailand Halves Number of Teen Mothers, Sets More Ambitious Goal

Fertility and birth control

629. The First Endometriosis Drug in Four Decades Is on the Horizon
630. FHI 360 Conducting Trial for Biodegradable Contraceptive Implant
631. Male Birth Control Gel Shows Promise in Early-Stage Clinical Trials
632. Your Boss Will Freeze Your Eggs Now
633. Study Suggests Drug Could Extend Women’s Fertility by Five Years
634. More than 70 Babies Have Been Born from Uterus Transplants
635. Making Eggs Without Ovaries
636. Pharma Eyes Male Birth Control Pill for Gen Z
637. US Startup Charging Couples to “Screen Embryos for IQ”
638. AI Reveals How Sperm Sticks to Egg During Fertilization
639. The Scientists Trying to Improve IVF Success Rate
640. Micro-Robot Will Navigate Fallopian Tubes to Treat Infertility
641. First Live Birth Using Procedure That Matures Eggs Outside Body

Mental health, substance abuse, and addiction

642. Vertex Non-opioid Painkiller Shows Positive Results
643. A Brain Pacemaker Helped a Woman With Depression
644. Deep Brain Stimulation Working Wonders against OCD
645. US Drug Overdose Deaths Decline for First Time in 5 Years
646. Semaglutide Treatment Reduces Risk of Alcohol Abuse, Study Finds
647. Long-Term Changing Patterns of Suicide Mortality in China
648. Can an AI Friend Make You Less Lonely?
649. Startups Launch Life-Saving Tech for the Opioid Crisis
650. Sadness among Teen Girls May Be Improving, CDC Finds
651. An Implantable Sensor Could Reverse Opioid Overdoses
652. Cigarette Smoking Rate in US Ties 80-Year Low
653. Youth E-Cigarette Use Drops to Lowest Level in a Decade
654. US Overdose Deaths Plummet, Saving Thousands of Lives
655. The New Drug Set to Tackle Schizophrenia
656. Ozempic Patients Have Much Lower Risk of Opioid Overdose
657. AI Chatbots May Ease the World’s Loneliness
658. Teen Tobacco Use Falls to 25-Year Low

Weight and nutrition

659. Cheaper, Faster Method Produces 10X More Ozempic
660. You Can Now Get Weight-Loss Drug Zepbound through Amazon
661. Weight Loss from Wegovy Sustained for up to Four Years
662. The First Step toward Precision Medicine for Obesity
663. New GLP-1 Drugs Promise Weight Loss and Health Benefits
664. The New Bacon Safe for Some People Allergic to Red Meat
665. Forget Cutting Sugar—New Tech Makes It Healthier Instead
666. US Obesity Rates Fall For the First Time Ever, New CDC Data Shows
667. GLP-1s Are Among the Most Important Drug Breakthroughs
668. Obesity Dipped in US Adults Last Year for the First Time in a Decade

Longevity and mortality

669. Indian State of Maharashtra Sees 11 Percent Drop in Child Mortality
670. Historic Milestone as Global Child Deaths Fall Below 5 Million in 2022
671. US Life Expectancy Rises after 2-Year Dip
672. Morocco’s Remarkable Progress in Reducing Child Mortality
673. Immunization Efforts Saved 154 Million Lives over past 50 Years
674. Life Expectancy Projected to Increase Nearly 5 Years by 2050
675. Ozempic Can Reduce Risk of Serious Illness and Death, Study Finds
676. How a Kettle Could Help Keep Older People Safe
677. Startup Brings New Hope to the Pursuit of Reviving Frozen Bodies
678. US Death Rate Dropped 6 Percent in 2023, CDC Says
679. Ozempic Could Delay Ageing, Researchers Suggest
680. Unlikely Candidates Lead Hunt for New Longevity Drugs
681. A Disease That Makes Children Age Rapidly Gets Closer to a Cure
682. Life Expectancy Is Returning to Pre-pandemic Levels

Surgery and emergency medicine

683. New Antivenom Raises Hopes Against Lethal Snakebites
684. The Bone-Marrow-Transplant Revolution
685. Spanish Doctors Perform Robotic Heart Surgery on Teenagers
686. New Technique Could Make Blood Types Mutually Compatible
687. New Technique to Freeze Brain Tissue without Harm
688. “Digital Twin” Heart Lets Doctors Test Treatments before Surgery
689. The Search for a Blood Substitute
690. Blood Thinner Could Be Used to Treat Cobra Venom, Global Study Suggests
691. Injectable Goo Could Fix Joints without Surgery, Study Suggests
692. FDA Approves Nasal Spray to Treat Dangerous Allergic Reactions
693. A New Device That Stops Bleeding from Gunshot Wounds
694. Not Ready for a Knee Replacement? You Might Be Able to Fix Your Cartilage
695. A Placenta Restored Her Face After an Explosion
696. One Company Is Turning To Cadavers for Bone Marrow
697. Survivor of Suicide Attempt Receives Innovative Face Transplant
698. “Neural Tourniquet” Can Stop Bleeding with Nerve Stimulation

Organ transplantation

699. Experimental Use of Pig Liver Filters Blood Externally
700. Japanese Startup Creates Pigs Engineered for Organ Donation
701. Genetically Modified Pigs Could End Organ Transplant Shortage
702. Scientists Grow Organs Using Fluid Drawn During Pregnancy
703. Patient Receives World’s First Gene-Edited Pig Liver Transplant
704. First Human Transplant of a Genetically Modified Pig Kidney Performed
705. Woman Given a New 3D-Printed Windpipe in a World-First
706. Pig Kidney Transplant Patient Leaves Hospital
707. “Mini Liver” Will Grow in Lymph Node in Bold New Trial
708. She Received a Pig Kidney Instead of a Traditional Transplant
709. Pig-to-Human Liver Transplant Recipient “Doing Very Well”
710. Meet the Pigs Raised to Grow Kidneys and Hearts for Humans
711. Startup Raises $191 Million to Edit Pig Organs for Human Transplant
712. Donating a Kidney Is Safer than Ever, Reassuring Research Finds
713. World’s First Whole-Eye Transplant
714. World’s First Fully Robotic Double Lung Transplant
715. Woman Receives Nation’s Third Pig Kidney Transplant

