With temperatures soaring across the UK, our ability to detect and avoid places that are too warm is vital for regulating our body temperature. However, until now, little was known about the molecular mechanisms responsible for detecting warmth in the sensory neurons of our skin.

A new King's College London study, published today in Nature, reveals that a gene called TRPM2 initiates a 'warm' signal in mice that drives them to seek cooler environments. When this gene is removed, the mice are unable to distinguish between cool and warm temperatures.

A large screening programme has identified several genes associated with age-related conditions including hearing loss, retinal degeneration and osteoarthritis. The animal study, published in Nature Communications, may lead to studies of the equivalent human gene and help develop screening programmes to identify the risk of developing an age-related condition many years before symptoms appear.

Age is a risk factor for many conditions, including diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hearing loss, dementia and others, but the genes that we carry also influence whether we are more or less susceptible to these. Not much is known about which genes influence age-related conditions, or how they do so.

New research led by scientists from King's College London and the University of Bristol has found that a high-fat, high-sugar diet during pregnancy may be linked to symptoms of ADHD in children who show conduct problems early in life.

Published today in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, this study is the first to indicate that epigenetic changes evident at birth may explain the link between unhealthy diet, conduct problems and ADHD.

A number of competitors at the Rio Olympics have reported stomach problems. Team GB officials have denied that athletes have fallen victim to food poisoning at the Olympic athletes' village in Rio, despite a number complaining of upset stomachs.

Professor Raymond Playford, a gastro-intestinal expert and Professor of Medicine from Plymouth University Peninsula Schools of Medicine and Dentistry, suggests that the culprit may, in some cases, be 'leaky gut' syndrome.

'Leaky gut' is a condition where the thin mucosal barrier of the gut, which plays a role in absorbing nutrients and preventing large molecules and germs from the gut entering the blood stream, becomes less effective.

Contrary to earlier reports, giving acetaminophen (Tylenol, etc.) for pain and fever does not worsen asthma in young children with the condition, concludes a randomized trial in the August 18 New England Journal of Medicine.

The Acetaminophen Versus Ibuprofen in Children with Asthma (AVICA) trial, led by researchers at Boston Children's Hospital for the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute's Asthma Network (AsthmaNet), is the only blinded, randomized, controlled trial to date to prospectively compare acetaminophen head-to-head with ibuprofen (Motrin, etc.) in children with asthma.

Testing for the activity of two genes could pick out women who are at increased risk of dying from their breast cancers, suggests a new study of almost 2,000 patients.

Women whose tumours had a specific pattern of activity in the two genes were three times as likely to die within 10 years as others with a different pattern of activity.

Scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, spotted the pattern of gene activity among breast cancer cells with a particular ability to escape from the glue that normally holds them in place.

They believe the genes could play a key role in releasing cells from this glue - known as the extracellular matrix - so they can spread round the body.