🌞 The cancer treatment breakthrough

Hello!

Shoutout to all of you for selling out our first good news event this week in Sydney…that was impressively fast.

If you missed out, we’ll be sure to host another one soon. If you managed to grab a ticket, we can’t wait to meet you on Thursday.

Now, onto the good stuff...

🩺 Cancer breakthrough

Here’s something I never thought I’d say in this newsletter: there’s some good news about cancer treatment.

That’s right. This week, results from a clinical trial proved that the majority of melanoma patients whose disease had spread to their brains could be “cured” by using combination immunotherapy.

The results found that after using combination immunotherapy (an approach using multiple immunotherapy treatments, or immunotherapy with other types of treatments), there was an overall survival rate of 48%, with that rate increasing to 51% if patients were given the immunotherapy treatment upfront.

To emphasise how important this is, here’s a scary stat: Australia has the highest melanoma rates in the world. There is one person diagnosed with the disease every 30 minutes and one person dying every six hours. Among this cohort, brain metastases (when cancer cells spread from their original site around the body to the brain, forming a secondary cancer) are present in 30-40% of patients at diagnosis with Stage 4 melanoma. In the past (prior to this clinical trial) these patients only survived for around 16 weeks.

But now, there’s hope. According to former Australian of the Year and Medical Director of the Melanoma Institute Australia Prof Georgina Long: “We are now confident these patients are cured, a term not used lightly in cancer.”

💨 Pods convert wind into energy

Let’s shift our attention overseas now. In a world first, pods designed to convert aircraft wind into energy have been installed at an airport in Texas. Yes, my brain immediately went to the chocolate snack. No, unfortunately, these are not the right type of pods (see below).

The turbine pods placed on the runway capture high-powered jet wind generated during takeoff and landing, and convert it into electricity.

The pods will become a permanent fixture of the Dallas Love Field Airport, after a prototype was successfully trialled near the airport’s control tower.

The renewable energy captured by these pods will be used to power charging stations inside the airport, where passengers can charge their personal devices.

🎵 Feel good song of the week

Dinosaur news

The oldest known fossil of a megaraptorid, a kind of carnivorous dinosaur, has been found in Victoria. After seeing the image below, I’m not a million per cent sure this is good news, but I’ve been told it…is?

The fossils were discovered on Victoria’s coastline by Museums Victoria Research Institute and Monash University PhD student Jake Kotevski. It’s believed they were formed up to 121.4 million years ago, nearly 60 million years before the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs!

There was also another fossil discovered - the carcharodontosaur - which is essentially a great white shark with legs. It’s the first time one of its kind has been found.

“The discovery of [these fossils] in Australia is groundbreaking,” Kotevski said. The good news is that the fossils can offer insight into Victoria’s ancient ecosystem.

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📸 Photo of the week

You’re looking at confetti being fired into the air as the Regatta on the River of San Giobbe arrives near the Rialto Bridge in Venice, Italy. A regatta is made up of various races using different kinds of boats.

🏳️‍🌈 Mardi Gras to begin

The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade will light up Oxford St next week!

This year, the slogan of Mardi Gras is ‘free to be’. The Mardi Gras organisation said the theme is an important celebration of the strides made towards LGBTQIA+ equality while also acting “as a global reminder that our fight is far from over”.

I asked the team what they’re most excited about. Lucy, our copyeditor, said: “I’m excited to dance all night with my friends, listening to music most DJs won’t play (like a house remix of Jennifer Coolidge’s monologue from The White Lotus)”

Emma, our Features Editor, added: “I can’t wait to see the brilliant floats and the spectacle of colour, sparkle, feathers and joy on full display down Sydney’s iconic Oxford Street. Keep an eye out for a performance from Romy, who you might know from The xx.”

As always, the festival will wrap up on Saturday 1 March with the iconic Mardi Gras parade, one of the world’s biggest LGBTQIA+ events. More than 12,000 people are expected to march and dance down Oxford Street.

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