The United Nations observes Human Rights Day every year on 10 December after the UN General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. The theme for this year’s UN day is “Our Rights, Our Freedoms, Always”. This year the UN day highlights ‘Freedoms’ recalling the four freedoms that underlie the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and two major human ... Read More »
Drug developer Advaxis Inc said on Wednesday the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had lifted a clinical hold on three of its experimental cancer therapies, sending the company’s shares up as much as 38 percent. The U.S. health regulator had in October put on hold mid-stage trials of the company’s lead therapy, axalimogene filolisbac, after a patient died. Advaxis had ... Read More »
Are girls more proficient in the English language than boys? This is a question researchers from Cambridge English Language Assessment have attempted to answer by looking at thousands of test results from teenagers taking IELTS exams between January 2014 and January 2015 Researchers looked at 16-19 year old test takers in 35 countries sitting the exam for academic or immigration ... Read More »
Edvisor, an online management system for education agencies, has been named the best technology startup in British Columbia for 2015, winning CAN$100,000. The annual prize is awarded by venture capital firm New Ventures BC, supported by the BC Innovation Council, to “the idea most likely to be commercially viable with the greatest value”. “The sole reason we exist as a ... Read More »
‘Ihave ordered some amaryllis bulbs,” I say. This doesn’t go down so well at home. Hippeastrum (often wrongly known as amaryllis) are seen as highly naff. Big, gaudy blooms, often the wrong shade of red or pink or both, perhaps with some white picotee edging for effect. “I have ordered very tasteful varieties in green and deep red,” I say. This is ... Read More »
We’ve been stripping out our old kitchen units to make way for the new ones my partner, Chris, is making (with a friend’s help). The refit is long overdue and I’m delighted to see it go, but I’m loath to say goodbye entirely. What was past its best in the house still has a lot of potential in and around ... Read More »
Rustic treescape (above) Hanging tree, £40. On tree, from top: mirrored glass floral wreath, £33. Porcelainstar, £5 for two, and leaf, £5 each. Bristle bears, £18 each, selfridges.com. Porcelain antler, £10. Glitter bauble, £2.50, johnlewis.com. Copper and whitebauble, £35 for 12. Owl, £4; frosted pine cone, £2.50; rope glitter bauble, £3.50; hanging cedar weath, £4.50; and glitter stag, £4, johnlewis.com. ... Read More »
Iwas born in 1966, from which vantage point next year, 2016, was the unimaginable future. All I knew for certain was that life would be better half a century hence, more exciting and at the very least much more shiny. Back then I expect my hopes for the future involved hover cars, interplanetary travel and digital watches. And credit where ... Read More »
Who is to blame for the media’s continuing obsession with the demise of the dinner party? At this point, I’m not precisely sure – though as I write, doubtless some poor PhD student is hard at it, tracing the dots between our postwar literary culture, Katherine Whitehorn’s 1963 appropriation of the word “slut”, the early work of Mike Leigh and ... Read More »
As anyone who has suffered from insomnia knows well, drinking a glass of warm milk doesn’t always help. But it might, a new study reports, if the milk is taken from a cow at night. According to an animal study in the Journal of Medicinal Food, night milk – literally milk collected from a cow at night – contains high ... Read More »
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