Testing, diagnosis, measurement, and imaging

716. How Portable X-Ray Machines Are Helping Remote Patients
717. Google AI Could Use a Person’s Cough to Diagnose Disease
718. FDA Authorizes AI-Driven Test to Predict Sepsis in Hospitals
719. Will AI Replace Doctors Who Read X-Rays?
720. Smart Bandages Heal Wounds Faster and Talk to Your Doctor
721. Rapid UTI Test Cuts Detection Time to 45 Minutes
722. Low-Cost CRISPR-Based Test Offers Rapid Influenza Diagnosis
723. Apple Watch Is Becoming Doctors’ Favorite Medical Device
724. AI Is Supercharging Disease Diagnosis
725. New Imaging Set to Accelerate Cardiovascular Medicine
726. The Companies Realizing Theranos’s Failed Dream
727. FDA Authorizes First Over-the-Counter Home Syphilis Test
728. How Portable, AI X-Ray Machines Are Helping Uganda Beat TB
729. Common Food Dye Lets Scientists See through Skin
730. FDA Approves First At-Home Flu Vaccine in US, a Nasal Spray
731. This $400 Genetic Test Could Save Your Life
732. Doctors Can Create a “Digital Twin” of Your Heart and Other Organs
733. Breakthrough Genomic Test Identifies Virtually Any Infection
734. AI Chatbots Defeated Doctors at Diagnosing Illness
735. AI Is Trained to Spot Warning Signs in Blood Tests

Health systems

736. AI May Make Shopping for Health Insurance Less Painful
737. How Sewers Are Helping Us to Monitor Disease Outbreaks
738. Medical AIs with Human Faces Are on Their Way
739. ChatGPT 4 Could Be Used to Triage Eye Problems
740. AI That Determines Risk of Death Helps Save Lives in Hospital Trial
741. Infrastructure Upgrade to Kenya’s Vaccine Cold Chain Rolls Out
742. Ro Launches GLP-1 Supply Tracker to Mitigate Shortages
743. OpenAI Expands Healthcare Push with Color Health’s Cancer Copilot
744. Foreign Physicians Can Help Solve America’s Doctor Shortage
745. Perceptive Says AI-Driven Robot Is Faster than a Human Dentist
746. Day Zero Antivirals for Future Pandemics
747. Dr. Chatbot Will See You Now
748. Hospitals Are Safer than They Were Before the Pandemic: Study
749. Semaglutide Reduces All-Cause Hospital Admissions

General wellbeing

750. Internet Use Is Associated with Greater Wellbeing, Study Finds
751. A Mysterious Health Wave Is Breaking Out Across the US
752. Most American Adults Are Flourishing Online

Other innovations

753. New Allergy Drug Protects Against Severe Food Reactions
754. Tooth-Regrowing Drug Will Be Given to Humans in September
755. Australia Starts New Peanut Allergy Treatment for Babies

Politics & Freedom

756. Return to Pre-pandemic Passport Processing Times
757. Australia to Abolish Nearly 500 So-Called Nuisance Tariffs
758. Japan to Allow Divorced Parents to Share Custody of Children
759. Human Rights Have Improved in All Regions over the Last Century
760. Bribery Becoming Less Accepted in Nigeria, Says New Report
761. Americans Can Now Renew Passports Online
762. Half a Million Stateless People Got Citizenship in past Decade
763. Americans Can Now Visit China for up to 10 Days Without a Visa

Technology

Artificial intelligence

764. Microsoft Is Adding an AI Button to PC Keyboards
765. ChatGPT Can Now “Remember” Users—Including Their Voice
766. Anthropic Debuts Its Most Powerful Chatbot Yet
767. AI Race Heats up between OpenAI, Google and Mistral
768. Meta’s Llama 3 Language Model Outperforms Competitors in Tests
769. Microsoft Makes a New Push into Smaller AI Systems
770. Microsoft Readies New AI Model to Compete with Google, OpenAI
771. OpenAI Releases GPT-4o, a Faster Model for All ChatGPT Users
772. Pocket-Sized AI Models Could Unlock a New Era of Computing
773. Anthropic Releases “Most Intelligent” AI Model in Rivalry with OpenAI
774. New LLM Can Run on the Energy Needed to Power a Lightbulb
775. OpenAI Unveils GPT-4o Mini, a Smaller and Cheaper AI Model
776. OpenAI Working on New Reasoning Technology
777. Meta Releases the Biggest and Best Open-Source AI Model Yet
778. OpenAI Is Launching Search Engine, Taking Aim at Google
779. New Device Could Slash AI Energy Use by up to 2,500 Times
780. Ask Claude: Amazon Turns to Anthropic’s AI for Alexa Revamp
781. Apple Unveils New iPhones with Built-in Artificial Intelligence
782. OpenAI Releases “Strawberry” Model with Better Reasoning
783. OpenAI Launches AI Models It Says Are Capable of Reasoning
784. Google Will Begin Flagging AI-Generated Images in Search
785. Is Math the Path to Chatbots That Don’t Make Stuff Up?
786. Anthropic Releases AI Tool That Can Take over the User’s Cursor
787. OpenAI Folds AI-Powered Search Engine Into ChatGPT
788. The IEA Thinks We Should Chill Out About AI’s Energy Demand
789. Gemini 2.0 Flash Has Enhanced Performance and Fast Responses
790. OpenAI’s ChatGPT Will Respond to Video Feeds in Real Time
791. New LLM Technique Slashes Memory Costs up to 75 Percent

AI content

792. OpenAI Teases “Sora,” Its New Text-To-Video AI Model
793. Scientists Turn to AI to Make Beer Taste Even Better
794. Microsoft’s VASA-1 Can Deepfake a Person with Photo and Audio
795. Google Rolls Out AI-Generated, Summarized Search Results in US
796. Ancestry.com Uses AI to Boost Black Family Trees
797. DeepMind Creates AI Model That Can Add Sound to Silent Videos
798. India’s Farmers Are Now Getting Their News from AI Anchors
799. AI Races to Adapt Chatbots to India’s Many Languages
800. An AI Version of Al Michaels’ Voice for Summer Olympics
801. How AI Brought 11,000 College Football Players to Digital Life
802. Audible to Start Generating AI Voice Replicas of Select Narrators
803. Roblox Is Launching a Generative AI That Builds 3D Environments
804. People Are Using Google Study Software to Make AI Podcasts
805. Meta Unveils Instant AI Video Generator That Adds Sounds
806. New AI Audio Model Synthesizes Sounds That Have Never Existed
807. OpenAI Makes Video Generator Sora Publicly Available in US

