News

To mark International Women’s Day (Sunday 8 March), the Cambridge Festival (16 March–2 April) is spotlighting the outstanding achievements of women across a wide range of disciplines.From breast cancer and music to reproduction and politics, the festival will showcase the ground breaking work of women who have profoundly influenced our understandin…

Differences in cellular pathway activity flip the switch from nocturnality to diurnality and explain a major evolutionary change humans have undergone.Early mammals were nocturnal, sleeping during the day while large predators were active. However, after the extinction of dinosaurs, several different lineages of mammals independently transitioned t…

Flexible electronics are often sold on a simple promise: bendable screens, lightweight solar cells or wearable devices that can bend and flex without breaking. But what does that ‘flexibility’ actually look like at the molecular scale, and how does it affect performance?Researchers led by the University of Cambridge say they have taken a first step…

Experts are warning that far from being over-diagnosed, people with ADHD are waiting too long for assessment, support and treatment.In a paper, published today in the British Journal of Psychiatry, a group of experts say there is no robust evidence that ADHD is over-diagnosed in the UK. They refute the view that ‘nowadays everyone has ADHD’, which …

Researchers have developed a wearable, comfortable and washable device called Revoice that could help people regain the ability to communicate naturally and fluently following a stroke, without the need for invasive brain implants.The device, whose development was led by researchers at the University of Cambridge, uses a combination of ultra-sensit…

Helping babies bloomOne in three babies admitted to a neonatal intensive care unit will fail their school readiness assessment at age five, with consequences lasting into adulthood. A new project aims to identify those babies at greatest risk and give them a helping hand to fulfil their potential.Every year in the UK, around 600,000 babies are born…

People prescribed the new generation of weight loss drugs may not receive sufficient nutritional guidance to support safe and sustainable weight loss, leaving them vulnerable to nutritional deficiencies and muscle loss, say experts at UCL and the University of Cambridge.If nutritional care is not integrated alongside treatment, there’s a risk of re…

Cambridge researchers have discovered that an existing therapy which boosts protective immune cells in people who recently had heart attacks reduces blood vessel inflammation and may reduce the likelihood of future heart attacks.For decades, we have known that inflammation contributes to heart disease, but effective treatments have remained elusive…

Cambridge and GSK announce new partnership to advance our understanding of the role of cells and tissues in disease, paving the way for new medical breakthroughsThe collaboration will use state-of-the-art genomics approaches in combination with machine learning methods to advance our scientific understanding of cells and tissues in health and disea…

Members of the collegiate University honoured for their outstanding contributions to society in science, education, medicine, the environment, and the arts.Girton College Honorary Fellow Dr Suzy Lishman CBE, and Murray Edwards College Honorary Fellow Meera Syal CBE have been awarded damehoods.Dr Lishman, a consultant cellular pathologist and medica…

A drug mimicking the hormone progesterone has anti-cancer activity when used together with conventional anti-oestrogen treatment for women with breast cancer, a new Cambridge-led trial has found.In the two-week window that we looked at, adding a progestin made the anti-oestrogen treatment more effective at slowing tumour growth. What was particular…

Cambridge AI spinout is helping factories become more productive, lower energy use and reduce emissionsUniversity of Cambridge spinout Matta has raised $14 million in funding to transform how products are designed and manufactured.Manufacturing underpins a third of global economic output yet remains plagued by inefficiencies that waste up to 20 per…

Funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe programme will support promising mid-career scientists to pursue creative research ideas across a broad range of scientific fields.Eight University of Cambridge researchers will receive a share of the European Research Council’s (ERC) record €728 million Consolidator Grant awards this year. The grant…

Bird flu viruses are a particular threat to humans because they can replicate at temperatures higher than a typical fever, one of the body’s ways of stopping viruses in their tracks, according to new research led by the universities of Cambridge and Glasgow.Understanding what makes bird flu viruses cause serious illness in humans is crucial for sur…

Sera Markoff has been appointed Plumian Professor of Astronomy and Experimental Philosophy at the University of Cambridge.One of the oldest named professorships in the world – founded in 1704 by Thomas Plume, after Sir Isaac Newton oversaw its creation – previous Plumian Professors include distinguished astronomers Sir Arthur Eddington, Sir Fred Ho…