A new genetic test has revealed that most of the free-roaming canines in Australia, often labelled ‘wild dogs’, carry a significant amount of dingo ancestry.

The scientific study of life’s origins is undergoing a major transition, from a decades-long focus on deep-sea hydrothermal vents toward increasing investigation of hot springs and other chemically dynamic environments on land.

New research from Edith Cowan University (ECU) has revealed that the waters between Australia and Southeast Asia were once a hotspot for new and mammoth coral reefs – laying the foundations for the extraordinary diversity of marine life we see today.

Gallbladder cancer (GBC) is an extremely aggressive biliary tract malignancy characterized by silent early progression, late-stage diagnosis and poor prognosis. It is one of the most lethal gastrointestinal cancers, with a five-year survival rate often below 10%, partly because only about 10-20% of patients are eligible for curative surgical resection at diagnosis. 

A key focus of molecular research is whether Actionable Genomic Alterations (AGAs) – specific DNA changes in cancer cells – independently impact survival beyond established factors like stage and treatment.

A new study by researchers at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine has found that patients with gallbladder cancer who had certain documented gene changes in their tumor had a higher risk of death, even when we compared them with similar patients based on age, sex, race/ethnicity, cancer stage, surgery and chemotherapy.