New Scientist

New Scientist covers the latest developments in science and technology that will impact your world. New Scientist employs and commissions the best writers in their fields from all over the world. Our editorial team provide cutting-edge news, award-winning features and reports, written in concise and clear language that puts discoveries and advances in the context of everyday life today and in the future.

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A healthy dose of AI • Deployed in the right way, artificial intelligence in medicine can save lives

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Celestial peek-a-boo

AI boost to cancer detection • Radiologists who chose to use AI assistance were better at identifying breast cancer in a large, real-world test, finds Chris Stokel-Walker

Can AI listen to patients?

Scorpion ‘spits’ venom to defend itself from predators

Permafrost thaw beneath Arctic lakes poses threat

Why US obesity rates have fallen for the first time in decades • After years of rising, the obesity rate dipped slightly in the US during 2023, though experts disagree about the exact cause, finds Grace Wade

Dinosaur highway • Giant footprint site showcases dinosaurs that wandered the UK

AI helps avatars behave more like us

Google’s uncertain quantum future • The tech giant is racing ahead in building error-correcting quantum computers, but it may ultimately fall behind, finds Karmela Padavic-Callaghan

Pluto may have captured its moon Charon with a brief kiss

AI helps work out what someone is trying to say

Delicate robot hands know just how hard to squeeze

Global treaty is failing to curb ultra-potent greenhouse gas

Atoms bent in ‘impossible’ test • Diffracting hydrogen and helium atoms with a crystal was thought too difficult – until now

People ate lots of foxes and wildcats 10,000 years ago

Error found in decades-old proof • Researchers working to make maths machine-readable discovered a nasty surprise

Say goodbye to deep snow across the US if world warms

Blinking could give your brain a microbreak

Climate change may have killed ancient ‘hobbit’

Dolphins may use their teeth to hear underwater

Crystal-based cooling could make fridges sustainable

Ozempic has heart health benefits • Treatments containing semaglutide may aid the heart even without any weight loss

Ancient dress had a striking pattern for its time

Children are more than the future • We need to stop ignoring the views of young people on artificial intelligence. They are already at the sharp end of its development, says Mhairi Aitken

This changes everything • Back to the future Sticks found in a cave that date back 12,000 years show people of that time already had a conception of history and the future, says Annalee Newitz

Marble marvel

Your letters

The man who loved animals • In the centenary of naturalist Gerald Durrell’s birth, a new memoir adds rich new layers to what we know about the man, finds Chris Simms

Chocolate’s dark heart • Could reviving wild cocoa produce great chocolate ethically? Jason Arunn Murugesu explores a nerve-racking tale

New Scientist recommends

Learning to read the runes • Here’s my prediction: you will love a new exhibition on archaic ways of telling the future. The show may be tiny, but it packs a big punch, says Simon Ings

Bursting the bubble • A radical new insight into the nature of quantum reality suggests that multiple parallel universes might not exist after all. Michael Brooks investigates

Cold comfort • Some penguins are proving to be surprisingly adaptable, but it may not be enough to save them from climate change, says Colin Barras

“Music gives your body and brain a...