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UCL Science Magazine

AlphaFold2: Reshaping Our Understanding of Protein Folding

AlphaFold2: Reshaping Our Understanding of Protein Folding

AlphaFold2, one of the AI programs behind the 2024 Nobel Prize win in Chemistry, provides an innovative breakthrough for tackling "The Protein Folding Problem." The protein structure prediction capability provided by AlphaFold2 not only provides a new perspective for solving this long-standing problem but also indicates the potential

How to Train Your Fusion Reactor: Letting Tokamaks Learn Stability

How to Train Your Fusion Reactor: Letting Tokamaks Learn Stability

Fusion Reactors, while impressively useful for renewable energy production, often run into chaos due to plasma disruption events. A group of scientists tackled this problem using reinforcement learning, letting the reactor learn how to stay stable during operation. By Faraaz Akhtar You may have heard of the notion that we

The Shining Abacus: How Light Can Be Used to Perform Computations

The Shining Abacus: How Light Can Be Used to Perform Computations

Quantum Computing is one of the hottest buzzwords in technology today, but what lies beneath the hype? How does this cutting-edge tech actually work, and why is it being called a game-changer for everything from medicine to cybersecurity? By Veronika Liutarevich Quantum computing is a broad term describing the field

Sticking it to Cancer: How Molecular Glues Could Transform Treatment

Sticking it to Cancer: How Molecular Glues Could Transform Treatment

Imagine a therapy that forces rogue cancer-causing proteins to self-destruct. Molecular glues offer just that — a ground-breaking avenue in targeted protein degradation, especially when conventional cancer drugs fail. By Neelabh Datta. These small molecules foster binding interactions between harmful proteins and degradation signallers known as E3 ubiquitin ligases - these

The Fire Within: A Look at the Inflammatory Basis of Schizophrenia

The Fire Within: A Look at the Inflammatory Basis of Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is a complex syndrome where people interpret reality abnormally resulting in hallucinations, delusions, and disordered thinking (‘Schizophrenia’, 2020). The specific mechanism of how this disorder presents is unknown. Could inflammation be the underlying cause of this disorder? By Oriella Stellakis Two case studies informed this theory. The first patient

Listen To Your Heart: A Patient Perspective on Catheter Ablation

Listen To Your Heart: A Patient Perspective on Catheter Ablation

Undergoing a heart procedure can be a nerve-wracking experience, especially when it involves a catheter ablation. This is a first-hand account of a patient's personal journey in hospital, shedding light on the daunting procedure of catheter ablation and the promising results it should produce for patients. By Micah

Can We Save Our Collapsing Fisheries?

Can We Save Our Collapsing Fisheries?

In 2017, 100 million Pacific cod disappeared off southern Alaska’s coast. This 70% reduction (over 2 years), represents an unprecedented crash of fishery worth $100 million annually, and it was caused by an increase in ocean temperatures. By Francesca Young