Scientists believe they have found a quirky way to fight mosquito-spread diseases such as dengue, yellow fever and Zika - by turning male insects deaf so they struggle to mate and breed.
Mosquitoes have sex while flying in mid-air and the males rely on hearing to chase down a female, based on her attractive wingbeats.
The researchers did an experiment, altering a genetic pathway that male mosquitoes use for this hearing. The result - they made no physical contact with females, even after three days in the same cage.
Female mosquitoes are the ones that spread diseases to people, and so trying to prevent them having babies would help reduce overall numbers.
The team from the University of California, Irvine studied Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which spread viruses to around 400 million people a year.
They closely observed the insects' aerial mating habits - that can last between a few seconds to just under a minute - and then figured out how to disrupt it using genetics.
They targeted a protein called trpVa that appears to be essential for hearing.
In the mutated mosquitoes, neurons normally involved in detecting sound showed no response to the flight tones or wingbeats of potential mates.
The alluring noise fell on deaf ears.
In contrast, wild (non-mutant) males were quick to copulate, multiple times, and fertilised nearly all the females in their cage.
The researchers from the University of California, Santa Barbara, who have published their work in the journal PNAS, said the effect of the gene knock-out was "absolute", as mating by deaf males was entirely eliminated.
Dr Joerg Albert, from the University of Oldenburg in Germany, is an expert on mosquito mating and I asked him what he made of the research.
He said attacking sense of sound was a promising route for mosquito control, but it needed to be studied and managed.
"The study provides a first direct molecular test, which suggests that hearing is indeed not only important for mosquito reproduction but essential.
"Without the ability of males to hear - and acoustically chase - female mosquitoes might become extinct."
Another method being explored is releasing sterile males in areas where there are pockets of mosquito-spread diseases, he added.
Although mosquitoes can carry diseases, they are an important part of the food chain - as nourishment for fish, birds, bats and frogs, for example - and some are important pollinators.
The government has announced plans to make it illegal to smoke in children's playgrounds and outside schools and hospitals in England, with some places also becoming vape-free.
In Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, it is already an offence to smoke on NHS hospital grounds.
The Tobacco and Vapes Bill would also make it impossible for anyone currently aged 15 or under to buy cigarettes - something the previous government had planned - and give more powers to restrict vape flavours, displays and packaging.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting said the government was taking "bold action" to create a smoke-free generation, "clamp down on kids getting hooked on nicotine through vapes" and protect the vulnerable from the dangers of second-hand cigarette smoke.
Plans include extending the indoor smoking ban to certain outdoor settings, such as schools and hospitals, to protect children and the most vulnerable.
It said it was considering outdoor vaping bans too in some places.
The proposals will all be open to public debate over the coming months.
Under the bill, shops would have to obtain a licence in order to sell tobacco, vape and nicotine products in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
This would mean on-the-spot fines of £200 for retailers selling unregulated products or to people aged under 18.
A registration system for retailers selling these products has been in place in Scotland since 2017.
Smoking puts huge pressure on the NHS. It kills 80,000 people a year in the UK and is responsible for one in four of all deaths from cancer.
It also increases the risk of many illnesses including heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, asthma and dementia.
The government said smoking also cost the economy £18bn a year in lost productivity, with smokers a third more likely to be off work sick.
Health charities have welcomed the bill, which will be subject to consultation for the next six months.
Action on Smoking and Health said it would help create a country where young people would never start smoking.
“It is important to have the debate about how we will protect children and vulnerable people from the harms of second-hand smoke," said the charity's chair, Prof Nick Hopkinson.
He added: "A key next step is for the government to set out further how it will help the UK’s six million smokers to quit. This will require a properly funded plan, paid for by a levy on tobacco companies.”
Dr Charmaine Griffiths, British Heart Foundation chief executive, said she welcomed the government's commitment to protect children and vulnerable people from second-hand smoke in schools, playgrounds and hospital grounds.
"We also welcome measures to make vaping less appealing to young people," she said.
Shoplifting is at "unacceptable" levels and not being tackled properly, a Lords inquiry has found.
The crime is seriously underreported and the problem is so urgent police forces need to take "immediate action", according to the House of Lords Justice and Home Affairs Committee.
It says retailers need to be able to report crimes more easily, more funding is needed for offender rehabilitation, and regulations should be introduced to make it more difficult to sell stolen goods online anonymously.
