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^BHormone replacement therapy.^b Close-up of Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) pills in a circular dispenser. HRT pills are synthetic hormones used to treat menopausal women. They counteract the hormone deficiency that occurs at menopause. These pills contain oestrogen, and often progestogen, drugs. HRT helps to prevent ^Iosteoporosis,^i ^Iatherosclerosis^i and ^Iatrophic vaginitis^i (where the vagina becomes thin and dry). Pills are taken daily on a monthly basis to coincide with the menstrual cycle. Adverse effects include nausea, tenderness of the breasts, fluid retention and leg cramps.

Outdated research on HRT is letting people down

31 August 2022

It's time to be clear about the evidence around hormone replacement therapy and let people make up their own minds

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein speaks at SESSION 5 at TED2022: A New Era. April 10-14, 2022, Vancouver, BC, Canada. Photo: Gilberto Tadday / TED

How I gave a TED talk on dark matter

31 August 2022

Giving a TED talk wasn't easy, but I wanted to make sure my audience came away with a better understanding of dark matter, writes Chanda Prescod-Weinstein

Our neighbouring planets can help us understand Earth's climate change

31 August 2022

Studying the atmospheres of Venus and Mars can help us learn how Earth's climate will look in the future, says David Grinspoon

Artistic reconstruction of Mbiresaurus raathi (foreground) with the rest of the Zimbabwean animal assemblage in the background. Includes two rhynchosaurs (front right), an aetosaur (left), and a herrerasaurid dinosaur chasing a cynodont (back right).

Two-legged dinosaur from Zimbabwe is the oldest ever found in Africa

31 August 2022

A predecessor of the long-necked sauropods named Mbiresaurus raathi provides clues about how climate restricted the range of early dinosaurs

Cup fungus (Dasyscyphella nivea) covered in water droplets, beside Zygote fungi (Zygomycota), close up. Hertfordshire, England, UK. November. Focus stacked image.

Fungi evolved their weird and wild shapes in two big bursts

30 August 2022

The vast array of shapes that fungi can take, including colourful mushroom caps and tangles of thread-like moulds, evolved in two big bursts hundreds of millions of years ago

A road damaged by flood waters following heavy monsoon rains in Madian, Pakistan

Deadly Pakistan floods are a climate catastrophe, says UN chief

30 August 2022

Eight weeks of torrential rain during a severe monsoon season have left a third of Pakistan underwater, in the worst flooding since 2010

A large, black Newfoundland dog with drool dripping from its half open mouth

Mucus has evolved at least 15 times in mammals

26 August 2022

Mucus-producing mucin proteins have repeatedly and independently emerged in mammals, possibly through co-option of existing proteins into slime factories

2ATWGRR Juvenile Pollock (Pollachius virens) school within the protective fronds of kelp near Port Joli, Nova Scotia, Canada. August

Heat-loving, oil-eating bacteria are seeping out of the seafloor

26 August 2022

A genetic analysis suggests that petroleum-eating bacteria that live thousands of metres beneath the seafloor seep out into the ocean where they may then float along currents

A drawing of one of Subsea Cloud's data centre pods

Underwater data centre in the Pacific could be running by end of year

26 August 2022

A start-up has developed data centre pods that can be submerged in the ocean to let the water naturally keep them cool. Cooling is normally very energy-intensive