Western Australia abandons shark cull
The state of Western Australia is abandoning a controversial shark-culling programme, but has also gained the right to deploy deadly baited lines for animals that pose an “imminent threat”. Read more
The state of Western Australia is abandoning a controversial shark-culling programme, but has also gained the right to deploy deadly baited lines for animals that pose an “imminent threat”. Read more
The fight against antibiotic-resistant microbes could suffer a major blow if widely circulated rumours are confirmed that pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca is due to disband its in-house antibiotic development. The company called the rumours “highly speculative”, while not explicitly denying them. Read more
The Australian government has unveiled plans to increase the commercial return on its billions in research funding, and to pump more resources into boosting industry-science links. Read more
Replace, refine, reduce. Those are the goals of a centre founded 10 years ago to improve the welfare of animals used in research. But more still needs to be done to embed these ideas, according to the head of the centre. Read more
Clinical trial data previously kept behind closed doors is to be released to the public by Europe’s medical regulator, after a new transparency policy was finally agreed at the European Medicines Agency. Read more
One of the United Kingdom’s leading universities has been cleared of charges of animal cruelty at the end of a long-running and contentious series of investigations, an official report has concluded. However, the report found that Imperial College London had a “widespread poor culture of care” in its animal-research labs. Read more
Earth’s wild vertebrate populations have dropped to one-half the size they were in the 1970s, according to an analysis of more than 3,000 species. Read more
US President Barack Obama has vastly increased marine protection in the Pacific by declaring 1 million square kilometres of ocean part of a giant marine reserve. Read more
The latest salvo in an ongoing row over the safety of electronic cigarettes has branded a major World Health Organization-commissioned report guilty of misrepresenting and misinterpreting key evidence. Read more
Don’t just gather data, do something. Scientists need to stop using a lack of knowledge as an excuse for not doing more to protect threatened species, a major gathering of marine conservationists has been warned. Read more
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