Communications

808. SpaceX Deploys New Direct-to-Smartphone Satellites
809. Apple Making “Significant” Push to Bring AI to iPhones
810. 6G Speeds 500 Times Faster than Average 5G Cellphones in Test
811. Nokia and NASA Are Taking 4G into Space
812. Google Builds First Subsea Cable Connecting Africa to Australia
813. Musk Launches SpaceX’s Starlink Internet Services in Indonesia
814. Welcome to the Era of the AI Smartphone
815. Mobile Money Accounts Are Surging Globally
816. Starlink Mini Brings Space Internet to Backpackers
817. How Mobile Phone Networks Are Embracing AI
818. Google Translate Is Using AI to Translate 110 New Languages
819. Record-Breaking 402 Tbps Data Transmission Speeds Achieved
820. Google Unveils AI-Powered Pixel 9 Series Smartphones
821. United Airlines to Offer Free Wi-Fi Using Starlink from SpaceX
822. Air France Launches Free Ultra-High-Speed Wi-Fi on All Flights
823. Starlink Roll-Out Across Africa Could Transform Digital Health Services
824. Meta Plans to Build Subsea Cable Spanning the World, Sources Say
825. FCC Approves Starlink Plan for Cellular Phone Service
826. Europe Signs €10.6bn Iris² Satellite Deal to Rival Starlink

Computing

827. Qualcomm Unveils Chip for Mixed Reality
828. Digital Transformation Drives Development in Africa
829. Intel Unveils Largest-Ever AI “Neuromorphic Computer”
830. Practical Uses for Quantum Computers Are Emerging
831. Putting Data Centers in Space Could Reduce Carbon Footprint
832. Quantum Computers Could Be Powered Using Lasers Made 10,000 Times Smaller
833. Japan on Edge of EUV Lithography Chip-Making Revolution
834. Novel Ideas to Cool Data Centers: Liquid in Pipes or a Dunking Bath
835. Google Says It’s Made a Quantum Computing Breakthrough
836. New Quantum Computer Chip Now Outperforms Fastest Supercomputers in Certain Areas
837. Microsoft Builds First Datacenters with Wood to Slash Emissions
838. Amazon Announces Super-Computer, Homegrown AI Chips
839. Google Reveals Breakthrough Quantum Computing Chip

Construction and manufacturing

840. Material Discovered by AI Could Reduce Lithium Use in Batteries
841. The Man Leading the Masters with Irons Made by a 3D Printer
842. Ford Introduces Mixed Reality Tech to Factory Floor
843. The World’s Fastest Brick-Laying Construction Robot
844. World’s Largest 3D-Printed Neighborhood Nears Completion
845. Completion of World’s First 1-Km Skyscraper in Sight
846. Global Robot Density in Factories Doubled in Seven Years
847. America’s Biggest Apartment Owner Leaps Into Modular Homes
848. New Ironmaking Breakthrough Achieves Huge Productivity Boost

Drones

849. 2024 Will Be a Breakout Year for Delivery Drones
850. Delivery Drones Are Getting Bigger — Much Bigger
851. Amazon Gets FAA Approval to Expand Drone Deliveries
852. The Drones Looking Inside Intensifying Hurricanes
853. Drone Deliveries, Slow to Take Flight, Come to Silicon Valley

Robotics and automation

854. Toyota’s Robots Are Learning to Do Housework
855. A Restaurant Robot Might Mix Your Next Cocktail
856. Humanoid Robots Will Join BMW’s Production Line
857. Companies with Robots Now Need Human “Robot Wranglers”
858. Uber Eats Is Launching Robot Deliveries in Japan
859. New AI Outperforming Customer Service Representatives?
860. Amazon Robots Provide Glimpse of an Automated Workplace
861. Underwater Robots Are Helping Maritime Shipping
862. How Robots Are Taking over Warehouse Work
863. At Moderna, OpenAI’s GPTs Are Changing Almost Everything
864. Boston Dynamics’ New Humanoid Moves Like No Other Robot
865. Why It’s Good News That Robots Are Getting Smarter
866. Restaurant Robots Can Cook, Serve and Bus Your Meal Now
867. Walmart Plans to Launch Digital Shelf Tags in 2,300 Stores
868. The German Robots Hunting the Sea for WW2 Bombs
869. AI Drive-Thru Ordering Is on the Rise
870. The Company Making AI Robots to Do America’s Toughest Jobs
871. A Major Change Is Coming to Taco Bell Drive-Thrus
872. DeepMind Develops a Robot That Can Play Amateur Level Ping-Pong
873. Robots Are Starting (Good) Fires in California
874. These New AI Bots Will Do Just about Anything for You
875. Chipotle’s New Guac Robots Can Peel Avocados in 26 Seconds
876. Teeth-Cleaning Robots, Red-Light Therapy: What’s Ahead for Dental Health
877. Robot Performs the Cello with a Symphony Orchestra
878. Incredible Generalist Robots Show Us a Future Free of Chores
879. Contract Bots Could Soon Be On Both Sides of Negotiations
880. Robots and Labor in Nursing Homes
881. Robot Learns to Perform Surgical Tasks Expertly Just by Watching Videos
882. Amazon Developing Special Eye Glasses to Speed Up Deliveries
883. Robot Runs Marathon for the First Time in South Korea

Autonomous vehicles

884. Waymo’s Driverless Cars Are Finally Ready for the Highway
885. Huge Remote Controlled Vessels Are Setting Sail
886. Self-Driving Semi-trucks Are Coming to America’s Highways
887. Tesla to Unveil Robotaxi in August, Elon Musk Says
888. Waymo Will Launch Paid Robotaxi Service on Wednesday
889. Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League Starts This Weekend
890. Waymo Says Its Driverless Cars Are 200 Percent Safer Than You
891. Waymo Opens up Its Robotaxis to Everyone in San Francisco
892. Cheap Robotaxi Rides Rattle China’s Taxi Drivers
893. Self-Driving Labs Are the New AI Asset
894. Waymo Has Doubled Its Weekly Paid Robotaxi Trips since May
895. Waymo’s Roomier Robotaxi with Less-Expensive Tech
896. Human Drivers Are to Blame for Most Serious Waymo Collisions
897. Uber, Waymo to Expand Autonomous Ride Hailing
898. Driverless Semis Could Be Months Away
899. Uber Partners With WeRide to Offer Robotaxi Rides in UAE
900. Elon Musk Shows off Tesla “Robotaxi” That Drives Itself
901. Up Close with the 300 Tonne Driverless Trucks
902. Waymo Opens Robotaxi Service to Anyone in Los Angeles
903. Waymo and Hyundai Enter Multi-Year, Strategic Partnership
904. Waymo Unveils Plan to Bring Its Robotaxi Service to Miami
905. Study: Waymo Is Safer than Even the Most Advanced Human-Driven Vehicles

