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Hantavirus: WHO chief says public health risk is low
The origin of the outbreak is still unknown, with the World Health Organisation saying investigations are “still under way”.
Hantavirus survivor says sickness was like ‘hell on earth’
Two survivors who caught the hantavirus years earlier told the BBC they both felt lucky to be alive.
When does snoring become a problem?
When should we worry that our snoring might be the sign of a larger problem?
The Neighbourhood Bumped From Its Primetime Slot After Falling Viewing Figures
Graham Norton’s reality show The Neighbourhood has been pulled from its primetime TV slot just weeks after its big launch.
According to this week’s ITV schedule, The Neighbourhood has been bumped from its regular 9pm slot on Thursdays and Fridays back to 10.45 pm, in a huge blow for the struggling series.
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The competition show sees real-life friends and families move into a community to compete against each other for a life-changing amount of money.
In Thursday’s schedule, it’s been replaced by an old episode of Davina McCall‘s Long Lost Family, which originally aired two years ago.
On Friday, meanwhile, the 9pm slot is now occupied by an episode of Beat The Chasers, which was first shown in 2021.
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An ITV rep told The Sun: “The full box set of The Neighbourhood is now available to stream on ITVX. Additionally, the show will continue to air in an evening slot on ITV.”
Despite its starry presenter, a huge promotional push by ITV and prime-time slot, The Neighbour was met with poor reviews when it premiered towards the end of April, and had reportedly only pulled in 500k viewers by its third episode.
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This follows a trend of poor ratings for recent ITV shows they hoped would rival the success of The Traitors, with Genius Game and The Fortune Hotel also suffering from disappointing viewing figures, and both having since been cancelled by the channel.
Despite its poor performance, Graham had previously spoken enthusiastically about The Neighbourhood, insisting: “It leans into our curiosity about what’s behind closed doors and there’s something really compelling and addictive about seeing the way the existing households interact with each other.
“I thought, ‘I’d watch that’ – and I’d never want to work on something I wouldn’t watch. I thought, ‘this show would hook me!’.”
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The Neighbourhood continues at 10.45pm on Thursday and Friday on ITV1, with the full series available to stream on ITVX now.
Jane Fonda Gets Reflective About ‘Complicated’ Marriage To The Late Ted Turner
Jane Fonda has shared her thoughts on her “complicated” marriage to media mogul Ted Turner in an exceptionally earnest tribute following the news of his death at the age of 87.
Offering her “immediate thoughts about Ted” in a Wednesday afternoon Instagram post, the Hollywood veteran and lifelong activist looked back on their relationship as “challenging”, while adding that she had “always been up for a challenge, and with Ted it was almost always worth it”.
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“He swept into my life, a gloriously handsome, deeply romantic, swashbuckling pirate and I’ve never been the same,” she said of Turner, who was her husband from 1991 until their divorce in 2001.
Explaining how it felt for the multifaceted billionaire to need her love, Fonda wrote: “No one had ever let me know they needed me, and this wasn’t your average human being that needed me, this was the creator of CNN, and Turner Classic Movies, who had won the America’s Cup as the world’s greatest sailor.
“He had a big life, a brilliant mind and a soaring sense of humour.”
Jean-Pierre REY via Getty Images
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She also acknowledged his ability to care for her, writing: “To be needed and cared for simultaneously is transformative.”
“Ted Turner helped me believe in myself. He gave me confidence. I think I did the same for him, but that’s what women are raised to do,” the Oscar winner went on to say, calling Turner’s ability to be vulnerable one of his “greatest strengths”.
Fonda said she learned more from Turner than “more than any other person or school classes” could teach before remarking how he was the “most competitive person” she had ever met – besides storied actor Katharine Hepburn – and how “fascinating” that was “to witness”.
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“Whether it was who’d made the most ski runs at the end of the day, to acres of land owned (stewarded is the more fitting word for his relationship to land), who had the most billions, how many countries he’d made love to his prior lover in and could I match that, it was challenging,” she said.