The Home Office said it was making assaults on shopworkers a criminal offence and deploying "thousands" of police officers dedicated to tackling shoplifting.
The Lords committee held an inquiry into tackling shoplifting in which it heard evidence from police chiefs, retailers and industry experts in May and September.
In a letter published today, it said there were more than 443,000 incidents of shop theft recorded by police in March 2024 – the highest ever since records began 20 years ago.
But they were "a drop in the ocean" when compared with likely real figures estimated at 17 million annually – which has "devastating consequences for businesses and families".
Shop theft has evolved from "individualised offending to relentless, large-scale, organised operations accompanied by unprecedented levels of violence", it added.
Tracey Robertson, co-owner of Paw Prints – a small chain of pet shops across Yorkshire – says shoplifting costs her business around £8,000 a year.
"It’s a financial impact on a family business. It’s bad in the fact that it affects the staff that work for us because sometimes it’s aggressive and violent," she said.
The committee supported schemes like Project Pegasus - a partnership between retailers and police to tackle organised shoplifting gangs - but said there needs to be a strategy to deal with local prolific offenders too.
"The scale of the shop theft problem within England and Wales is totally unacceptable and action, like that under way in the Pegasus scheme, is vital and urgent," said Lord Foster of Bath, chair of the committee.
The committee found there is a widespread perception that shop theft is not treated seriously by the police which "risks undermining confidence in the police and wider criminal justice system".
It said shoplifting cost the retail sector nearly £2bn last year – which resulted in price rises impacting individuals, families and communities.
"We acknowledge the pressures on police resources, but we believe that the urgency of the situation relating to shop theft requires immediate action within existing police staffing levels," the letter said.
It has made a series of recommendations to the government which it says would "help tackle the problem and keep the public and our economy safer".
These include:
Phasing out the use of the outdated term "shoplifting" which serves to trivialise the severity of the offence
Developing improved reporting systems to enable retailers to report crime to the police quickly and easily
Increasing funding to community-based reoffending and rehabilitation initiatives
Introducing regulations to make it more difficult to sell stolen goods on online marketplaces anonymously
Introducing regulations and best practice guidance for the use of facial recognition technology by private companies
Shop owner Tracey Robertson believes the recommendations do not go far enough and wants to see much tougher sentences for repeat offenders.
Professor of criminology Emmeline Taylor, who gave evidence to the inquiry, said the committee recommendations are "far-reaching" and understand the multiple root causes of shop theft.
"If adopted by the police, the industry and the government it will certainly do a huge amount to begin to turn the tide on the tsunamic of shop theft that has impacted the retail sector across the UK."
The National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) said it welcomed the report which further highlights the significant impact retail crime has on its victims.
"We are doing all we can to reduce thefts and pursue offenders, especially those prolific and habitual offenders, who cause misery within the community," said Chief Constable Amanda Blakeman, the NPCC’s lead for acquisitive crime.
The Home Office said it understands the "devastating impact" of shop theft has on communities.
A spokesperson added: "We are taking immediate action through our commitment to scrap the £200 shop theft threshold, and making assaults on shop workers a criminal offence.
"We will also put thousands more dedicated police officers on our streets, and establish a Retail Crime Forum for retailers to confidently implement tactics against shop theft."
The moods and messages were more different than ever as the presidential rivals made one last scramble through battleground states, their ambitions riding heavily on Pennsylvania.
The shift in policy, covering government agencies and contractors working on national security, is intended to promote “responsible and ethical” innovations, the company said.
In his first TV interview since then, Sir Chris tells BBC Breakfast's Sally Nugent of the "absolute shock and horror" he felt at his initial diagnosis, the "nightmare" of learning wife Sarra had multiple sclerosis, and having to break the news to their two young children.
But he also speaks about how they are dealing with their situation, the outpouring of support they have received and - remarkably - how he is focusing on the positives and the good he hopes can come from it.
'I started to feel nauseous, I was green in the face' – the diagnosis
"It's been the toughest year of our lives so far by some stretch," says Sir Chris. The news that he had a terminal illness, in September 2023, came "completely out the blue".
"No symptoms, no warnings, nothing. All I had was a pain in my shoulder and a little bit of pain in my ribs."
He thought it was just aches and pains from working out in the gym. "But this ache and pain didn't go away.
"I assumed it was going to be tendonitis or something, and it was just going to be lay off weights or lay off cycling for a wee while and get some treatment and it'll be fine."
