The ability to perceive the five basic tastes – sweet, sour, salty, bitter and umami (savoury) – is hardwired in our brains, according to scientists who were able to switch taste on and off through brain manipulation. “Taste, the way you and I think of it, is ultimately in the brain,” said study leader Charles…

Scientists have produced a strain of mosquitoes carrying genes that block the transmission of the malaria parasite, with the hope they could breed with wild populations and produce offspring that cannot spread the disease. The American researchers used gene-editing, a genetic engineering technique in which DNA can be inserted, replaced or deleted from a genome,…