Continuing her lengthy homage in the comments, the Barbarella star said: “I loved Ted with all my heart.”
Ben Rose via Getty Images
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“I see him in heaven now with all the wildlife he helped bring back from extinction,” Fonda went on. “
The black footed ferrets, the prairie dogs, Big Horned sheep, Mexican Gray Wolf, the Yellowstone wolf pack, bison, the red cockaded woodpecker and so many more, they’re all gathered at the pearly gates applauding and thanking him for saving their species.”
Addressing the five offspring that now survive Turner, she called them, “five talented, complex kids who I had the privilege of becoming stepmother to”.
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“I love them to this day,” she went on. “If it was complicated to be married to him, think how complicated it was being his child. And they are all doing fine.”
“Rest in Peace, dearest Ted,” her message ended. “You are loved and you will be remembered.”
Though the couple split in 2001, they remained friends after.
Less than a week before his death, Fonda had called the television trailblazer her “favourite ex-husband” during the opening of this year’s TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood, adding that founding the festival’s namesake network, Turner Classic Movies, is just one of the “great things that he did”.
Turner will also be remembered as the creator of CNN, the world’s first 24-hour cable news channel, as well as WTBS and TNT.
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Sydney Sweeney Opens Up About Shooting Euphoria’s Latest ‘Crazy’ Party Scene
Sydney Sweeney is lifting the lid on shooting one of Euphoria season three’s most memorable sequences.
In the most recent episode of the divisive drama, Sydney’s character Cassie was seen embracing a different sort of lifestyle afforded to her by her new OnlyFans career, including a lavish influencer party.
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While this party eventually descended into more of the extreme scenes that has seen Euphoria’s third iteration prove divisive among viewers, the Emmy nominee has made it clear that she had a blast filming the episode.
“Maddy transforms Cassie back into Cassie’s most glorious self, and she takes it from there,” she explained in a behind-the-scenes video posted on HBO’s YouTube page.
“There is nothing like a Euphoria party. Every season, Sam [Levinson, Euphoria’s creator] always writes in one.”
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Admitting that she uses these scenes to live vicariously through her character, Sydney continued: “I don’t really go to parties, so this is my time where I get to have fun through Cassie. And she lets loose! This girl knows how to party, she’s having the time of her life.”
Interspersed with shots of Sydney and hundreds of extras partying, she added: “I was like, ‘are we ever going to call cut?’. I didn’t know what to do! I don’t know how to dance. I thought my wig was going to fly off, I’m whipping my hair all over the place. It was crazy.”
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Over the last few weeks, Cassie’s Euphoria storyline has continued to raise eyebrows, with many critics describing some of Sydney’s scenes as “degrading”, “horrible” and comparable to a “humiliation ritual” for the actor.
Sam Levinson said earlier this week: “What’s interesting is if you push it a little bit, [Sydney] becomes brilliant. You just do a few more takes, and she can reach these levels that are very honest emotionally, but also deeply funny.”
He added: “She’s able to anchor the scene with this kind of madness and chaos going on around her.”
Euphoria airs weekly on Sky and Now in the UK.
Scientists accidentally discover DNA that breaks the rules of life
A test designed to push the limits of single cell DNA sequencing ended up revealing something far more surprising: a microscopic organism from a pond at Oxford University Parks appears to use the genetic code in a way scientists had not seen before.
Dr. Jamie McGowan, a postdoctoral scientist at the Earlham Institute, was studying the genome of a protist collected from freshwater. The goal was practical. Researchers wanted to test a DNA sequencing pipeline that could work with extremely small amounts of DNA, including DNA from a single cell.
Instead, the team found an unexpected genetic outlier. The organism, identified as Oligohymenophorea sp. PL0344, turned out to be a previously unknown species with a rare change in how it reads DNA instructions and builds proteins. The PLOS Genetics study reported that two codons normally associated with gene stopping signals had been reassigned to different amino acids, a combination the researchers described as previously unreported.
