Taxes on sugary drinks had no effect on beverage calorie purchases from fast-food chain restaurants in the U.S., according to a new study by Brian Elbel and Pasquale Rummo from NYU Grossman School of Medicine and colleagues publishing April 2^nd in the open-access journal PLOS Medicine.

A comprehensive new analysis of South Africa's environmental footprint reveals a complex and often contradictory relationship between development and pollution. Researchers Frank Ranganai Matenda, Helper Zhou, and Mabutho Sibanda from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, alongside Asif Raihan of the National University of Malaysia, examined three decades of national data to untangle the key drivers of carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions. The investigation, spanning from 1990 to 2020, exposes how economic progress, globalization, and even technological innovation are currently contributing to rising emissions, while highlighting the significant potential of renewable energy to reverse this trend.

Accelerator programs are supposed to give entrepreneurs the mentorship, training and skills boost that will help launch them towards success. 

But in countries where the gender playing field still steeply tilts toward male advantage, women-led businesses that participated in accelerators showed no financial improvement, or even did worse, compared to ventures that applied but weren't accepted.