This week, we look at cancer treatments for cats, the secrets of a distant nebula, and de-ageing sweeteners.
Ground-breaking treatment for cats with cancer
When Jak, a cat with cancer, was given six to eight weeks to live, his owners didn’t have much hope. But Jak, right, was enrolled on the first clinical trial of a new therapy that targets STAT3, a protein linked with cancer that until recently was considered “undruggable”.
The study in California involved 20 cats with head and neck cancer. In 35 per cent the tumours shrank or stabilised with minimal side effects. Jak’s symptoms eased and he survived for eight more months: enough time for a final Christmas with his family — and to give science a hopeful new lead.
Astronomers uncover nebula’s dusty secrets
The Butterfly Nebula was one of astronomy’s most mesmerising mysteries — until now. Last week the James Webb Space Telescope exposed the central star that has been obscured by cosmic dust.
It offers crucial insights into how sun-like stars meet their end, swelling dramatically and shedding layers to become “planetary nebulae”. Webb’s UK-built mid-infrared instrument also found crystalline silicates and jets of heavy metals surging from the core. The findings are a cosmic lab — and a preview of our sun’s destiny in billions of years.
Revolutionary revelation by scientists
In 1789, rumours spread across France that bandits, mobilised by nobles, were attacking villages and destroying crops. It wasn’t true but the resulting panic — the Great Fear — during the French Revolution has divided historians: were the rumours spontaneous or spread deliberately?
For a new study in Nature, European researchers tracked how the rumour spread epidemiologically, as if it were a disease. They found it followed epidemic dynamics and spread most in literate regions and where destroying land registers weakened feudal power.
Sweeteners in drinks may have de-ageing effects
A recent study published in the American Academy of Neurology suggests artificial sweeteners could have degenerative effects on cognitive skills and memory. Using a sample of 12,000 participants – with an average age of 52 – the study traced the effects of seven artificial sweeteners – from aspartame to saccharin – found in popular ultra-processed foods, including yoghurt, flavoured water, and energy drinks.
Scientists leading the research, which took place in Brazil, divided the sample pool into three groups, who all took varying amounts of the products containing artificial sweeteners. They were then given sporadic cognitive and memory tests. The results revealed the group with the highest intake experienced a 62 per cent faster decline in cognition than the lowest intake group, which is about the same as 1.6 years of ageing.
Damages of smoking runs in the family
New research from the University of Melbourne has found that children exposed to passive smoke are vulnerable to chronic respiratory diseases in later life. The study tracked families across decades and showed that when fathers had been around smoke during their own childhood, their sons and daughters were more likely to have weaker lungs well into adulthood.
Even if the children themselves did not grow up in a smoky household, the risk carried across generations, raising the odds of illnesses like COPD. The findings underscore that tobacco’s harms are not limited to the smoker alone but ripple outward, affecting health long after the cigarette is stubbed out. Researchers stress that fathers have a unique role in breaking this cycle.