Aviation

906. 3 Reasons Why Everyone Aboard Japan Airlines Flight 516 Survived
907. 2023 Was One of Aviation’s Safest Years on Record
908. Two Airplanes Lugging Cargo Together Is Texas Startup’s Bet
909. Boom’s First Test Flight Could Signal Return of Supersonic Travel
910. First Test Flight of “Un-Jammable” Quantum Navigation System
911. Blue Origin Launches Six Tourists to the Edge of Space
912. Solar-Powered Planes Take Flight
913. Joby Says FAA Authorizes In-House Software for Air Taxi Service
914. Air Taxi Startup Is Developing a Hydrogen-Powered VTOL
915. Hypersonic Breakthrough Can Eliminate Deadly “Shock Train”
916. New Study Finds Commercial Air Travel Keeps Getting Safer
917. XB-1 Supersonic Aircraft Completes Second Flight
918. Toyota to Invest $500 Million in Flying Taxi Start-up Joby
919. Boom Supersonic XB-1 Hits New Speed Record in Latest Test Flight
920. NASA and Partners Scaling up Air Traffic Management
921. Feds OK Rules for US To Begin Electric Air Taxi Service
922. Archer Inks Deal to Bring Electric Air Taxis to Japan
923. US Airlines Have Traveled Light-Years Since the Last Plane Crash

Other transportation

924. World’s Biggest Cruise Ship Icon of the Seas Sets Sail
925. A Novel Solution to Clean up Heavy-Duty Truck Emissions
926. Formula E Electric Vehicles Could Spark Widespread Innovation
927. Revolutionary Electric Car Battery Can Charge in 10 Minutes
928. A New Model for Saving Lives on Roads around the World
929. US Traffic Deaths Decline by an Estimated 3.6 Percent in 2023
930. Want an EV with 600 Miles of Range? It’s Coming
931. AI and Radar Seek to Unsnarl a 500-Year-Old Traffic Jam
932. In Warsaw, Falling Road Deaths Signal a Traffic Safety Turnaround
933. Cruise Ships Keep Breaking Records

Science

Archeology, geology, and paleontology

934. Vesuvius Challenge 2023 Grand Prize Awarded
935. Ceramic Head Reveals Previously Unknown Roman Settlement
936. The Future of AI Is Helping Us Discover the Past
937. UK’s Most Complete Dinosaur Fossil in a Century Reveals New Species
938. Deepest-Ever Samples of Rock from Earth’s Mantle Unveiled
939. AI Is Helping Scholars Decipher the Epic of Gilgamesh
940. AI Research Uncovers 300 Ancient Etchings in Peru’s Nazca Desert
941. LIDAR Uncovers A New Mayan Lost City
942. Satellites Reveal Stunningly Detailed Maps of Earth’s Seafloors

Biology

943. Science Is Immortalizing Argentina’s Top Polo Horses
944. Moonwalk Bio Joins Push for “Epigenetic” Treatments
945. A Key to Detecting Brain Disease Earlier than Ever
946. A New Clue to Understand Lupus and Other Autoimmune Diseases
947. Researchers Produce 3D-Printed Functional Human Brain Tissue
948. Move Over, CRISPR: RNA-Editing Therapies Pick up Steam
949. Doctors Can Now Edit the Genes Inside Your Body
950. This AI Can Find Billions of New Antibiotics
951. World’s Most Powerful MRI Scans First Images of Human Brain
952. Generative AI Arrives in the Gene Editing World of CRISPR
953. AI Identifies New Parkinson’s Treatments 10X Faster
954. Study Maps Most Detailed Tree of Life Yet for Flowering Plants
955. AlphaFold 3 Predicts the Structure and Interactions of All of Life’s Molecules
956. AI Used to Predict Potential New Antibiotics
957. Gene Editing’s Next Big Targets
958. Scientists Get a New Tool to Study a Common Genetic Heart Condition
959. Ex-Meta Experts Offer Tool to Create New Molecules
960. New System for Programmable Genome Design Discovered
961. How Science Went to the Dogs (And Cats)
962. “Jumping Gene” Enzyme Edits Genomes without Breaking DNA
963. Nobel-Winning Technique Like “Google Earth for Molecules”
964. Mice Live Longer When Inflammation-Boosting Protein Is Blocked
965. Ex-Meta Scientists Develop AI Model That Creates New Proteins
966. Engineered Skin Microbiome Outsmarts Mosquitoes
967. Scientists Uncover Microbes That Destroy Forever Chemicals
968. Arc Institute Is Bringing Science into the Century of Biology
969. Where Did Viruses Come From? AIs Are Finding Answers
970. After a Decade, Scientists Unveil Fly Brain in Stunning Detail
971. CRISPR Helps Brain Stem Cells Regain Youth in Mice
972. DNA “Printing Press” Could Quickly Store Mountains of Data
973. Plan to Sequence DNA of Millions of Species Gains Momentum
974. Researchers Enable Hamster Cells to Photosynthesize Light
975. AI Protein-Prediction Tool AlphaFold3 Is Now More Open
976. New Tool Allows Study of Gene Mutation in Living Human Cells
977. Scientists Map Out the Human Body One Cell at a Time
978. New CRISPR System Pauses Genes Rather than Turning Them Off
979. LLMs Surpass Human Experts in Predicting Neuroscience Results
980. “Dark Proteome” Survey Reveals Thousands of New Human Genes
981. Researchers Get an Updated Look at the Human Cell Atlas
982. “DNA Typewriters” Can Record a Cell’s History
983. Animals as Chemical Factories

