University College London apologises for role in promoting eugenics

Posted on January 7, 2021 by Admin

Links to early eugenicists such as Francis Galton a source of ‘deep regret’ to institution

University College London has expressed “deep regret” for its role in the propagation of eugenics, alongside a promise to improve conditions for disabled staff and students and a pledge to give “greater prominence” to teaching the malign legacy of the discredited movement.

The formal apology for legitimising eugenics – the advocacy of selective breeding of the population often to further racist or discriminatory aims – is UCL’s latest effort to address its links to early eugenicists such as Francis Galton, who funded a professorship in eugenics at the university.

Researchers find a western-style diet can impair brain function

Posted on February 18, 2020 by Admin

After a week on a high fat, high added sugar diet, volunteers scored worse on memory tests

Consuming a western diet for as little as one week can subtly impair brain function and encourage slim and otherwise healthy young people to overeat, scientists claim.

Researchers found that after seven days on a high fat, high added sugar diet, volunteers in their 20s scored worse on memory tests and found junk food more desirable immediately after they had finished a meal.

Top geneticist ‘should resign’ over his team’s laboratory fraud

Posted on February 1, 2020 by Admin

Professor responsible for ‘reckless’ failure to properly oversee researchers

A row over scientific fraud at the highest level of British academia has led to calls for one of the country’s leading geneticists and highest-paid university chiefs to leave his posts.

David Latchman, professor of genetics at University College London and master of Birkbeck, University of London – a post that earns him £380,000 a year – has angered senior academics by presiding over a laboratory that published fraudulent research, mostly on genetics and heart disease, for more than a decade. The number of fabricated results and the length of time over which the deception took place made the case one of the worst instances of research fraud uncovered in a British university.

Maths and tech specialists need Hippocratic oath, says academic

Posted on August 16, 2019 by Admin

Exclusive: Hannah Fry says ethical pledge needed in tech fields that will shape future

Mathematicians, computer engineers and scientists in related fields should take a Hippocratic oath to protect the public from powerful new technologies under development in laboratories and tech firms, a leading researcher has said.

The ethical pledge would commit scientists to think deeply about the possible applications of their work and compel them to pursue only those that, at the least, do no harm to society.