“It’s sheer luck we chose this protist to test our sequencing pipeline, and it just shows what’s out there, highlighting just how little we know about the genetics of protists.”
A Tiny Organism With a Big Genetic Surprise
Protists are difficult to define neatly because they are so diverse. Many are microscopic, single celled organisms, including amoebas, algae, and diatoms. Others are much larger and multicellular, such as kelp, slime molds, and red algae.
“The definition of a protist is loose — essentially it is any eukaryotic organism which is not an animal, plant, or fungus,” said Dr. McGowan. “This is obviously very general, and that’s because protists are an extremely variable group.
“Some are more closely related to animals, some more closely related to plants. There are hunters and prey, parasites and hosts, swimmers and sitters, and there are those with varied diets while others photosynthesize. Basically, we can make very few generalizations.”
Oligohymenophorea sp. PL0344 belongs to a group called ciliates. These swimming protists can be seen under a microscope and are found in many watery environments. Ciliates have become especially interesting to geneticists because they are known hotspots for genetic code changes, including changes involving stop codons.
When Genetic Stop Signs Change Meaning
In most living things, three stop codons tell the cell where a gene ends: TAA, TAG, and TGA. These work like punctuation marks in the genetic instructions, signaling that protein construction should stop.
The genetic code is usually described as nearly universal because most organisms use the same basic rules. Variations do occur, but they are rare. In the small number of known genetic code variants, TAA and TAG usually change together and usually end up meaning the same thing. That pattern suggested the two codons were evolutionarily linked.
“In almost every other case we know of, TAA and TAG change in tandem,” explained Dr. McGowan. “When they aren’t stop codons, they each specify the same amino acid.”
This organism did something different. In Oligohymenophorea sp. PL0344, only TGA appears to function as a stop codon. The other two signals have been repurposed. TAA specifies lysine, while TAG specifies glutamic acid. The researchers also found more TGA codons than expected, which may help compensate for the loss of the other two stop signals. The PLOS Genetics paper reported that the remaining UGA stop codon is enriched just after coding regions, suggesting it may help prevent harmful readthrough when translation continues too far.
“This is extremely unusual,” Dr. McGowan said. “We’re not aware of any other case where these stop codons are linked to two different amino acids. It breaks some of the rules we thought we knew about gene translation — these two codons were thought to be coupled.
“Scientists attempt to engineer new genetic codes — but they are also out there in nature. There are fascinating things we can find, if we look for them.
“Or, in this case, when we are not looking for them.”
How Cells Read DNA Instructions
DNA can be thought of as a set of instructions, but the instructions must be copied and interpreted before they have an effect. First, a gene is transcribed into RNA. That RNA copy is then translated into amino acids, which are linked together to form proteins and other functional molecules.
Translation begins at the DNA start codon (ATG) and normally ends at a stop codon (normally TAA, TAG, or TGA). In this ciliate, that familiar ending system has been rearranged. The discovery shows that even one of biology’s most conserved systems can be more flexible than expected.
The team’s genome and transcriptome analysis also identified suppressor tRNA genes that match the reassigned codons, supporting the conclusion that the organism truly reads these former stop signals as amino acids. In the study, UAA was found to code for lysine and UAG for glutamic acid.
Later Work Shows Ciliates Are Genetic Rule Breakers
Follow up work has strengthened the idea that ciliates are unusually rich sources of genetic code surprises. In a 2024 PLOS Genetics study, researchers reported multiple independent reassignments of the UAG stop codon in phyllopharyngean ciliates. Some uncultivated ciliates from the TARA Oceans dataset appear to use UAG to encode leucine, while Hartmannula sinica and Trochilia petrani were found to use UAG to encode glutamine.
