New Atlas

Science Audio available

Massive global health study reveals "disturbing" trends

Rich Haridy November 11, 2018

The annual Global Burden of Disease study is a giant peer-reviewed assessment of global health trends. The results this year, published across a series of articles in The Lancet, present some concerning trends, from a worrying plateau in global mortality rates to a decline in global fertility rates.

The annual Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study reveals some worrying trends in people's health around ...

Smartwatches Audio available

Fossil Sport boasts Qualcomm's newest wearable chip and plenty of sensors

David Nield November 8, 2018

The Fossil Sport is the latest smartwatch from Fossil, and as well as carrying an impressive number of onboard sensors, it also has the Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 3100 chip inside – the processor that is set to power the next generation of wearables running Google's Wear OS.

The Fossil Sport comes with a choice of six colors and 28 straps

Health & Wellbeing

Gut microbiome snapshot gives premature babies a better start

Michael Irving October 29, 2018

A new study has now found that a healthier gut microbiome can help premature babies grow faster, reducing or potentially preventing a lifetime of chronic health problems.

New research shows how a better understanding of the gut microbiome could give premature babies a ...

Health & Wellbeing Audio available

Anti-aging drug cocktail teases significant lifespan extension in early experiments

Rich Haridy October 22, 2018

Research has found that a novel drug cocktail almost doubled the lifespan of a microscopic worm, the largest drug-induced lifespan extension in an animal ever reported. The study suggests that pharmacological intervention to help us live longer could be a realistic proposition.

The microscopic C. elegans worms, often used in anti-aging studies, had their lifespan almost doubled after ...

Science

Legal marijuana: The world watches as Canada’s massive social experiment begins

Rich Haridy October 20, 2018

As Canada becomes only the second country in the world to legalize recreational marijuana, the world is closely watching. The country will offer the grandest social experiment we have ever seen in drug legalization and may help answer some questions that have been divisively debated for decades.

What are the questions we hope the Canada experiment will help us answer?

Health & Wellbeing

Orwellian "smart mirror" tells you how to fix your face

James Holloway October 19, 2018

Mirror, mirror, show my reflection; tell me how to fix my complexion. That's the premise behind HiMirror's HiMirror Classic: a smart-mirror with built-in camera designed to help beauty professionals. But with the new Mini, they're cutting out the go-between so you won't even need to leave the house.

The first HiMirror Mini Premiums are estimated to ship on November 5

Biology

Could a microbial "Noah's Ark" save good gut bugs from disappearing?

Michael Irving October 8, 2018

Maintaining the right microbial balance is crucial to your health, but antibiotics and poor diet have reduced the diversity of human microbiota. To preserve that diversity before it’s gone for good, a team of scientists is now calling for the creation of a microbial “Noah’s Ark.”

To protect microbiota diversity and, by extension, human health, researchers have suggested creating a microbial "Noah's ...

Biology

Electric bacteria found in the human gut

Michael Irving September 18, 2018

The diverse microbes that live in your gut keep turning up new surprises. Now researchers at UC Berkeley have found that some species of gut-dwelling bacteria can generate electricity.

An artist's rendition of Listeria bacteria, which have been found to produce electricity

Health & Wellbeing

Starkey's latest hearing aid doubles as a health tracker

Paul Ridden August 28, 2018

Starkey Hearing Technologies has transformed a single use device into a multi-purpose hearing aid, adding physical activity and cognitive tracking smarts to a device that essentially moves health trackers away from the wrist and wraps them around the ears.

The Livio AI hearing aid can track physical activity and cognitive health, take phone calls, interface ...

Science

Scientists may have uncovered exactly how eating certain vegetables can prevent colon cancer

Rich Haridy August 15, 2018

Newsflash - eating vegetables is good for you! OK, so this may not exactly be new information, but a new study has revealed for the first time one of the key biological mechanisms at play explaining how chemicals produced by some vegetables can prevent cancer and colon inflammation.

When we eat vegetables from the Brassica genus, our guts produce a chemical now identified as ...