Today’s picks
1. Kemi Badenoch’s pitch for power is incoherent
This piece examines Kemi Badenoch’s inconsistent pitch for power as Conservative leader. Yet it argues that the British Tories still have a chance to reunite the right. It is worth reading for insight into the party’s struggles and the broader realignment of British conservatism.
2. The 2026 Nobel prizes for science
This episode of our science and technology podcast examines this year’s Nobel Prizes in physiology or medicine, physics and chemistry. It walks through the winning discoveries, explains the science behind them and the research lineages they grew from, and assesses why these findings matter. For listeners wanting a concise, expert guide to the year’s most significant scientific work, it rewards a careful listen.
3. A suspected case of pneumonic plague is raising fears of an outbreak. Should you be worried?
Russian authorities reported that an employee at a Siberian lab studying plague and other infectious diseases died of pneumonia from an “unknown” cause. The case is being treated as suspected pneumonic plague, a rare but severe form that can spread between people. The article sifts what is known so far, weighs the public-health risk and explains whether ordinary readers should be worried.
4. Scientists unlock the longevity secrets of 194-year-old Jonathan the giant tortoise
Scientists studying Jonathan, a 194-year-old giant tortoise, suggest his extreme longevity may be linked to keeping genes tidy—maintaining genomic order and stability. The finding offers a rare window into extreme lifespan in a long-lived vertebrate. It is worth reading for clues about aging and how cells protect their genetic material over centuries.
5. From the archive – No place like home: my bitter return to Palestine – podcast
This Guardian Long Read podcast revisits Fida Jiryis’s 2022 essay. Raised in exile by parents who told her of Palestine’s tragedy, she returns in her early twenties and confronts the country herself. Read by Sarah Agha, it offers an intimate account of displacement, family memory and the painful meaning of home. Worth listening for its personal view of return and belonging.
6. A Nobel for the strangest telescope ever built
This deep read profiles the strangest telescope ever built: not a lens or mirror, but a cubic-kilometre detector sunk in ice or water that catches ghostly neutrinos. It explains why the instrument looks nothing like an observatory, and how its rare signals illuminate distant corners of the universe. A clear guide to the physics now honoured with a Nobel.
By publication
The Economist
- Kemi Badenoch’s pitch for power is incoherent
- The 2026 Nobel prizes for science
- A Nobel for the strangest telescope ever built
Scientific American
- A suspected case of pneumonic plague is raising fears of an outbreak. Should you be worried?
- Scientists unlock the longevity secrets of 194-year-old Jonathan the giant tortoise