In an American study from 2011, researchers observed that rats first freed their fellow rats from a cage and then shared food with them instead of leaving them in the cage and eating alone; this means they showed empathy. But do they have the same capacity for empathy as we humans, or do we differ in that regard? A research team working with Professor Albert Newen from the Ruhr University Bochum Institute for Philosophy II, Germany, set out to answer this question. They developed a model for more accurately describing empathy in various animals. Their answer: Yes, rats exhibit empathy, although it differs gradually from that of humans. The researchers report their findings in the journal Biological Review from June 28, 2026.

When analyzing crime, the foreign population typically shows higher rates than the native population. However, crime statistics change significantly when comparing groups of the same age and gender. A detailed data analysis conducted in a scientific study by the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) demonstrates that the apparent crime gap between the foreign and native populations is primarily due to the fact that the immigrant profile tends to concentrate more young men—the demographic sector with the highest crime rates in any society.

Most Europeans citizens consider economic growth a necessary condition, rather than an obstacle, for advancing towards a sustainable future. This is the conclusion reached in a new study by the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB), published in Nature Communications.

A new conceptual review by researchers from the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) and James Cook University, Singapore, suggests that stress, loneliness and constant comparison may be linked to a mismatch between human instincts and modern environments.

The science magazine of the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) is now also available as a website at bfr2go.de. This allows readers to access the articles in BfR2GO even more easily and conveniently on smartphones and tablet computers – and to share them effortlessly via messaging services or social media platforms. “With bfr2go.de, our background articles and interviews will reach even more readers in the future, helping us inform the public about key issues in consumer health protection,” says BfR President Andreas Hensel. While the magazine was previously only available online as a PDF, the articles on the new website can now also be read in a format optimised for mobile devices.