Rey Juan Carlos University

Next Monday sees the start of COP29 in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, a summit marked by Donald Trump's victory as president of the United States on Tuesday. His denial of climate change and his commitment to fossil fuels during his previous term in office will weigh down a meeting from which no major agreements are expected and from which experts are calling for greater ambition. 

Prostate cancer screening tests using PSA (Prostate Specific Antigen) are associated with overdiagnosis, which calls into question their use. A clinical trial in men aged 50-60 years published in the journal NEJM has studied the possibility of adding an MRI test in those with an elevated PSA level and dispensing with biopsy if imaging finds no suspicious lesions. The results indicate that the procedure avoids more than half of clinically irrelevant cancer diagnoses that would not need treatment and only slightly increases the risk of failing to identify those that may become incurable. The authors recommend, on the basis of the study, to review the recommendations for such screening.

With summer, the presence of these gelatinous creatures on the Spanish coasts bothers swimmers, who can suffer injuries if they come in contact with them. Are there more jellyfish than before? Which ones are the most dangerous? What should I do if one stings me? How can I avoid it? In this guide, we answer the main questions on jellyfish so you know how to act. 

A treatment using lights and sound pulses can protect mice from cognitive decline associated with chemotherapy, according to a research team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the US. The benefits are greatest when the therapy is used early and preventively at the same time as chemotherapy, says the study, published in Science Translational Medicine. The use of this non-invasive sensory stimulation therapy to alleviate other pathologies has already been studied.

After an intense night of negotiations in Dubai (United Arab Emirates), the countries participating in COP28 reached a historic agreement by mentioning for the first time "moving away from fossil fuels" in the Global Stocktake document - the assessment of progress made towards achieving the climate goals set out in the Paris Agreement. The agreement comes after the first draft presented by the presidency did not make this mention - it referred only to "reducing consumption and production" of these fuels - which was described as "unacceptable" by countries such as Spain.

An analysis of data published in the journal General Psychiatry with more than 66,000 diagnoses of gender dysphoria, mostly made in the United States, concludes that prevalence increased between 2017 and 2021, and that the median age decreased over the same period from 31 to 26 years.

Most high-income countries do not have prostate cancer screening programmes for their entire population; prostate-specific antigen (PSA) tests can be done on an individual basis. In an opinion piece published in The BMJ, a group of urologists and epidemiologists specialised in prostate cancer screening argue for restricting the use of PSA tests to avoid over-detection and over-treatment. 

Almost a decade after the previous edition, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has presented the synthesis report of its sixth assessment cycle (AR6) on Monday in Switzerland. "This synthesis report underlines the urgency of taking more ambitious action and demonstrates that, if we act now, we can still secure a sustainable and liveable future for all," said IPCC chair Hoesung Lee. 

The document includes the main findings of the three Working Group reports of 2021 and 2022 (Physical basis, Impacts, adaptation and vulnerability and Mitigation of climate change) and the three special reports of 2018 and 2019 (Global warming of 1.5°C, Climate change and land, Ocean and cryosphere in a changing climate). With this document, which is primarily addressed to policy makers, the IPCC closes its sixth assessment cycle.

The deadline passed and after two marathon nights of meetings, the delegations of the UN member states have managed to reach an agreement to make the so-called Oceans Treaty - or BBNJ Treaty, Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction - a reality. New York City has seen the fifth session of this conference bear fruit with an agreement on the wording of the text, seventeen years after the talks began and with negotiations stalled last August due to a lack of agreement. The Treaty aims to protect and regulate the use of areas beyond national jurisdiction, which account for more than 60% of the oceans, or almost half of the planet. Marine genetic resources and how to share these benefits has been one of the main stumbling blocks.

A study published in Nature suggests that carbon sequestration is at risk of destabilising in large regions of the planet. In some areas, this sequestration - the difference between the CO₂ captured and released by ecosystems into the atmosphere - has varied greatly in recent years. The research is led by CREAF and the University of Antwerp (Belgium).