A scan revealed a tumour. "It was the biggest shock of my life. I remember the feeling of just absolute horror and shock.
"I just basically walked back in a daze. I couldn't believe the news and I was just trying to process it, I don't remember walking. I just remember sort of halfway home thinking 'where am I?' And then I was thinking 'how am I going to tell Sarra? What am I going to say?'."
Several scans and hospital appointments followed. It had spread. Secondary bone cancer from prostate cancer, he was told.
"I'd had zero symptoms, nothing to point me towards that that might be an issue. We were given the news that this was incurable.
"Suddenly, everything, all your thoughts, everything rushes. It's almost like your life is flashing before your eyes in that moment.
"It does feel like this isn't real. You feel that you want to get out, you feel like you're a caged animal, you want to get out of that consulting room and get away from the hospital and run away from it all.
"But you realise you can't outrun this, this is within you and this is just the first step of the process of acceptance."
'How are we going to tell the kids?' - cancer and chemotherapy
Sir Chris and Sarra have two children, Callum and Chloe, who were aged nine and six at the time. How would they break the news to them?
"That was the first thought in my head," Sir Chris says. "How on earth are we going to tell the kids? It's just this absolute horror, it is a waking nightmare, living nightmare.
"We just tried to be positive and tried to say do you know what, this is what we're doing and you can help because when I'm not feeling well, you can come and give me cuddles, you can be supportive, you can be happy, you can be kind to each other.
"I'm sure lots of families do it in different ways and I think there's no one right approach for anyone. There's no one-size-fits-all, but for us I think that was the best way to do it."
Sir Chris says chemotherapy "was one of the biggest challenges I've ever faced and gone through" at a time when he was "still reeling from the diagnosis" just a few weeks earlier.
He says he tried to focus on the positives and see it as "a good thing, we're here to try and to start punching back, this is going to be a positive fight against the cancer".
He "wasn’t fussed" about potentially losing his hair - though son Callum had some concerns.
"I think he was worried about what it would be like if I just suddenly turned up to pick him up at school with no hair and it might be a shock for him."
When it started, the chemotherapy was "excruciating".
"It's like torture basically. I wasn't ready for it, I didn't know how to cope with it, how to deal with it initially."
He used Callum, and his great uncle Andy, who had been a prisoner of war in Japan, as "motivating factors" to get through it and developed a strategy for coping with the two-hour treatment sessions. "Don't do it for two hours, do it for one minute. The strategy was just take it one step at a time, just deal with the next minute, just watch that seconds hand go round the clock.
"If you can do one more minute, that's all you need to do. And then when it gets round to the end of the minute, you do it again.
"I don't think we necessarily give ourselves enough credit for what we're able to deal with. It's only when you're in really difficult situations you find out what you're made of and what you can deal with.
"And it puts it into perspective riding bikes for a living, you realise 'God, that was just a bit of fun really', you know."
'It was the lowest point' - Sarra's diagnosis
Following a scan, wife Sarra learned in November 2023 she had multiple sclerosis, only sharing the news with her sister. "The strength of Sarra is unbelievable, she kept it to herself," Sir Chris explains.
"Throughout all of that she was there for me but didn't at any point crack. And it was really only in December that she said 'this is the news I've had'.
"That was the lowest point I think. That was the point where I suddenly thought 'what is going on?' I almost felt like saying OK stop, this is a dream, wake me up, this isn't real, this is a nightmare. You were already on the canvas and I just felt this, another punch when you're already down - it was like getting that kick on the floor.
"That was the bit where you think if you didn't have the kids, if you didn't have that purpose and the absolute need to keep getting out of bed every day and moving on, it would have been really difficult. But that's why you’re a team. You help each other.
"You worry about your family, you worry about people close to you. It's not where we thought we would be a year ago. That was the hardest point without question, that diagnosis.
"But we're pressing on, she's receiving treatment and she's doing well at the moment, and aren't we lucky that there's treatment for it? She has medicine she can take and I have medicine I can take. So we're lucky."
'I thought cycling was life or death but the stakes have changed'
In a storied cycling career, Edinburgh-born Sir Chris established himself as a British sporting icon. One of the country's most decorated Olympians, he won six gold medals across four Games. London 2012, he says "felt like it was the culmination of my whole career".
