Baby Reindeer, the autobiographical Netflix series about one comedian’s experience of stalking, has consistently been in the streamer’s top ten most-watched since its release. The story follows barman-cum-comedian Donny, played by Richard Gadd whose real-life experiences inform the show, as an encounter with a woman changes his life. When Martha comes into his pub visibly upset and unable to afford anything, Donny offers her a cup of tea. We see that act of kindness turn into a years-long obsession as Martha stalks Donny, his parents and his girlfriend. Critics have praised the series calling ..read more

Lizavetta/Shutterstock It’s a cliche of reporting on people who reach 100 years of age, or even 110, to ask them some variation of the question: “What did you do to live this long?” Inevitably, some interesting and unexpected answer is highlighted. Fish and chips every Friday. Drinking a glass of strong liquor every day. Bacon for breakfast every morning. Wine and chocolate. While a popular news story, this is a relatively meaningless question that doesn’t help us understand why certain people have lived so long. Let me try to explain why, via beautiful buildings, fighter pilots and statistics ..read more

Students expressing solidarity with Palestinians and protesting Israel’s war in Gaza have set up encampments on campuses around the UK. Around 15 encampments have emerged in Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh, Warwick Manchester and others. They’ve also emerged in other countries including France and Ireland. Broadly, students are calling for transparency over and divestment from universities’ financial links with Israeli companies (particularly those involved in the arms industry). They are demanding university leaders cut ties with Israeli universities, increase resources (including scholarships f ..read more

Future geologists may wonder how this cow (native to Eurasia) found itself in a California wildfire. BettyBop / Shutterstock When we think of fossils it is usually of dinosaurs, or perhaps the beautiful spiral shape of an ammonite picked up on a beach during a summer holiday. We see fossils as ancient relics of the deep past that allow us to marvel at the history of life on Earth, of animals that walked or swam many millions of years ago, of the giant trees that became buried and crushed to form coal. Fossils are an essential record of life on Earth that demonstrate long periods of stability ..read more

After the dust settled, Apple accepted the ad didn't land as it hoped. Apple There is a fine line between creativity and self-destruction. Apple’s new crush advert, which shows items linked to creative pursuits being pulverised to make way for the new iPad Pro, tried to find that line but instead appears to have made a rare mis-step. It has angered a lot of people in the process. Apple has now apologised and said it no longer plans to air the ad on TV. Creative destruction is a term coined in the 1940s to describe revolutionising the economic structure from within – destroying the old one to m ..read more

It's still in there! Maxim Elramsisy/Shutterstock Independent US presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s health is in the spotlight again – this time relating to a neurological issue. In a 2012 deposition recently reviewed by the New York Times, the politician revealed that in 2010 a worm got into his brain “ate a portion of it and then died”. Kennedy had been suffering from cognitive difficulties. Doctors initially suspected that he had a brain tumour, but it turned out to be a parasite infection – specifically, a pork tapeworm larva lodged in his brain. This particular parasite (Taenia ..read more

If you visit the National Gallery you will see a number of wonderful renaissance paintings by Northern Italian masters. At the time of their acquisition, in the gallery’s early days, these painting were not, however, highly sought after. Initially, the focus for the National Gallery’s collection was set by Sir Charles Lock Eastlake, the gallery’s first director. For Eastlake, the collection needed to showcase the masters of the Italian renaissance, reflecting popular tastes in the 19th century. This canon of the greats comprised the coveted masters such as Raphael, Michelangelo, Leonardo and B ..read more

Christoph Burgstedt / Shutterstock AlphaFold 3, unveiled to the world on May 9, is the latest version of an algorithm designed to predict the structures of proteins – vital molecules used by all life – from the “instruction code” in their building blocks. Predicting protein structures and the way they interact with other molecules has been one of the biggest problems in biology. Yet, AI developer Google DeepMind has gone some way to solving it in the last few years. This new version of the AI system features improved function and accuracy over its predecessors. Like the next release in a video ..read more

It’s a season of political change in Mexico. On June 2, millions of Mexicans will head to the polls to elect a new president, state governors and members of federal and local congresses, municipality administrations and town councils. In total, the elections will see nearly 21,000 positions filled. However, Mexico’s election season is also one of political violence. Between 2018 and March 2024, there were 1,709 targeted attacks, murders, assassinations and threats against people working in politics or government, or against government and party facilities. Most of these attacks occurred in the ..read more

A case of Lassa fever has been reported in Paris, France, sparking lurid warnings about the “horrific Ebola-like bug”. So what is Lassa fever and are comparisons with Ebola fair? Lassa virus (Lassa mammarenavirus) belongs to the Arenaviridae family and there are eight species of this family known to infect humans. What makes this group of viruses noteworthy are their relatively recent emergence as threats to human health (the first case was in Lassa, Nigeria, in 1969), the severity of disease they cause, and the fact that they are mostly transmitted to humans by rodents. And where you find peo ..read more