That later study also found that UAA remains the preferred stop codon in those phyllopharyngean ciliates, while UAG has repeatedly shifted into a protein coding role. The findings point to repeated changes in the genetic code across poorly studied microbial eukaryotes and reinforce the idea that ciliates are among the strongest exceptions to the standard genetic code.
Together, these discoveries suggest that the genetic code is not as fixed as it once seemed. For most organisms, the rules remain remarkably stable. But in overlooked microbial life, especially ciliates, evolution has repeatedly found ways to edit the instructions.
Funding and Publication
The original research was published in PLOS Genetics in 2023. It was funded by the Wellcome Trust as part of the Darwin Tree of Life Project and supported by the Earlham Institute’s core funding from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), part of UKRI. The publication reported sequencing data and genome assembly resources deposited in public repositories.
People once risked everything just to keep their hats on
From courtroom standoffs to tense encounters with highway robbers, hats in early modern England carried far more meaning than simple fashion. New research reveals that what people wore on their heads could signal loyalty, rebellion, status, and even personal safety.
Today, choosing whether to wear a hat is a personal decision. But about 400 years ago, strict social rules governed “hatiquette,” and removing a hat was expected as a sign of respect. According to a study published in The Historical Journal (Cambridge University Press), refusing to doff (“do off”) a hat could serve as a deliberate and highly visible act of protest.
One striking example comes from 1630, when an outspoken oatmeal maker was brought before England’s highest church court. After being told that some of the judges were also privy councillors, he briefly removed his hat in acknowledgment. But he quickly put it back on, declaring, ‘as you are privy councillors … I put off my hat; but as ye [bishops] are rags of the Beast, lo! — I put it on again’.
This kind of behavior became more common during the turbulent reign of Charles I. As political tensions grew, refusing to remove a hat evolved into a widely recognized gesture of defiance, especially during the English Civil War.
From Social Custom to Political Protest
Historian Bernard Capp, Emeritus Professor at the University of Warwick, explains that hat etiquette once reinforced social hierarchy. “Long before the civil wars, men and boys were expected to doff their hats, indoors or out, whenever they met a superior,” he says. “That was about respecting your place in society, but in the revolutionary 1640s and 1650s, hat-honor became a real gesture of defiance in the political sphere.”
Prominent figures used this act to make powerful statements. In 1646, the radical Leveller John Lilburne, imprisoned in Newgate, prepared to appear before the House of Lords by resolving to ‘come in with my hat upon my head, and to stop my eares when they read my Charge, in detestation’. A few years later, in 1649, Digger leaders William Everard and Gerrard Winstanley refused to remove their hats when brought before General Fairfax, insisting he was ‘but their fellow Creature’. Others, including Fifth Monarchist Wentworth Day, followed suit in later prosecutions.
This gesture crossed political lines. After losing power, royalists also used it to signal resistance. Charles I himself kept his hat on during his trial in January 1649, rejecting the authority of the court. Similarly, the earl of Peterborough’s son refused both to remove his hat and to enter a plea when tried for treason in 1658.
At times, elites used hat etiquette in reverse. Some royalist leaders, including Lord Capel, removed their hats before execution as a calculated appeal to the crowd. As Capp explains, “This was a sort of populist political gesture, essentially inviting the moral support of the crowd.”
A Father’s Unusual Punishment
Not all hat-related conflicts played out in public arenas. Professor Capp highlights a revealing domestic story involving Thomas Ellwood and his father in 1659. In an effort to control his 19-year-old son, the father confiscated all of his hats.
Ellwood later recalled: ‘I was still under a kind of Confinement, unless I would have run about the Country bare-headed, like a Mad-Man’. Because going without a hat carried social stigma, he effectively remained confined at home. His repeated association with the Quakers, who were known for refusing to remove their hats, had already caused family disputes and even physical punishment.
Ellwood’s memoir, published in 1714, shows how deeply ingrained these norms were. As Capp notes, “It makes no sense to us today. But in 1659, father and son just saw this as common sense. Thomas couldn’t leave the house without a hat — it would have brought too much shame on himself and his family.”