"The timing of everything was perfect. I was so lucky to have a home Olympics during my career and my lifetime. That moment when I walked on to the track and you knew that this is it. This is the final scene in the movie, this is kind of the culmination of all that hard work and that response from the crowd, the noise. It was something I'll never forget.
"I can bring those images back like that. You shut your eyes and you're back in that velodrome. We all have these moments in our lives. It's just wonderful to have these memories that you can look back on and it just becomes a bit more poignant over the last year, you look back on them with even more intensity.
"The stakes are much higher now. It felt like life and death in the moment when you were battling it out for an Olympic gold medal, but the stakes have changed dramatically and it is life and death.
"But the principle is the same, it's about focusing on what you have control over and not worrying about the stuff that you can't control.
"You don't just suddenly have a leap forward and one day you wake up and everything's OK. It takes time and you've got to be disciplined with how you approach it, and you've got to nip things in the bud before these negative thoughts start to take hold."
'It sounds crazy, but we're lucky' - looking to the future
When Sir Chris revealed his diagnosis last month, the public shock was seismic. Messages flowed from all walks of life, from Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and Scotland's first minister John Swinney to fellow sporting icons, such as Olympic cyclist and former Great Britain team-mate Sir Mark Cavendish.
The messages of support continue to pour in. Former England football captain David Beckham, Coldplay singer Chris Martin and another Scottish sporting superstar in Sir Andy Murray have all got in touch. "It's overwhelming," Sir Chris says.
And it is the awareness of what Sir Chris is going through that he hopes can deliver a life-saving legacy far beyond the Glasgow velodrome which bears his name.
For one, he is hoping his platform will help him persuade more men to take a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) blood test to check for cancer.
Both his grandfather and father have had prostate cancer, which is genetic but can affect anyone - one in eight men will have prostate cancer in their life at some point.
"If you've got family history of it like I have, if you're over the age of 45, go and ask your doctor. I've got a friend who, when I told him my news early on confidentially, he went and got a PSA test and it turned out he had cancer. He's had treatment and he's been given the all-clear."
He would like to see screening for men with a strong family history of prostate cancer start at an earlier age. "Catch it before you need to have any major treatment. To me it seems a no-brainer. Reduce the age, allow more men to just go in and get a blood test.
"Maybe people seeing this or hearing about my story - just by them asking their GP - will create enough of a surge of interest that people that make the decisions will go 'you know what, we need to address this'. And in the long term this will save potentially millions of lives."
An awareness-raising charity bike ride is planned for 2025 for people with stage four cancers. Sir Chris wants it to change perspectives and show "many people can still have very full and happy lives, and healthy lives, dealing with it".
"I'm not saying everybody's in the same boat but there's hope out there. Look at me now, six months on from finishing chemo and I'm riding my bike every day, I'm in the gym, I'm physically active, I'm not in pain. When people talk about battles with cancer, for me the biggest battle is between your ears.
"It's the mental struggle, it's the challenge to try and deal with these thoughts, deal with the implications of the news you're given. Your life is turned upside down with one sentence. You've walked in one person and you walk out as another person.
"When you hear terminal illness, terminal cancer, you just have this image in your head of what it is, what it's going to be like. And everybody's different, and not everybody is given the time that I've been given - and that's why I feel lucky. We genuinely feel lucky, as crazy as that might sound, because we've got the time."
He has used that time to write a book - All That Matters: My Toughest Race Yet - which is released this week, and says the process was "cathartic".
"I've hoped it's going to help other people, not just people who are going through a similar situation to me or families going through a similar situation, but for anyone in life to try and understand that no matter what challenges you're facing, you can get through them. And it doesn't mean that there's going to be a happy ending, I'm not delusional.
"I know what the end result will be. Nobody lives forever. Our time on this planet is finite. Don't waste your time worrying about stuff that isn't that important. Focus on the things that are important, focus on your family, the people in your life. Do that thing that you've always planned to do one day, why not do it today.
"My perspective on life has changed massively. I am more thankful, I'm more grateful for each day. It's been a tough year and it's going to be tough ahead in the future too but for now, right here right now, we're doing pretty well."
The full interview - Sir Chris Hoy: Finding Hope - will be shown on BBC One at 20:00 GMT on Tuesday, 5 November
Senior doctors are charging the NHS premium rates for overtime, as pressure to cut waiting lists is allowing some to make more than £200,000 a year from additional work, a BBC News investigation has found.