Chemistry and materials

984. Reflective “Cooling Glass” Could Help Fight Climate Change
985. AI to Drastically Cut Time to Develop New Battery Materials
986. A Shape-Shifting Plastic with a Flexible Future
987. Researchers Develop Better Way to Make Painkiller from Trees
988. Diamond Wafers Could Store a Billion Blu-Ray’s Worth of Data
989. World’s Thinnest Gold Leaf Is Just One Atom Thick
990. Researchers Turn Wool and Hair Offcuts into Graphite for Batteries
991. LEDs Change Everything
992. Scientists Grow Diamonds from Scratch in 15 Minutes
993. AI Develops “Ground-Breaking” Magnet Free of Rare Earth Metals
994. A New Age of Materials Is Dawning
995. AI Radically Speeds Predictions of Materials’ Thermal Properties
996. This Sound-Suppressing Silk Can Create Quiet Spaces
997. Unique Transistor “Could Change the World of Electronics”
998. AI Makes Effective Solar Cells—and Explains the Results
999. Genome Stored In Crystal Could Survive to the End of the Universe
1000. Rings Get Bigger as Lab-Grown Diamonds Catch up to Naturals
1001. Carbon Bond That Uses Only One Electron Seen for First Time
1002. “Forever” Chemicals Can Be Destroyed with Clever Chemistry

Math and physics

1003. A Quantum Leap Measuring Microscopic Gravity
1004. Most Accurate Clock Ever Can Tick for 40 Billion Years
1005. How Light Can Vaporize Water without the Need for Heat
1006. Google’s Proof-Solving AI Models Claim Math Breakthrough
1007. Breakthrough Step Toward Revealing Hidden Structure of Prime Numbers
1008. Mathematicians Discover New Class of Shape Seen Throughout Nature
1009. China Poised to Turn On Powerful Source of X-Ray Light

More AI in science

1010. AI Copilots and Robo-Labs Turbocharge Research
1011. These Engineers Say Chatbots and AI Can Help Design Chips
1012. The AI Scientist: Automated Open-Ended Scientific Discovery
1013. Do AI Models Produce More Original Ideas than Researchers?
1014. DeepMind and BioNTech Build AI Lab Assistants for Scientific Research
1015. “In Awe”: Scientists Impressed by Latest ChatGPT Model o1

Space industry and exploration

1016. Aditya-L1: India’s Solar Mission Reaches Sun’s Orbit
1017. Japan’s Successful Moon Landing Was the Most Precise Ever
1018. Japan: Moon Lander Slim Comes Back to Life and Resumes Mission
1019. NASA Gives 95-Minute Warning as Meteor Burns up outside Berlin
1020. Private Space Company to Make Historic Lunar Landing Attempt
1021. Tiny Robot Completes First Simulated Surgery in Space
1022. Space Mission Will Deliver Hyper-Detailed View of Earth
1023. Odysseus, a Private Lunar Lander, Launches Toward the Moon
1024. Odysseus Mission Marks Milestone in Reaching the Moon
1025. Varda Hopes New Research Draws More Drugmakers to Space
1026. SpaceX Celebrates Progress on the Third Flight of Starship
1027. 3D Cosmic Map Raises Questions over Future of Universe
1028. NASA Hears from Voyager 1 after Months of Quiet
1029. “We’re in a New Era”: The 21st-Century Space Race Takes Off
1030. Intuitive Machines Eyes Second Moon Landing This Year
1031. Mars Rover Mission Will Use Pioneering Nuclear Power Source
1032. SpaceX to Launch ESA’s EarthCARE Satellite
1033. A New Search for Ripples in Space from the Beginning of Time
1034. Lunar Probe Is First to Land on Far Side of the Moon
1035. SpaceX’s Starship Rocket Completes Test Flight
1036. Largest Camera Ever Built Arrives at Rubin Observatory in Chile
1037. “At Least 150,000 Tons” of Water Frost Discovered on Mars
1038. China Space Probe Returns with Rare Moon Rocks
1039. Japan Launches Advanced Satellite on Its New H3 Rocket
1040. Scientists Design Spacesuit That Turns Urine into Drinking Water
1041. Cave on the Moon Confirmed, and Scientists Suspect Hundreds More
1042. Space-Based Solar Power Gets Practical
1043. Reservoir of Liquid Water Found Deep in Martian Rocks
1044. SpaceX Is Set to Launch the First Civilian Spacewalk
1045. Robot Metalsmiths Resurrect Toroidal Tanks for NASA
1046. Lab-Grown Muscle Launched Into Space for Medical Research
1047. Polaris Dawn Astronauts Reach Record High Orbit Above Earth
1048. Tech Billionaire Pulls off First Private Spacewalk High Above Earth
1049. First Private Spacewalk a Success!
1050. NASA’s Laser Comms Demo Makes Deep Space Record
1051. SpaceX Machines Catch Rocket Booster Back at the Launch Pad
1052. Europa Clipper Launched to Explore a Moon’s Habitability
1053. SpaceX Capsule Returns Stranded Astronauts to Earth
1054. SpaceX Completes Sixth Starship Test Flight but Calls Off Catch
1055. Falcon 9’s Flight Rate 30x Higher than Shuttle at 1/100th the Cost
1056. Satellites Launched to Create Artificial Solar Eclipses in a Demo

Violence

1057. Intentional Homicides in Mexico Fall by 4.18%, below 30,000 in 2023
1058. Italy, Home of the Mafia, Now One of Europe’s Safest Countries
1059. The US Crime Rate Is Still Dropping, FBI Data Shows
1060. Murder Rates Are Plummeting. What Should We Make Of It?
1061. Most Crime Has Fallen by 90% in 30 Years in England and Wales
1062. Number of Crimes in Seoul Falls, Yet Public Anxiety Rises
1063. Homicide Rates Have Declined Dramatically over the Centuries
1064. A Plummeting Murder Rate Stuns Boston
1065. Number of Countries with the Death Penalty Falls
1066. Drop in Death Penalty Support Led by Younger Generations

Summary: The realities of life in preindustrial England reveal a world teeming with physical discomforts, social cruelty, and environmental hazards unimaginable to modern sensibilities. England from 1600 to 1770 was plagued by disease, primitive hygiene, adulterated food, and oppressive punishments. Far from the romanticized notions of simpler times, living in this early modern time and place often meant enduring relentless hardship and indignity.

