I am Professor Joel Pearson, a psychologist and neuroscientist studying Aphantasia - the fascinating condition of ‘minds eye blindness’ - Ask Me Anything about Aphantasia and Hyperphantasia!

I'm Professor Toby Walsh, a leading artificial intelligence researcher investigating the impacts of AI on society. Ask me anything about AI, ChatGPT, technology and the future!

Quit-smoking medicines such as nicotine patches and varenicline do not increase the risk of major birth defects in babies

New breath test uses combination of mass spectrometry and machine learning to detect silicosis before irreversible lung damage occurs, providing a fast, non-invasive diagnostic tool for at-risk workers

Taking creatine at the recommended level (5 grams daily) has little to no effect on muscle growth

Quitting smoking after cancer diagnosis can improve patient quality of life and survival length. Patients who quit smoking could live from a median of several months to more than two years longer than those who keep smoking.

2% of the world’s amphibians are at risk of overheating, and climate change could push 7.5% of amphibian species beyond their physiological heat tolerance

COVID-19 not likely linked to early stage of type 1 diabetes in children, study of 1277 Australian children finds

Study finds highly concerning levels of air pollution in Pacific Island urban areas, with acceptable PM2.5 and PM10 particle limits exceeded in both Fiji and the Solomon Islands

Platypus-themed love letters for your Valentine 💌

Drowning risk is higher on days with greater leisure time, spiking on public holidays, school holidays and long weekends - study of fatal and non-fatal drowning incidents in Australia shows

Four quantum researchers and four cats explain how their real-world “Schrödinger’s cat” experiment uncovered a new way to perform quantum computations

Researchers complete real-world “Schrödinger’s cat” experiment by embedding an atom of antimony inside a silicon chip. The findings provide a new and more robust way to perform quantum computations and have important implications for quantum error correction

People with aphantasia still activate their visual cortex when trying to conjure an image in their mind’s eye, but the images produced are too weak or distorted to become conscious to the individual

World Cup Football is getting faster for men and women alike: new study finds stoppage time, ball speed and passing rates have all increased significantly in the FIFA World Cup finals

A drug used to manage excess copper levels could improve the odds for children battling the rare cancer, neuroblastoma from 10% to 50%, new study in mice shows

Popular diabetes drugs like Ozempic can reduce the risk of kidney failure and death due to kidney or cardiovascular causes in people with and without diabetes

Mandating less salt in packaged foods could prevent 40,000 cardiovascular events, 32,000 cases of kidney disease, up to 3000 deaths, and could save $3.25 billion in healthcare costs

Study links hot weather to an increase in suicidal thoughts among young people. For every 1°C rise in daily temperature emergency department presentations for suicidal behaviours increased by 1.3%

Study finds a secure visa, employment, income, good housing conditions and control over environmental circumstances are associated with good mental health outcomes in refugees

Modelling shows that widespread rooftop solar panel installation in cities could raise daytime temperatures by up to 1.5 °C and potentially lower nighttime temperatures by up to 0.6 °C

Study shows that non-professional athletes people who experience sports-related concussions exhibit no long-term cognitive deficits and even show slightly better performance in working memory and verbal reasoning compared to people who haven't suffered a concussion

Study challenges view that non-native species can only reach Antarctica from remote Southern Ocean islands, shows Antarctica's coastlines at risk of species incursions from all major Southern Hemisphere landmasses

Study finds the heat mitigation benefits of trees are significantly reduced during heatwaves and that climate models overestimate the peak cooling efficiency of trees

Slow-release ketamine tablet shown to reduce depression symptoms in treatment-resistant depression; may offer cost-effective and accessible alternative to existing clinic-based treatments