That is nearly double the average basic pay for a full-time consultant in England.
Many of the consultants earning the most are thought to be part-time, allowing them to work significant amounts of overtime for rates exceeding £200 an hour – more than four times normal pay.
NHS England said hospitals had to offer rates that were competitive with the private sector.
But the British Medical Association (BMA), the doctors' union, pointed out the NHS would not have to rely so much on overtime were it not for staffing shortages.
And hospitals said covering for strike days and sickness had also been factors.
The findings come as the government invests more money in the NHS, to increase the number of appointments and operations it can offer – a key election promise made by Labour.
As part of the Budget, the chancellor said the NHS would receive an extra £25bn this year and next – with reducing waits a priority.
A key part of Labour’s plan is for staff to work evenings and weekends, to cut the backlog.
But the BBC News investigation raises concerns about whether this approach can deliver value for money.
One senior NHS source said: “Consultants hold all the cards – they know we cannot make progress on the backlog without them."
The source said consultants were in a "pretty unique position compared to other staff" because their contracts meant they could opt out of weekend work and then charge whatever their hospital was willing to pay for overtime.
They said it was not in the BMA's interests to renegotiate these "outdated" contracts, more than 20 years old.
'Artificial intelligence'
"What worries me is that the overtime costs are going to keep increasing with the need to tackle the backlog and this will breed resentment among other NHS staff who often work overtime for little more,” the source said.
They added that the NHS needed to hire more consultants, ask other staff to take on some of their work and invest in technologies such as artificial intelligence to lighten the load.
BBC News used Freedom of Information requests to hospital trusts and data supplied by NHS England to reveal what consultants working beyond their contracted hours was costing the NHS:
The overall overtime bill hit almost £1bn in 2023-24, up from £512m 10 years ago, albeit some of that rise is related to more consultants being employed
Six in 10 consultants work beyond their contracted hours, with average extra pay topping £27,000 a year
At least half of the 41 hospital trusts that responded to BBC News are now paying some of their consultants more than £100,000 in overtime
In 2023-24, Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust paid four consultants from its medicine speciality more than £100,000 in overtime payments.
One earned just above £208,000 in overtime for 128 days work.
And during those shifts, their pay averaged £188 an hour.
The trust said “in common with most NHS trusts”, it had to rely on overtime payments to “manage waiting lists and to cover rota gaps and vacancies” and covering strikes had placed it under added strain.
Medway NHS Foundation Trust confirmed it had paid three radiologists, who diagnose and treat patients using scans and tests, more than £150,000 in overtime – one of whom had earned above £200,000.
It said shortages in this field meant it had to pay premium rates, sometimes on a scan-by-scan basis.
'Extra operations'
NHS Frimley Health Foundation Trust paid two consultants in its endoscopy department, which provides internal examinations, more than £180,000 each in overtime, to tackle the backlog in treatment.
The trust said: “We’re focused on ensuring we always provide value for money - and anything we spend is in proportion with the benefit it brings to our patients.”
NHS Humber Health Partnership, which runs five hospitals, paid three consultants between £185,000 and £240,000 in overtime.
Chief medical officer Kate Wood said the overtime spending had helped fund extra operations at weekends, to reduce waiting lists.
“We assess the costs of these shifts against the risks of not having cover," she said.
"We have put patient safety first as that is our key focus.
"This is not something that is unique to us.”
'Critical role'
Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust paid three consultants more than £100,000 in overtime, including one who earned just above £198,000.
Managing director Stephen Collman said the trust was trying to reduce “premium payments” where possible but the need to cover sickness absence and vacant posts meant to keep services “running safely and effectively” it had no option.
Some hospitals said overtime rates had been driven up over the past year by the particularly high rates the BMA had told its consultants to ask for to provide strike cover.
"It created a new expectation of what they should get," one official said.
But BMA consultant co-leaders Dr Helen Neary and Dr Shanu Datta said: “Unfortunately, a declining workforce in crisis and spiralling patient demand - which has led to sky high waiting lists - means that extra hours of work are essential to get the job done.”
They pointed out much of the overtime was done during unsocial hours, adding these were “highly-trained and experienced professionals” so it was reasonable for them to value their time “at appropriate rates”.
Danny Mortimer, of NHS Employers, which represents hospitals on employment issues, said: "In light of the difficult financial position of the NHS, health leaders are trying to bear down on extra-contractual premium pay rates."