British historian Emily Cockayne’s Hubbub: Filth, Noise & Stench in England, 1600–1770 provides a window into the lives of ordinary people in the preindustrial and early industrial era. A “social history,” the book conveys how the world sounded, smelled, felt, and tasted—a horror show beyond the comprehension of most modern people. The chapters bear titles such as “Itchy,” “Mouldy,” “Grotty,” “Dirty,” and “Gloomy.”

A preindustrial person transported to the present day would be amazed by the current prevalence of relatively smooth, clear skin enabled by better general health in addition to the widespread use of sunscreen, moisturizers, and all manner of modern beauty treatments. In the past, frequent illnesses left victims permanently marked. To be “Pock-broken” or “pock-freckled” was a common descriptor. Skin was often directly disfigured by diseases and further damaged by how fleas and then-common medical conditions caused compulsive scratching. “Fleas would have been a common feature of institutions and inns, as well as domestic settings,” proliferating in crammed households, cities, and seaports. A Dutch traveler named William Schellinks (1623–1678) found the fleas in one English inn so “aggressive” that he opted to sleep on a hard bench rather than the provided bed. But fleas were far from the sole culprit. “Many conditions would have caused itching, including eczema, impetigo, ‘psorophthalmy’ (eyebrow dandruff), scabies, chilblains, chapped and rough skin, tetters’ (spots and sores), ‘black morphew’ (leprous or scurvy skin) and ringworm. Few citizens [of Britain] enjoyed smooth unblemished skin.”

If you could visit the past, you would be shocked at the commonness not just of pockmarks but also of oozing open sores. “Venereal disease was the secret epidemic that blighted the entire period,” resulting in such outward signs as “weeping sores on the lips” and “pocky” countenances. Many other diseases also produced wounds that festered and exuded foul discharges on the faces of everyday people. “In this pre-antibiotic era, skin eruptions in the forms of bulging pustules, lesions, acne and gout-induced ulcers could all have become infected, causing chronic wounds.” Such skin problems affected all social classes. “In 1761, as an Oxford undergraduate, the parson-in-waiting James Woodforde . . . was plagued by a ‘bad Boyle on my Eye-brow’. This boil reappeared the following year, to be joined by a stye among his lower right eyelashes.”

With so many faces covered in scars, as well as boils and sores emitting blood and infected pus, it is an understatement to say the people of the past were in desperate need of skincare. Sadly, their primitive skincare and makeup regimens made matters even worse. “Caustic and toxic ingredients lurked in many ready-made and home-mixed cosmetics and toiletries. Eliza Smith’s cure for pimples included brimstone (sulphur). Johann Jacob Wecker suggested the use of arsenic and ‘Dogs-turd’ as ingredients for ointments to ‘make the nails fall’. The Duchess of Newcastle warned that the mercury in some cosmetics could cause consumption and oedema. Indeed, some preparations were so toxic that they could ‘take away both the Life and Youth of a Face, which is the greatest Beauty.’ The Countess of Coventry was said to have died from toxic properties in her cosmetics.” That countess, Maria Coventry née Gunning (1732–1760), died at age 27, likely of lead poisoning, as lead was a common ingredient in skin-whitening makeup at the time, despite lead’s propensity to make its wearers ill (or, in Maria’s case, deceased).

Even nonlethal makeup was of far poorer quality than today’s cosmetics, frequently dissolving and dripping. Women “shunned hot places for fear of melting visages.” Even royalty, with access to the best cosmetics of the era, fell victim to this tendency of makeup to drip. One observer remarked in his diary after seeing the queen of England at a banquet in 1662 that “her make-up was running down her sweaty face.”

The state of clothing for the masses contributed to skin and health problems. The truly poor bought used garments. “Poorer citizens rarely bought new items of clothing, but made do with second-, third- and fourth-hand clothes. . . . By the time they reached the poorest members of society, garments would be smutted, food-stained, sweat-ridden, pissburnt and might shine with grease. . . . Clothes in such a state would be hard, unyielding and smelly.”

“The second-hand market was a thriving one” in early modern London. “Some specialised in old shoes, or even old boots. [The Dutch-born artist] Marcellus Laroon included an image of a trader who exchanged brooms for casto-off shoes . . . in his Cryes of London (1688). . . . A high demand for second-hand clothing meant that garments constituted a considerable proportion of property that was stolen. Thomas Sevan was apprehended . . . wearing three stolen shirts in 1724. He had left his old ragged shirt behind at the scene of the crime. Elizabeth Pepys’s new farandine waistcoat was snatched from her lap as she sat in traffic in Cheapside. On Easter Monday 1732 John Elliott became the victim of highway robbers who relieved him of his hat, wig, waistcoat and shoes. . . . No item of clothing was immune from theft—even odd shoes and bundles of dirty washing were lifted.”

“Clothes could be taken to a botcher, or a botching tailor, for patching and repair. . . . Old shoes were rejuvenated or modified by cobblers, or ‘translators.’ The subsequent wearers of shoes would have worked their feet into spaces stretched to fit a foreign shape, which might have caused blisters, bunions and corns. . . . Partial unstitching and ‘turning’—the inner parts becoming the new exterior—could prolong the life of coats and other garments. Even the rich eked out the life of their favourite garments by turning, dyeing and scouring. . . . However, clothes could only be refashioned a limited number of times before they became napless, threadbare and tattered. If enough good fabric remained, this could be reused to make a smaller item of clothing, a garment for a child, or a cloth cap. . . . Tired garments were passed down to apprentices or servants.”

The condition of teeth was also disturbingly poor. “Queen Elizabeth sported black teeth. Emetics were popular cure-alls, and these would have hastened tooth decay through the acidic erosion of the enamel. Archaeological surveys suggest that the majority of early modern adults suffered tooth decay.” While they did not meet with much success, the people of the past certainly attempted to keep their teeth from rotting. “There was an array of dentifrice powders and cures on the market. Although most would have had little or no effect on cavities or diseased gums, some of these powders and recipes would have carried away some dirt and plaque from teeth. Powders were concocted from cuttlefish, cream of tartar and sal amoniack (ammonium chloride). These abrasive substances could be rubbed on” teeth, and some recommended “hard rubbing with a dry cloth or sage leaf” to cleanse teeth. The writer Thomas Tryon (1634–1703) recommended swishing river water as a mouthwash. Needless to say, such routines were insufficient. “A lack of adequate tooth cleansing and an inappropriate diet led to bad breath and also caused tooth decay.” Missing teeth were common. “A character in an eighteenth-century play bemoaned the poor dental state of London’s women” by claiming that “not one in ten has a Tooth left.” When those suffering from toothaches sought dental care, what passed for dentistry at the time could make matters even worse. Consider the unfortunate case of the English lawyer and politician Dudley Ryder (1691–1756). “After spending a month in 1715 chewing on just one side of his mouth to avoid the pain of a severely decayed tooth, Dudley Ryder finally summoned up the courage to have it drawn. In the process, a little of his jaw was broken off, but he rallied, claiming it didn’t hurt. Much. By the mid-eighteenth century wealthier citizens would have the option of trying out a transplant, using teeth from a paid donor.”

