The discovery of a species of octopus that lives in groups and mates face-to-face is changing our thinking about what cephalopods are capable of

They’re safer than other kinds of road junction, require less energy for lights and result in less pollution from vehicles. But will they ever conquer the world?

Pennies and cents clog up wallets and pockets. Cold, hard mathematics proves it's time to ditch the shrapnel in favour of a new denomination

The universe’s most common element could also be its most wondrous. Two different groups of researchers say they've made it - but can either claim withstand scrutiny?

More than half of us breathe the wrong way, missing out on many benefits from better health to altered consciousness. Here's how to do it right

From the mealtimes you keep and the speed at which you eat to your choice of dining companions, how you eat has a big impact on your health and waistline

Changing your footwear could be kind to your knees, a different gait could lift your mood, but the real secret of successful walking is even simpler

Notorious for making us sick, viruses are weird, undead organisms – but new insights are revealing they may have created life's glorious complexity in the first place

We all need to chill out to reduce our stress levels but does watching TV count? What about running? And what’s the best form of micro-relaxation?

Is toilet squatting really better than just sitting, or are the supposed benefits of a squatty potty just the fantasy of a rainbow-pooping unicorn?

Some people have a visceral fear-like reaction to the holes in sponges, Swiss cheese or seed pods. Known as trypophobia, this response is increasingly common but isn’t what it seems

In everyday life, causes always precede effects. But new experiments suggests that no such restriction applies in the quantum world

Puzzling, slow-living microbes named after Loki, the trickster of Norse mythology, are helping solve one of evolution's biggest mysteries: the origin of complex life

One of civilisation’s most revolutionary inventions was long thought to be the brainchild of ancient Egyptian scribes. But its true creators may have been far less glamorous

With the help of their webs, spiders are capable of foresight, planning, learning and other smarts that indicate they may possess consciousness

In a universe that unthinkingly follows the rules, human agency is an anomaly. Can physics ever make sense of our power to change the physical world at will?

When a bizarre fossil appeared for sale in Europe, it looked so odd it had to be fake. But a high-tech investigation introduced us to Halzkaraptor escullei – part velociraptor, part penguin

Forget fake steaks, the first cultured meat we're likely to eat will be shrimp. How will it compare to the real thing? Will it be better for the environment? And will people eat it?

Why is there something rather than nothing? We’re finally making enough antimatter to extract an answer – and it might reveal the dark side of the universe too

Lose your bearings in an unfamiliar landscape and fear shreds your navigational brain. But studies are now revealing the common mistakes lost people make, helping rescue teams to find them before it’s too late

Stress or infection may prompt viruses hidden in our genome to stagger back to life, contributing to some cases of multiple sclerosis, diabetes and schizophrenia

Julia Ebner infiltrated the hidden forums that extremists use. Her experiences lay bare how they hijack social media and video games to spread hate – and how to beat them

Our images of deep space are spectacular, but don’t reflect what our eyes would see. Here's what their stunning true colours reveal about the cosmos

Does pounding the pavement damage your joints? Can you get away with just walking? Sports engineer Steve Haake pits running against walking and dispels some abiding myths

The data centres servicing our beloved digital devices gobble huge amounts of electricity. A new way to think about heat and energy could help us meet growing demand without burning through the world's resources

Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac led the 2015 Paris climate negotiations. They tell us why they’re hopeful for the future, and explain how fighting climate change is “the most exciting experiment in history”

We love to hate wasps, but they pollinate flowers, kill off pests and their venom might even help us treat cancer

The "wave function collapse" transforms vague clouds of quantum possibilities into the physical reality we know – but no one knows how. New experiments are finally revealing reality in the making

Your immune system ages too, weakening as you get older and making you more susceptible to infections. Fortunately, we are discovering plenty of things you can do to turn back the clock and stay healthy

Strange particles observed by an experiment in Antarctica could be evidence of an alternative reality where everything is upside down

Most molecules exist in mirror-image forms, and yet life prefers one over the other. How this bias began and why it persisted is one of the most baffling questions in biology – but now we have an answer

Building muscle reduces the risk of cancer and stroke, boosts brainpower, burns through calories and more – it might even be better for you than cardio

Dingoes have been persecuted in Australia for centuries for killing livestock, but protecting them could benefit the environment and aid recovery from the devastating fires

The question of how the brain gives rise to subjective experience is the hardest of all. Mathematicians think they can help, but their first attempts have thrown up some eye-popping conclusions

Four coronaviruses cause around a quarter of all common colds, but each was probably deadly when it first made the leap to humans. We can learn a lot from what happened next

To figure out what makes some people more vulnerable to severe cases of covid-19, we need to rethink what we know about infection

Human behaviour is key to the spread of coronavirus, so government scientists are trying to control our decisions. Does it work, and what happens when they get it wrong?

Auto production in Mexico and Brazil, Latin America's top producers, plunged by an unprecedented 99% in April as a result of the coronavirus crisis, with the two countries building a total of just 5,569 vehicles.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday approved a drug to treat lung and thyroid cancers driven by a specific genetic mutation that Eli Lilly and Co acquired with its 2019 purchase of Loxo Oncology.

Potbelly Corp said on Friday it is unable to file its quarterly report with the U.S. SEC by the May 8 deadline due to the COVID-19 crisis, adding to the restaurant chain's pandemic-led woes.

Alphabet Inc's Google said on Friday it has asked employees to take a day off on May 22, to address work-from-home-related burnout during the coronavirus pandemic.

Two more firms are eyeing a share of Reliance Industries Ltd's $65-billion digital unit Jio Platforms, according to Bloomberg News, setting them up to be a part of a growing list of firms that have recently invested in the Indian company.

The head of the International Monetary Fund on Friday signaled a possible downward revision of global economic forecasts, and warned the United States and China against rekindling a trade war that could weaken a recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.

A group of Republican lawmakers from energy-producing states on Friday called on President Donald Trump to prevent banks from halting loans and investments with companies that produce oil and other fossil fuels while they have access to federal assistance programs during the COVID-19 pandemic.

* LILLY RECEIVES U.S. FDA APPROVAL FOR RETEVMO™ (SELPERCATINIB), THE FIRST THERAPY SPECIFICALLY FOR PATIENTS WITH ADVANCED RET-DRIVEN LUNG AND THYROID CANCERS

U.S. luxury department store chain Neiman Marcus Group said on Friday it received court approval to access $675 million of its debtor-in-possession financing, which will allow continuity of the company's business during Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings and enable it to pay employees and vendors.

Nearly 90 cases of the novel coronavirus have been recorded among employees of Polyus Krasnoyarsk, a unit of Russia's largest gold producer Polyus , the regional branch of Russia's consumer health watchdog said on Saturday.

* Tourism, travel, hospitality business hit the hardest by COVID

* Airports say it could be devastating for aviation industry (Adds details, changes sourcing)

South Africa's central bank has temporarily prohibited the use of debt issued by the Land Bank as collateral after the state agricultural lender was downgraded deeper into junk status and missed $2.7 billion in loan repayments.