Global heating linked to early birth and damage to babies’ health, scientists find

Exclusive: Impacts include premature births and birth defects and affect everybody, everywhere, say researchers

100 ways to slightly improve your life without really trying

Whether it’s taking fruit to work (and to the bedroom!), being polite to rude strangers or taking up skinny-dipping, here’s a century of ways to make life better, with little effort involved …

Contact with nature in cities reduces loneliness, study shows

Loneliness is significant mental health concern and can raise risk of death by 45%, say scientists

Proximity to green space may help with PMS, study finds

Research adds to growing evidence of the health benefits associated with natural environments

Country diary: In rural Britain, some signs are more polite than others

Croxton Park, Cambridgeshire: While nature reserves ask, private estates demand

10 of the best eco-friendly places to stay in Europe

Sustainable stays offering the chance to share mountain views with bears, sleep easy in a low-carbon hotel and wellness experiences

From fringe to mainstream: how millions got a taste for going vegan

First, it was a fad. Now, as meat consumption falls, it’s part of everyday life … the unstoppable rise of the plant-based diet

‘Sun-powered orgasms are fantastic’: why I went to live in a desert cave

Armed with only a solar charger, a vibrator and some marijuana gummy bears, I rode out the pandemic – and my fear of spiders – in a California commune

The Guardian view on autumn: as summer ends, fresh starts abound

Editorial: Though the days turn cold and the night draws in, we should not mourn; this time of year is full of richnesses and new beginnings too

‘I was sliding towards the drop and couldn’t stop’ – the writer who fell from a mountain

It is every climber’s worst nightmare. In this extract from his thrilling book about the glorious – and treacherous – Cuillin Ridge on Skye, Simon Ingram recalls the day its wild peaks almost took his life