Tooth and skin problems were visible, but internal ailments that were less apparent also plagued our ancestors. One of the many negative health effects of animals crowding the cities was that parasites from the creatures often spread to humans. “The abundance of dogs and pigs on the city streets provided the perfect breeding ground for a variety of intestinal parasites, many of which wormed their way into humans. Eliza Smith asserted that ‘vast numbers’ were infested. Many bottoms would have itched with discomfort thanks to the presence of thread and tape worms in the digestive system. According to the numerous contemporary adverts, worms created a myriad of physical discomforts, including ‘pinching Pain in the Belly, when hungry, a stinking Breath’, vomiting, nightmares, pallidness, fever and teeth gnashing.” The animals caused other problems as well. “Neighbours near to houses in which beasts were kept or slaughtered would have endured stench and noise.” For example, “those living near Lewis Smart’s huge piggery on London’s Tottenham Court Road described how servants fell sick and resigned on account of the smell, which ‘Drive thro’ the walls of the houses.’ Visitors to the house opposite were forced to hold their noses, and one neighbour explained how the fumes dirtied newly laundered linen and tarnished plate.”

The people of the past often went hungry. “Recording a high rate of corn spoilage in 1693, due to a wet summer season, [the English antiquary] Anthony Wood noted that scarcity pushed prices out of the pockets of the poor, who were forced to ‘eat turnips instead of bread’. During this dearth [the writer] Thomas Tryon outlined a diet for a person on a budget of twopence per day. The recipes are uniformly bland: flour, water, milk and peas, all boiled to differing consistencies.”

Food often spoiled during transport to the market. “Eggs that came to London from Scotland or Ireland were often rotten by the time they arrived.” Food was often adulterated, and some degree of adulteration was considered unavoidable. Malt was only deemed unacceptable if it contained “half a peck of dust or more” per quarter. “Butchers would disguise stale slaughtered birds. [A contemporary account] warns of one such operator who greased the skin and dredged on a fine powder to make the bird strike ‘a fine Colour.’” Butter was frequently adulterated with “tallow and pig’s lard.” “Some fishmongers coated gills with fresh blood, as red gills indicated a recent netting,” to misrepresent stale fish to the unwary buyer. Fish were often wormy and if not cooked thoroughly remained so at the time of serving. The English statesman Samuel Pepys (1633–1703) once noted his disgust at the sight of a sturgeon dish upon which he observed “very many little worms creeping.”

Bread, the mainstay of most diets, was not immune to contamination. “Some loaves were deliberately adulterated with stones and other items to bulk them up.” In 1642, an unscrupulous Liverpool woman named Alice Gallaway “tried to sell a white loaf that contained a stone, to make up its weight. This sort of practice would have been widespread—the baker could claim that the stone had not been removed in milling, and blamed the miller. Stone, grit and other unwelcome contaminants would have posed dangers to the teeth of the unwary.” Millers also engaged in such unethical behavior as adding “beanmeal, chalk, animal bones and slaked lime” to disguise musty flour. Perhaps it should be no surprise then that London bread was described in 1771 as “a deleterious paste, mixed up with chalk, alum and bone ashes, insipid to the taste and destructive to the constitution.”

There are even accounts of human remains being added to food for sale, resulting in unknowing cannibalism on the part of the buyer. The author of the 1757 public health treatise Poison Detected claimed, “The charnel houses of the dead are raked to add filthiness to the food of the living.” The squalid state of the marketplace further exposed food to pollution or contamination. “The market stalls, and the streets on which they stood, were frequently described as being filthy and strewn with rotting debris.” Flies and other insects swarmed each market. “Hanging meats were vulnerable to attack by hopper-fly, and if they got too warm they would rust and spoil.” The smoke of London’s chimneys was said to fill the air and “so Mummife, drye up, wast and burn [hanging meat in the marketplace], that it suddainly crumbles away, consumes and comes to nothing.”

The population was so accustomed to foul-smelling meat that “in 1736 a bundle of rags that concealed a suffocated newborn baby was mistaken for a joint of meat by its stinking smell.” Between the bugs, the smoke, and the dirt, few groceries reached customers unscathed. One 18th-century writer complained of “pallid contaminated mash, which they call strawberries; soiled and tossed by greasy paws through twenty baskets crusted with dirt.” The state of the marketplace even inspired deprecating lyrics, such as these from 1715, “As thick as Butchers Stalls with Fly-blows [where] every blue-ars’d Insect rambles.” “As the market day progressed, perishables . . . were more likely to be fly-blown or decayed.” Those undesirable leftovers unsold at the end of the market day were often later hawked by street vendors. A letter in The Spectator in 1712 complained that everything sold by such vendors was “perished or putrified.” Recipes took into account the poor quality of available ingredients. “Imparting some dubious tips for restoring rotting larder supplies, [cookbook author] Hannah Glasse’s strategy ‘to save Potted Birds, that begin to be bad’ (indeed, those which ‘smell so bad, that no body [can] . . . bear the Smell for the Rankness of the Butter’) involved dunking the birds in boiling water for thirty seconds, and then merely retopping with new butter.”

Yet those shopping at the marketplace with all its terrors were relatively fortunate compared to others. Broken victuals, the remnants and scrapings from the more affluent plates, were a perk of service for some servants, and the saviour of many paupers.” One account from 1709 tells of a woman reduced to living off “a Mouldy Cryst [crust] and a Cucumber” while breastfeeding, an activity that greatly increases caloric needs. Desperation sometimes resulted in swallowing nonfood objects, such as wax, to ease hunger pangs. “Witnesses reported that a young London servant girl was so hungry in 1766 that she ate cabbage leaves and candles.” She was far from the first person to use candle wax as a condiment. “The underfed spread butter thickly on bread (this was necessary to facilitate swallowing dark or stale bread). Cheap butter was poor grade, akin to grease . . . a ‘tallowy rancid mass’ made of candle ends and kitchen grease was the worst type” of concoction to pass under the name of butter. Another account of hunger from 1756 relates how a starving woman felt “obliged to eat the cabbage stalks off the dunghill.”