But there were no easy solutions as consultants played a "critical role" in tackling waiting lists.
And an NHS England official pointed out the use of agencies, which could be even more expensive, was falling.
Elon Musk's political group has been deciding who receives $1m (£772,000) in its election giveaway, and not been choosing winners randomly, a lawyer representing the billionaire said on Monday.
One of Donald Trump's biggest supporters in the election, Musk has offered the sum to registered voters in swing states through his America PAC, in what many believed was a lottery-style contest.
Philadelphia District Attorney Lawrence Krasner called the giveaway "an illegal lottery" when he sued Musk and the group last month.
But Musk's lawyer Chris Gober told a Pennsylvania judge that the group selects the recipients, according to media reports. The judge later ruled that the giveaway can continue.
Common Pleas Court Judge Angelo Foglietta did not immediately give a reason for the ruling, made a few hours after the hearing, according to the Associated Press.
America PAC has been awarding $1m to a voter in one of the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan and North Carolina each day in the leadup to Election Day.
Before the court hearing, the group announced a man named Joshua in Arizona was awarded the money for Monday.
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, which Musk owns, the group added: "Every day until Election Day, a person who signs will be selected to earn $1m as a spokesperson for America PAC".
Gober told the court that America PAC has already determined the final recipient who will be announced on Election Day and who is from Michigan, US media reported.
“The $1 million recipients are not chosen by chance,” Gober said, according to the Associated Press. “We know exactly who will be announced as the $1 million recipient today and tomorrow.”
But when the world's richest man unveiled the giveaway last month, many believed it was a random drawing for registered voters who signed a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments of the US Constitution.
“We are going to be awarding $1m randomly to people who have signed the petition, every day, from now until the election," Musk told a campaign event.
A few days later, the US Justice Department warned that the group could be breaking election laws, which forbid paying people to register to vote. Krasner's office then sued to stop it.
Musk has been aggressively campaigning for Trump in swing states across the country, and his committee has been pushing hard in Pennsylvania, where polls suggest Trump is in a tie with Vice-President Kamala Harris, a Democrat.
A lawyer in Krasner's office told Reuters that Gober's comments in court are "a complete admission of liability".
During the hearing, prosecutors played a video where Musk, who is also the chief executive of SpaceX, said that "all we ask" is that the winners serve as spokespeople for the group, Reuters reported.
But Chris Young, the director of America PAC, said in court that the recipients are screened and must have values aligned with the group, US media reported.
Those who receive the money sign non-disclosure agreements that block them from publicly discussing the terms of their contracts, according to Reuters.
Quincy Jones, musician and producer who worked with Michael Jackson, Frank Sinatra and many others, dies aged 91.
Jones’ publicist, Arnold Robinson, said he "passed away peacefully" on Sunday night at his home in Bel Air.
"Tonight, with full but broken hearts, we must share the news of our father and brother Quincy Jones’ passing. And although this is an incredible loss for our family, we celebrate the great life that he lived and know there will never be another like him," the family said in a statement.
Jones was best known as the producer of Michael Jackson's Thriller album.
Over his career that spanned more than 75 years he won 28 Grammy awards and was named as one of the most influential jazz musicians of the 20th century by Time magazine.
He produced and conducted the recording of the 1985 charity record, We Are The World.
He also composed the soundtrack to more than 50 films and TV programmes including Heat of the Night, The Color Purple and The Italian Job.
Early in his career, Jones worked closely with Frank Sinatra and re-worked Sinatra's classic Fly Me To The Moon taking it from a waltz to a swing.
One the film The Wiz, Jones found himself working alongside a 19-year-old Michael Jackson.
The pair worked together for decades and Jones produced albums Off the Wall, Thriller and Bad.
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Nigeria's president has ordered the immediate release of a group of young people accused of treason, after footage of some of them collapsing in court sparked outrage.
The 27 teenagers - among 76 suspects detained for months following their arrest in anti-government protests - are aged between 14 and 18.
Viral videos of them writhing in pain before being taken for medical treatment sparked a renewed debate over their treatment by authorities in Nigeria, as well as the length of their detention.
The demonstrations turned violent in some places when protesters clashed with security forces.
Police say seven people died - though rights groups put the death toll at 23. Nearly 700 people were arrested.
Some of those in court in the capital, Abuja, on Friday were accused of flying Russian flags and planning to overthrow the Nigerian government.