Why Hat-Doffing Declined
Some historians have suggested that the rise of handshaking replaced hat-doffing, but Capp disagrees. “The handshake evolved very slowly as a mode of greeting and had no bearing on hat-honor as a gesture of deference,” he says.
Instead, several factors likely contributed to the shift. Social manners gradually became less formal. Wigs also became more popular, reducing the importance of hats. In crowded cities, constantly removing one’s hat may have simply become impractical. As Capp puts it, “Conventions gradually change over generations and are usually multicausal.”
Hats as Protection and Social Necessity
Even after political tensions eased in the 18th century, hats remained highly valued. Court records from the Old Bailey reveal that people often prioritized their hats over money during robberies.
In 1718, William Seabrook was attacked by thieves on Finchley Common and lost about £15. When they took his hat, he pleaded for its return, and the robbers eventually tossed it back. According to the record, ‘they also took away his Hat, upon which he begg’d of them not to take away his Hat and make him go home bare-headed; then they threw down his Hat in the Road and left it’.
Capp suggests there may have been an informal understanding between robbers and victims. “There seems to have been an unwritten convention that if victims meekly surrendered their valuables, they deserved at least a small favor,” he says.
Health concerns also played a role. Many men wore wigs over shaved heads, making them more vulnerable to cold weather. Medical advice at the time stressed the importance of keeping the head warm, warning that going outside without a hat could lead to illness.
A 1733 case illustrates this clearly. After being robbed at gunpoint, Francis Peters handed over his valuables but protested when the thief ‘snatch’t off my Hat and Wig,’ arguing that ‘it was very unusual for Men of his Profession to take such Things, and that it being very cold it might indanger my Health’. The thief ignored him, though he later apologized when confronted in prison.
The Social Meaning of Being Bareheaded
In 18th-century England, appearing without a hat carried serious social consequences. It was often associated with extreme poverty or mental instability. As a result, people were deeply concerned about being seen bareheaded, especially in legal settings.
Capp notes, “Even in London’s seedy underworld, a hat felt essential.” When Thomas Ruby was tried for burglary in 1741, he ‘begged very hard’ to have his hat returned, explaining ‘for he had none to wear’.
The significance of hats went beyond practicality. As Capp concludes, “What you wear says something about how you see yourself and the world. And the hat is so eloquent because it’s so versatile — you can position it in so many ways, take it off, wave it around, and attach messages to it.”
Conscious Growth Club Year 10 Video Invitation
I recorded a new video invitation for Conscious Growth Club Year 10.
Instead of walking through every feature or detail, I wanted to share more of the heart of CGC – what kind of space it is, why I continue tending it with so much care, and what I especially want to emphasize for this next year.
CGC is a high-trust, participatory self-development community for growth-oriented people who want more than ideas, insights, or solo reflection. It’s a place for turning inner growth into lived experience – with real support, honest connection, exploration, creativity, pleasure, belonging, and meaningful shifts in your actual life.
In the video, I talk about CGC as a collection of permission containers – spaces where people can open up more honestly, explore deeper layers of themselves, and receive caring human intelligence from others who genuinely want to help.
This year’s pulse is about landing more of that growth into life.
Less circling. More improvement.
Less forcing. More harmony and flow.
Less doing everything alone. More support, connection, and real human warmth.
I also share more about the heartspace of CGC – the intimacy, trust, friendship, encouragement, exploration, pleasure, creative flow, and identity expansion that can happen when growth is supported inside a caring community instead of being processed only in private.
If you’ve been considering CGC, this video should give you a clearer feel for the kind of space you’d be entering.
The deadline to join CGC Year 10 is tomorrow: Thursday, May 7 at 11:59 PM Pacific.
Your membership begins as soon as you join and continues through April 30, 2027.
I’d love to welcome you in.
Learn more and join CGC Year 10 here.