The people of the past also had good reason to wonder whether their homes would collapse around them. “A proverb warned that ‘old buildings may fall in a moment’. So familiar was the sound of collapsing masonry that in 1688 Randle Holme included ‘a crash, a noise proceeding from a breach of a house or wall’ in a list of only nine descriptive sentences to illustrate the ‘Sense of Hearing’. Portmeadow House in Oxford collapsed in the early seventeenth century. Among the casualties recorded in the Bills of Mortality for 1664 was one hapless soul killed by a falling house in St Mary’s Whitechapel . . . Dr Johnson described London of the 1730s as a place where ‘falling Houses thunder on your Head.’ . . . In the 1740s, ‘Props to Houses’ appeared among a list of common items hindering free passage along the pavement in London. A German visitor wondered if he should go into the street in 1775 during a violent storm, ‘lest the house should fall in, which is no rare occurrence in London.’” “Thomas Atwood, a Bath plumber and property developer, died in 1775 when the floor of an old house gave way.” Regulations sometimes made matters worse, preventing the tearing down of homes on the verge of collapse. One account notes that homes in disrepair became “the rendezvous of thieves; and at last . . . fall of themselves, to the great distress of whole neighborhoods, and sometimes to bury passengers in their ruins.” Windy days could knock down homes. “Gales swept [London] in 1690, leaving ‘very many houses shattered, chimneys blowne down.’”

Inside, homes were often filled with smoke from fireplaces. “With open fires providing most of the heating, filthy discharges of soot and smut clung to interiors.” Even with regular chimney sweepings, clogged chimney pots and soot deluges could and did occur. One writer railed against the “pernicious smoke . . . superinducing a sooty Crust or furr upon all that it lights, spoyling the moveables, tarnishing the Plate, Gildings and Furniture, and Corroding the very Iron-bars and hardest stone with those piercing and acrimonious Spirits which accompany its Sulphur.” Interior smoke disturbed the air of the humblest homes and the grandest palaces alike. The German consul Zacharias Conrad von Uffenbach (1683–1734) complained that the Painted Chamber of London’s Westminster Hall could “scarce be seen for the smoke” that filled the interior; in the Upper Chamber he similarly noted that the tapestries were “so wretched and tarnished with smoke that neither gold nor silver, colours or figures can be recognized.”

“Householders struggled to contain infestations of vermin.” This was a problem even in well-off homes. Samuel Pepys recorded in his diary his multiyear struggle with mice, which “scampered across his desk” with abandon despite his purchase of a cat and deployment of mousetraps. “In 1756 Harrop’s Manchester Mercury ran an advert for a book detailing how to rid houses of all manner of vermin,” including adders, ants, badgers, birds, caterpillars, earwigs, flies, fish, fleas, foxes, frogs, gnats, lice, mice, moles, otters, polecats, rabbits, rats, snakes, scorpions (an invasive species of which had entered England via Italian masonry shipments), snails, spiders, toads, wasps, weasels, and worms.

As if that wasn’t enough to keep people up at night, nighttime was loud. Crying babies and the moaning of the hungry, ill, and dying echoed in the night, as well as the pained wails of women suffering through domestic violence. In London, in 1595, a law was passed to prevent men from beating their wives after 9 p.m. The legislation was not prompted by concern for the wives (after all, wife-beating was generally accepted as normal and morally unproblematic) but by consideration for neighbors trying to sleep through the noise. The law read in part: “No man shall after the houre of nine at the Night, keepe any rule whereby any such suddaine out-cry be made in the still of the Night, as making any affray, or beating hys Wife, or servant.” A similar law forbade smiths from using their hammers “after the houre of nyne in the night, nore afore the houre of four in the Morninge.”

The book gives insight into a far crueler and more violent society. Legal punishments could be grotesque and sadistic. For example, in 1611, a woman who had conducted “lewd acts . . . was punished by the Westminster burgesses by being stripped naked from the waist upwards, fastened to a cart, and whipped through the streets on a cold December day.” Women deemed “scolds” were often publicly humiliated in ritual fashion. “Ducking stools or cuckstools were equipment for punishing scolds and were items of town furniture [and] were still used as a deterrent in the eighteenth century. Ducking was a rite of humiliation intended to put the woman in her place and to teach her a lesson.” Many towns took pride in the maintenance of their ducking stools, and sometimes a device with a similar rationale called a “scold’s bridle,” an iron muzzle that enclosed the head and compressed the tongue to silence the unfortunate wearer.

“Across the country [of England] the civic authorities ensured that their cuckstools were functioning. In 1603 the Southampton authorities complained that ‘the Cuckinge stoole on the Towne ditches is all broken’ and expressed their desire for a new one, to ‘punish the manifold number of scoldinge woemen that be in this Towne’. The following year they wondered whether a stool-on-wheels might be invented. This could be carried from dore to dore as the scolde shall inhabit’. This mobile stool would, it was explained, be ‘a great ease to mr mayor . . . whoe is daylie troubled w[i]th suche brawles’. The Oxford Council erected a cuck stool at the Castle Mills in 1647. The Manchester stool was set up in 1602 ‘for the punyshement of Lewde Wemen and Scoldes . . . six scolds were immersed in 1627. A decade later the town added a scold’s bridle to their armoury of reform. A new ducking chair was erected in ‘the usual place’ in 1738. Even as late as 1770 a knot and bridle hung from the door of the stationers, near the Dark Entry in the Market Place ‘as a terror to the scolding huxter-women.’”

Outhouses doubled as dumping grounds for victims of infanticide with shocking frequency. “Much of what we know about London’s privies and houses of ease comes from unpleasant witness statements concerning gruesome discoveries of infants’ corpses found among the filth. In the trial of Mercy Hornby for killing her newborn daughter we find details of the privy into which the child was cast. Newly constructed in the 1730s, it was six foot deep, with just over three feet of soil at the time of the incident.”

And that is only a small slice of the manifold horrors detailed in Cockayne’s book, where practically every page provides fresh fodder for nightmares.

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