The Latest Breaking News from The Conversation Weekly

The Nobel Prize in chemistry for 2023 goes to three scientists “for the discovery and synthesis of quantum dots.” The Conversation Weekly podcast caught up with one of this trio, physical chemist Louis Brus, who did foundational work figuring out that the properties of these nanoparticles depend on their size.…

Imagine a particle so small that it’s the same relative size to a football as that ball is to the planet Earth. That’s the size of a quantum dot – a type of nanocrystal that changes colour depending on its size, and was once thought impossible to actually produce.

For generations, Neanderthals have been a source of fascination for scientists. This species of ancient hominim inhabited the world for around 500,000 years until they suddenly disappeared around 40,000 years ago. Today, the cause of their extinction remains a mystery.

Australia goes to the polls on October 14 in a referendum on whether to enshrine an Indigenous advisory body, known as the Voice to Parliament, into the country’s constitution.

The World Health Organization has approved a new vaccine that scientists argue will be a game-changer in the fight against malaria, which kills half a million people in Africa every year. Trials have shown that the R21/Matrix vaccine, developed by Oxford University together with the Serum Institute of India, reduces…

The world has waited decades for a malaria vaccine, and now two have come along in quick succession. On October 2, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended that a new malaria vaccine, R21, developed by the University of Oxford be rolled out for the prevention of malaria in children, just…

Spanish women are having fewer and fewer children, and yet the country has become the egg donation capital of Europe. In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, we find out about the experiences of women who decide to donate their eggs, and whether there are enough protections in place…

Despite the promise of the Oslo accords in the early 1990s, the negotiations that followed never cemented an Israel-Palestine peace deal. What lessons do they hold for the future?

When Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat shook hands on the White House lawn in September 1993, it was the beginning of a peace process, not a final agreement. In the second part of Inside the Oslo Accords, a special podcast series from The Conversation Weekly, we explore what happened in…

The photo marking the moment is so enduring because it once seemed so unlikely. President Bill Clinton towered over two other men as he encouraged them to shake hands. Yitzhak Rabin, then Israeli prime minister, and Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), were smaller in stature than…

To mark the 30th anniversary of the signing of the 1993 Oslo accords between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), The Conversation Weekly is launching a three-part podcast series. Inside the Oslo Accords revisits the history and legacy of this landmark moment in the Israel-Palestine peace process, through interviews…