In a statement on Monday, President Tinbula's spokesman Bayo Onanuga said that it was his wish that the release of the children did not prejudice the ongoing legal action.
Reuters reported, citing Information Minister Mohammed Idris, that the treason charges against the children had been dropped.
Mr Onanuga said the Nigerian humanitarian affairs ministry had been asked "to ensure the safe return of all the minors to their families while an investigation has been opened into the circumstances leading to their prolonged detention".
When the courtroom footage emerged, Nigerian rights organisation Enough is Enough said they had been subjected to "institutional child abuse".
Amnesty International described the children's detention was "one of the deadliest attempts to suppress freedom of assembly" so far.
Former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who is eyeing a potential run for New York City mayor next year, criticized plans to close part of the A train in the Rockaways for months.
The Trudeau government has focused on the oil and gas production industries because the large amounts of energy they use make them the country’s largest source of greenhouse gases.
Quincy Jones lived for 50 years after attending his own memorial service.
When the musician suffered a brain aneurysm in 1974, his chances of survival were said to be so slim, and his stature so high, that his famous friends started planning a tribute concert.
Then aged 41, Jones had already made an indelible mark on American music as a musician, arranger, songwriter, producer, soundtrack composer and record executive.
He started out in the jumping jazz clubs of the 1950s; mastered soul, swing and pop on recordings by Dinah Washington, Frank Sinatra and Lesley Gore; and reached the top 10 in his own right.
Some of the biggest entertainers in America agreed to perform at his memorial.
When he pulled through, the show went ahead anyway.
Jones went along, accompanied by his neurologist, who gave strict instructions not to get too excited.
"That was hard to do with Richard Pryor, Marvin Gaye, Sarah Vaughan and Sidney Poitier singing your praises," he told Newsweek in 2008.
Even more exciting things were to come.
Jones went on to forge an era-defining partnership with Michael Jackson; oversee 1985's We Are the World, one of the biggest-selling songs of all time; craft hits for acts like Chaka Khan and Donna Summer; and work with the biggest names in hip-hop.
Few branches of American popular music were immune to his influence.
Jones had always been a survivor.
He grew up in the shadow of the Great Depression in the 1930s on the South Side of Chicago. His mother was taken to a psychiatric institution when he was seven and his father worked as a carpenter for notorious gangsters the Jones Boys.
Young Quincy wanted to be a gangster too. "You want to be what you see, and that's all we ever saw," he said.
He and his brother were "street rats" and, when he strayed into the wrong neighbourhood at the age of seven, a rival gang member "nailed my hand to a fence". Another injury came from an ice pick to the face.
His father took the family to Washington state, where one night Quincy and some friends broke into a community centre, looking for food. Inside, there was a piano.
"I touched it and every cell in my body said, this is what you'll do [for] the rest of your life," he told BBC Radio 4's Front Row in 2016.
The encounter "changed my life", he said in conversation with rapper Kendrick Lamar for a 2018 Netflix documentary, adding that, "I would have been dead or in prison a long time ago" if he hadn't discovered music.
Quincy immediately began experimenting with instruments at school, settling on the trumpet, and began playing in nightclubs.
At the age of 14, he made friends with another then-unknown musician called Ray Charles, who became a musical mentor and a lifelong collaborator.
He also played with Billie Holiday at 14, and got taken under the wings of bandleader Count Basie and trumpeter Clark Terry. He went on to accompany Dizzy Gillespie and appeared in the band during Elvis Presley's first TV appearance.
After showing a talent for arranging songs while touring the world with Lionel Hampton's big band, he was soon in demand in that capacity, too.
But after running up a $145,000 debt on a European tour, he took a day job with Mercury Records in 1961, becoming the first African-American vice-president of a major record label.
While there, he discovered and produced the million-selling single It's My Party by Lesley Gore. He also released the Big Band Bossa Nova compilation album, which included his own infectious track Soul Bossa Nova, which has since become a staple of parties and film soundtracks, including Austin Powers.
Meanwhile, Sinatra had been impressed with Jones's work and called on him to arrange and conduct two of his albums in the 1960s. The pair formed a fertile partnership, with Sinatra calling him "a giant" and "one of the finest musicians I've ever known".
The pair became firm friends outside the studio, too. "Seven double Jack Daniels in an hour... [Sinatra] invented partying," Jones recalled.
