For the second day running, the feature event here on Thursday was in the balance until its final moment as Unowhatimeanharry, the beaten favourite behind Nichols Canyon in the Stayers’ Hurdle at Cheltenham, turned around the form under a bold ride by Noel Fehily and held off his old rival by a head. Ruby Walsh threw everything into his finish […]
The 2016 champion Mark Selby was left with plenty to think about overnight following an enthralling first session of his world championship semi-final with China’s Ding Junhui. There was little to split the pair in Sheffield on Thursday before Ding, who lost against Selby in the final last year, won the final three frames to secure a 5-3 advantage. They […]
t was fun when the late-April meeting at Sandown Park mixed Flat and National Hunt racing on the same afternoon, but it is difficult to argue with the move to partition the meeting into separate days for the two codes when it produces a card as deep and intriguing as the one at the Esher track today. From the Esher […]
French prosecutors have opened an investigation into potential corruption relating to Fifa’s vote for Russia and Qatar to host respectively the 2018 and 2022 World Cup finals, sources close to the investigation have confirmed. Investigators are understood to have interviewed Sepp Blatter, who was the Fifa president at the time of the controversial December 2010 vote by a majority of […]
Lewis Hamilton has spoken out in support of Serena Williams after she was the victim of racial abuse from the former player Ilie Nastase last week. The British driver, speaking before the Russian Grand Prix in Sochi, hailed Williams’s reaction to the abuse and said she was an inspiration as a “powerful, independent black woman”. Nastase, who won both the […]
Experts are warning that the UK must face up to the scale of its gambling problem with a lack of research, and industry influence, preventing proper scrutiny of a growing national habit. Joey Barton’s 18-month suspension from football on betting-related charges, and the player’s response in which he spoke of an “explosion in sports betting”, has brought the spotlight back […]
There was nothing more to say but they said it anyway. Hoovering up a few more pay-per-view clicks at the end of a long promotion ritually relies on pre-fight shenanigans but there was no chance of that when Anthony Joshua and Wladimir Klitschko stopped short of eloping together on Thursday as their world title fight on Saturday night looms. For […]
1) Spurs need to keep their heads. But if they can’t … Won’t someone think of the kids? OK! Will do! But let’s not get too pious: there was something satisfying – nay, gloriously entertaining – about the way Spurs tumbled down the tunnel at Chelsea last season, raging against the dying of the light. Bottom line, we all enjoy […]
In late September 1996, Arsenal travelled to face Borussia Mönchengladbach in the second leg of a Uefa Cup tie. Arsène Wenger had been confirmed as manager but was supposed to have only a watching brief, formally taking over after the following weekend’s match against Sunderland. At half-time, with the score 1-1 and Arsenal trailing 4-3 on aggregate, he came down […]
In Exeter they do not mind what their rugby players look like. “We’re not big ones for the colour of a player’s boots or hairstyles or tattoos,” confirms Rob Baxter, the Chiefs director of rugby, glancing over at his distinctively pony-tailed, 20-stone prop Harry Williams. “We’re happy for them to be their own men as long as they buy into […]
The most serious, life-threatening complication of dengue infection is dengue shock syndrome (DSS), seen primarily in children. Daily platelet counts in children in the early stages of dengue can predict those most at risk for DSS, researchers report in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases. More than a third of the world’s population lives in areas at risk for dengue virus infection, […]
Food insecurity (FI) affects nearly 795 million people worldwide. Although a complex phenomenon encompassing food availability, affordability, utilization, and even the social norms that define acceptable ways to acquire food, FI can affect people’s health beyond its impact on nutrition. A new study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine determined that FI was associated with poorer mental health […]
Researchers from the Byers Eye Institute at Stanford University have found a way to use artificial intelligence to fight a complication of diabetes that affects the eyes. This advance has the potential to reduce the worldwide rate of vision loss due to diabetes. In a study published online in Ophthalmology, the journal of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, the researchers […]
Columbia University researchers have developed a personalized algorithm that predicts the impact of particular foods on an individual’s blood sugar levels. The algorithm has been integrated into an app, Glucoracle, that will allow individuals with type 2 diabetes to keep a tighter rein on their glucose levels — the key to preventing or controlling the major complications of a disease […]
Like two magnets being pulled toward each other, tiny crystals twist, align and slam into each other, but due to an altogether different force. For the first time, researchers have measured the force that draws them together and visualized how they swivel and align. Called van der Waals forces, the attraction provides insights into how crystals self-assemble, an activity that […]
Researchers at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory’s (NRL) Chemistry Division have developed a safer alternative to fire-prone lithium-ion batteries, which were recently banned for some applications on Navy ships and other military platforms. Joseph Parker, Jeffrey Long, and Debra Rolison from NRL’s Advanced Electrochemical Materials group are leading an effort to create an entire family of safer, water-based, zinc batteries. […]
In experiments on transport tissues in plants, researchers from Heidelberg University were able to identify factors of crucial importance for the formation of the plant tissue known as phloem. According to Prof. Dr Thomas Greb of the Centre for Organismal Studies (COS), these factors differ from all previously known factors that trigger the specification of cells. The findings of the […]
The Tibetan people have inherited variants of five different genes that help them live at high altitudes, with one gene originating in the extinct human subspecies, the Denisovans. Hao Hu and Chad Huff of the University of Texas, Houston, and colleagues report these findings in a new study published April 27th, 2017 in PLOS Genetics. The people of Tibet have […]
The collection of microbial species found in the human body varies from person to person, and new research published in PLOS Computational Biology suggests that a significant part of this variation can be explained by variability in shared resources available to the microbes. Every human is home to a collection of thousands of diverse species of microbes known as the […]
Ice cores drilled from a glacier in a cave in Transylvania offer new evidence of how Europe’s winter weather and climate patterns fluctuated during the last 10,000 years, known as the Holocene period. The cores provide insights into how the region’s climate has changed over time. The researchers’ results, published this week in the journal Scientific Reports, could help reveal […]