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Girl was bitten at property near Walgett on 5 February, taken to local hospital then airlifted to Sydney Children’s hospital before her condition deteriorated

A six-year-old girl has died after being bitten by a brown snake on a property in outback New South Wales.

The girl was bitten at a property near Walgett, in the state’s north, on the afternoon of 5 February and was transferred to the local hospital to receive anti-venom.

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Xylella fastidiosa has wreaked havoc in the US and Europe and could dwarf the impact of ash dieback in the UK

It has caused severe damage to plants and trees in the US and southern Europe and now there are fears it is heading this way. With experts warning that it could make the devastating ash dieback disease seem like “a walk in the park”, the UK is on red alert for signs that Xylella fastidiosa has entered the country.

First confirmed in Europe three years ago when it ran rampant across olive plantations in southern Italy, a subspecies of Xylella has since been detected in southern France, where it has destroyed vines and lavender plants, and in Corsica. Xylella fastidiosa has also been found in both South and North America where it is commonly referred to as “phony peach disease” and where it has caused severe damage to citrus and coffee plantations. In New Jersey it has attacked more than a third of the state’s urban trees.

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NEADERTHAL LEGACY: Having Neanderthal DNA in your genes may increase the risk for depression, nicotine addiction, stroke, pregnancy complications and many other health problems, a new study suggests.

INSECT HOMING: When sand wasps leave home in the morning they capture snapshots of the landscape around their nest to make sure they can find their way back later, a study using high-speed video has found.

HISTORIC DISCOVERY: Tiny ripples in the fabric of space-time known as gravitational waves first proposed by Albert Einstein 100 years ago have been directly observed for the first time, an international team of scientists has announced.

Booming market grew 27% in 2015 edging past European Union for first time, says industry group. Climate Home reports

China installed half of all new wind capacity worldwide last year, according to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC).

The country added an “astonishing” 30.5 gigawatts (GW) to boost installations to 145.1GW, the Brussels-based industry group said on Wednesday.

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GRAVITATIONAL WAVES: What are gravitational waves, and what does their discovery mean?

COMMUNITY SPIRIT: Belief in an all-seeing punitive god motivates people to be more charitable towards strangers outside their own family and community, particularly to those of similar beliefs, researchers have found.

BUSHFIRE FREQUENCY: The number of bushfires per week in Australia increased by 40 per cent between 2008 and 2013, according to a new study, but experts say it's too early to link this to climate change.

GREAT ATTRACTOR: Hundreds of galaxies hidden from view behind the Milky Way have been unveiled in unprecedented detail for the first time by astronomers using Australia's Parkes Radio Telescope.

Female shark that has had no contact with males for more than two years produces two fertile eggs

A female shark that has had no contact with males of its species for more than two years is due to give birth to two babies. The white-spotted bamboo shark arrived at Great Yarmouth Sea Life Centre in 2013, having been evacuated from the badly flooded sister centre in Hunstanton, also in Norfolk.

She has been the only member of her species at the centre in that time and has had no contact with male sharks. But experts at the centre have revealed that she has produced two fertile eggs, which are due to hatch in nine months’ time.

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GREAT MOMENTS IN SCIENCE: Next time you're at the lights, stop to appreciate the humble pedestrian button. The design is so beautiful that even Oscar Wilde would approve, says Dr Karl.

International Shark Attack File notes 98 unprovoked shark attacks – including six fatalities – with US, Australia and South Africa witnessing highest numbers

Sharks attacked people 98 times in 2015, a spike in unprovoked attacks that set a new record as human populations rise, researchers found in an annual global tally released on Monday.

Related: Shark nets used at most beaches do not protect swimmers, research suggests

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Rodents are threatening the unique natural environment of Australia’s sparsely populated Lord Howe Island. But a plan to eradicate the pests by dropping 42 tonnes of poisoned cereal is splitting the close-knit community in half

Described by the UN as “an area of spectacular and scenic landscapes”, Lord Howe Island is nothing if not dramatic. Formed from an inferno of underwater volcanoes more than six million years ago, the 10km long crescent-shaped island sits in a bath of turquoise water, exactly where the warm East Australian Current meets the icy waters of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.

Those ancient lava flows left a rugged landscape with steep cliffs, which drop off into an ocean which supports the world’s most southerly coral reef. Between those cliffs and the reef lies a calm blue lagoon that laps against a yellow-sand beach.

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RESCUE ROACH: The hard-to-kill cockroach has inspired the development of a soft-bodied robot that can compress itself and crawl into confined spaces, and may help locate people trapped in buildings destroyed by disasters.

A new study finds that NOAA temperature adjustments are doing exactly what they’re supposed to

Congressman Lamar Smith (R-TX) has embarked upon a witch-hunt against climate scientists at NOAA, accusing them of conspiring to fudge global temperature data. However, a new study has found that the adjustments NOAA makes to the raw temperature data bring them closer to measurements from a reference network of pristinely-located temperature stations.

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Application on ecological sustainability - call for public comments open from 9 February 2016 until 9 March 2016.

Application on ecological sustainability - call for public comments open from 9 February 2016 until 9 March 2016.

A court ruling has backed Dover council’s decision to allow builders into an area of outstanding natural beauty

Conservationists and historians are digging in for a last-ditch defence of a sliver of “sacrosanct” ancient Kentish meadow and woods, protected in law but set to be the location for a large housing and leisure development.

The fight for the Farthingloe valley, a long, narrow green strip that extends to the western outskirts of Dover, has been especially bitter. The valley is within the Kent Downs area of outstanding natural beauty and makes up much of the rural hinterland behind the 300ft Shakespeare Cliff, the most westerly of the chalk cliffs at Dover. The cliff is owned by Dover district council and the National Trust owns a portion of land. The valley may have provided some inspiration for a scene in King Lear, which gave rise to the cliff’s name, coined in the 18th century.

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Invisible pollution kills up to 9,000 people a year in the capital. But under government plans, from school gates to shopping streets, Londoners will be breathing dangerous air until 2025. What more can be done?

“In the morning, this traffic island is packed with children and pushchairs and they are about a metre from all the exhausts,” says Shazia Ali-Webber. She is walking her three boys to school in Hackney, the eldest of whom, Zain, is eight and asthmatic.

Crossing choked Mare Street, where the heavy traffic grinds slowly past, is her biggest concern. “Children’s lung development is affected by air pollution: they have smaller lungs for life,” she says. “The government’s new plan says pollution will not fall to legal levels till 2025. But I don’t have time to wait: Zain will be 18 by then. They are condemning a generation of children to ill-health.”

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