Jones also worked with many other big names of the age, including Aretha Franklin, Louis Armstrong and Sammy Davis Jr, while his solo album Body Heat reached the US top 10.
Meanwhile, he was forging a career writing soundtracks for TV shows and films including In Cold Blood, The Italian Job and Roots.
In Cold Blood's author Truman Capote reportedly tried to have Jones removed from the film because he was black. But he remained, and the score earned Jones the first of seven Oscar nominations.
Another soundtrack was The Wiz, the 1978 film musical version of the Wizard of Oz, which starred Diana Ross and a 19-year-old Michael Jackson, who was looking to branch out after finding childhood fame in The Jackson 5.
Jones saw a superstar quality in Jackson and became his producer and mentor, first on 1979's Off the Wall, which was a major hit, and then 1982's Thriller, which reached new heights of commercial and critical success, and made Jackson the undisputed King of Pop.
The album was not just the fulfilment of Jackson's talent, but the culmination of Jones's career, as he used his peerless musical expertise to define the 1980s with a sleek and polished fusion of R&B and pop.
Jones listened to 600 songs (he sometimes said 800) to decide which nine should go on the album, and employed a dream team of musicians and songwriters that he had been assembling over the years.
His choice of collaborators was one example of his knack for knowing how to make a good song great. For Beat It, he thought the single needed a rockier edge, so he recruited Eddie Van Halen to contribute a guitar solo. Legend has it that the solo was so explosive that a speaker caught fire in the studio.
And when it came to the title track, Jones didn't like the original name Starlight, so he asked its writer, Rod Temperton, to come up with something different. Temperton renamed it Thriller and recast it with a spooky theme. Jones topped it off by asking his wife's friend, horror actor Vincent Price, to record a spoken-word outro.
The album earned Jones and Jackson the Grammy Award for producer of the year, while Thriller was named album of the year and Beat It won record of the year.
Jones used his winning formula in the 1980s with George Benson, Donna Summer and Patti Austin, and produced the decade's best-selling single when Jackson and Lionel Richie assembled 35 of America's biggest names for the 1985 charity song We Are the World.
Jones famously posted a message on the studio entrance telling the stars: "Check your egos at the door".
He had further success under his own name with his albums The Dude and Back on the Block. The latter, released in 1989, featured an all-star cast including many friends from his early career like Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie and Ray Charles.
But as well as revisiting his past, he was also firmly in the present, enlisting rappers like Ice-T and Grandmaster Melle Mel to appear on the title track.
It earned Jones another album of the year award at the Grammys.
Although he was in his 50s, he embraced rap music because he saw similarities with the energy of bebop jazz, and because may of its stars had risen out of hardship on the streets.
"I feel a kinship there because we went through a lot of the same stuff," he said.
And rap stars reciprocated his affection, looking on Jones as an inspirational elder statesman of black American music. Kendrick Lamar and Dr Dre were awestruck when meeting him for the Netflix documentary, which was titled Quincy and directed by his daughter, the actress Rashida Jones.
Jones used his status to try to try to stem the violence in the hip-hop world, convening the Quincy Jones Hip-Hop Symposium in 1995, where he addressed a room full of the nation's rap stars.
"I want to see you guys live at least to my age," he told them.
For Jones, social activism went hand-in-hand with his music.
He met Martin Luther King in 1955, and "from then on, my life was never the same", he said.
"Civil rights work and political involvement was no longer an activity to do on the side. It became an essential part of life and humanity."
He set up the Quincy Jones Listen Up Foundation and launched the We Are the Future project, among support for other causes.
Elsewhere, his redoubtable work ethic saw him launch a record label and hip-hop magazine Vibe, as well as producing films like The Color Purple and TV shows including The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
With that workload, and an accompanying longstanding drink problem, his family life and his health both suffered.
He married and divorced three times, having a nervous breakdown after splitting from third wife Peggy Lipton. To recover, he went to stay on the Pacific island owned by actor Marlon Brando, whom he first met in a jazz club at the age of 18.
Jones was also in a relationship with actress and model Nastassja Kinski in the 1990s, and he had seven children in total.
In 2015, he went into a diabetic coma for four days, and the following year went to hospital with a blood clot.
His death on Sunday at the age of 91 has left the music world in mourning.
If there's to be a second Quincy Jones memorial concert, stars will be queuing up to celebrate the achievements of a singular talent.