Australian authorities struggled to rescue a beached baby whale Wednesday and were forced to suspend the operation as fading light hampered efforts to return it to sea.

The whale, reportedly a two-year-old humpback, washed up on Palm Beach on the popular Gold Coast late Tuesday, with rescuers working for hours to try and free it.

More than two dozen scientific institutes, in unprecedented advice to world leaders, on Tuesday urged major economies to unleash an energy revolution for slashing carbon emissions to safer levels by 2050.

In a report issued ahead of the September 23 world climate summit, they also warned time was short for meeting the UN's global-warming target but the goal must not be scrapped.

Dutch student Boyan Slat is only 19 years old, but he already has 100 people working on his revolutionary plan to scoop thousands of tonnes of damaging plastics from the oceans.

The world's "plastic soup", much of it swirling around in five main gyres or rotating oceanic currents, costs billions of euros (dollars) to the fishing and tourism sectors every year.

U.S. military researchers announced Wednesday they have awarded $40 million toward developing a new kind of brain implant that may help restore memories in wounded soldiers and civilians.

The work represents a major scientific leap forward, but experts said many hurdles remain before it can be shown to work in people, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) said.

A common set of genes play a role in learning to read and do maths, with tiny variants influencing a child's skills in these tasks, according to a study published Tuesday.

But this ability is not just gene-driven, as schooling and help from parents are also vital contributors, its authors cautioned.

Dozens of neuroscientists are protesting Europe's $1.6 billion attempt to recreate the functioning of the human brain on supercomputers, fearing it will waste vast amounts of money and harm neuroscience in general.

The 10-year Human Brain Project is largely funded by the European Union. In an open letter issued Monday, more than 190 neuroscience researchers called on the EU to put less money into the effort to "build" a brain, and to invest instead in existing projects.

A fossil found in South Carolina has revealed a gigantic bird that apparently snatched fish while soaring over the ocean some 25 million to 28 million years ago.

Its estimated wingspan of around 21 feet is bigger than the height of a giraffe.

Having declared "war on pollution", China is arming itself with tougher weapons from new courts to daily fines and shutting down offenders altogether, in what analysts call promising steps but no guarantee of progress.

For decades, China accepted the blight on the environment as the collateral damage of tremendous economic growth that raised the incomes of hundreds of millions of people -- who now increasingly clamor for a better quality of life as well.

Thousands braved the summer heat Sunday to celebrate the first birthday of Yuan Zai, the first giant panda cub born in Taiwan, who has attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors in six months.

Around 3,000 people joined a 10-kilometer (6.2-mile) run which was part of a series of programs marking the birthday.

Satellite monitoring of tiny changes in the gravitational field of river basins may give up to 11 months' warning of disastrous floods, a study published on Sunday said.

Researchers at the University of California at Irvine drew up a map of the Mississippi River basin combining knowledge about land use and data from a NASA gravity-monitoring satellite called GRACE.