Here's a new perspective to motivate yourself (or someone else) to give up smoking: every cigarette smoked can take 20 minutes off your life expectancy, according to experts. Quit for a week, and your life could be a whole day longer.

The new metrics have been estimated by researchers from University College London (UCL), and are based on recent data added on top of a 2000 study that estimated each cigarette smoked equated to 11 minutes of lost life.

We now have more statistics for mortality rates across a greater number of smokers, which means a more accurate estimate for predicting their life expectancy.

The researchers were keen to update the calculation to motivate people to give up the smoking habit, which dramatically increases the risk of developing lung cancer, brain damage, and a host of other harms.

"Conveying these harms in a clear and accessible way that resonates with smokers can be challenging," write the researchers in their published paper.

"One potentially impactful way to express the harm caused by smoking is to estimate the average loss of life expectancy for each cigarette smoked."

Of course, 20-minute increments are a generalization based on a simplified measure of each person's habit. Everything from how deeply smokers inhale with each puff, to the other medical conditions they have, can make a difference to life expectancy.

However, 20 minutes is a useful shorthand for imagining the impact every cigarette has on the body, emphasizing the fact that benefits of being smoke-free increase over time.

"Epidemiological data indicate that the harm caused by smoking is cumulative and the sooner the person stops, and the more cigarettes they avoid smoking, the longer they live," write the researchers.

"Thus, a person smoking 10 cigarettes per day who quits smoking on the 1st of January 2025 could prevent loss of a full day of life by the 8th of January, a week of life by the 20th of February, and a month by the 5th of August. By the end of the year, they could have avoided losing 50 days of life."

In the UK, where the study data was sourced, being a smoker equates to an average reduction in lifespan of 10 years for men, and 11 for women. Smoking is the number one preventable cause of death, disability, and ill health in the country (as it is in the US).

And the researchers emphasize that it's not enough to cut down on how much you smoke; stopping completely is the only option if you want to eliminate the added risks of disease. No matter how old you are or how long you've smoked for, you can see benefits by finding a way to quit.

"Stopping smoking at every age is beneficial but the sooner smokers get off this escalator of death the longer and healthier they can expect their lives to be," write the researchers.

The research has been published in Addiction.

While our body shuts down in slumber each day, the brain remains busy at work, filing through the day's recordings and making sense of them with respect to past experiences.

Just how fresh memories are processed without blurring into old recollections has never been clear, with scientists hypothesizing different methods of keeping our memories separate while we sleep.

Researchers from Cornell University in the US strapped brain-scanning electrodes and tiny eye-tracking cameras to mice, monitoring them as they learned new tasks in the day, such as navigating a maze, and slept during the night. (Fun fact: mice can sleep with their eyes open.)

The team found two substages happening during non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, that restorative period crucial to forming memories. One replayed new memories, coinciding with a constriction of the pupils. The other substage featured recall of older memories, with the pupils dilated. Each phase occurred in quick succession.

The findings help answer the question of why consolidation of new memories doesn't erase old ones; for example, learning to play the piano without forgetting how to ride a bike. A similar analysis will need to be carried out in humans to verify the results, even if we do share a lot of brain similarities with mice.

"Our results suggest that the brain can multiplex distinct cognitive processes during sleep to facilitate continuous learning without interference," write the researchers in their published paper.

Previous studies have identified links between pupil size and sleep state, and between sleep state and memory formation, but this study adds a whole new level of detail to those connections.

Before now, there had been plenty of debate over how the brain fitted new memories in amongst the old ones during sleep – specifically, just how separated and intentional these processes are.

The team also found that blocking sharp-wave ripples (SWRs) – known to affect memory storage – during contracted pupil stages in the mice limited their capabilities to remember anything new.

"It's like new learning, old knowledge, new learning, old knowledge, and that is fluctuating slowly throughout the sleep," says neuroscientist Azahara Oliva, from Cornell University.

"We are proposing that the brain has this intermediate timescale that separates the new learning from the old knowledge."

The implications of the study are far-reaching: having a non-invasive means of monitoring brain function may help in the treatment of memory issues or the boosting of memory, for example.

The findings also lend weight to hypotheses on how our brains and computer systems have the potential to forget old information on a significant scale. In AI, it's known as catastrophic forgetting, and is one area where the machines are still way behind biology.

"This finding provides a potential solution for the long-standing problem in both biological and artificial neural networks of preventing catastrophic interference while also enabling memory integration," write the researchers.

The research has been published in Nature.

Volcanic activity bubbling away beneath the Yellowstone National Park in the US appears to be on the move.

New research shows that the reservoirs of magma that fuel the supervolcano's wild outbursts seem to be shifting to the northeast of the Yellowstone Caldera. This region could be the new locus of future volcanic activity, according to a team led by seismologist Ninfa Bennington of the US Geological Survey.

"On the basis of the volume of rhyolitic melt storage beneath northeast Yellowstone Caldera, and the region's direct connection to a lower-crustal heat source, we suggest that the locus of future rhyolitic volcanism has shifted to northeast Yellowstone Caldera," they write in their paper.

"In contrast, post-caldera rhyolitic volcanism in the previous 160,000 years has occurred across the majority of Yellowstone Caldera with the exclusion of this northeast region."

Yellowstone is one of the world's largest supervolcanoes; a vast, complex, dynamic region of Earth's crust that is both spectacularly beautiful and deeply dangerous.

In the past 2 million years, Yellowstone has undergone three huge, caldera-forming eruptions – those that create the cauldron-like basins on Earth's surface when a subterranean magma chamber empties and collapses in on the hollowed-out cavity. These huge eruptions have been interspersed with smaller eruptions.

The caldera-forming eruptions at Yellowstone are sourced from reservoirs of rhyolitic melt. That's silica-rich magma, the volcanic equivalent of granite, sticky and viscous and slow-moving, and thought to be stored in vast volumes underneath the Yellowstone region.

Previous studies presumed the rhyolitic reservoirs were supported by deeper reservoirs of basaltic magma – molten material that has a much smaller silica content than rhyolite, but abundant iron and magnesium. It's also significantly less viscous than rhyolite, but also denser, and the way it conducts electricity differs to rhyolite.

This latter difference in properties gave Bennington and her colleagues the tools they needed to probe the magmatic reservoir contents beneath the Yellowstone Plateau.

One way to monitor activity beneath Earth's surface involves measuring surface variations in the planet's magnetic and electric fields. This is known as magnetotellurics, and it's particularly sensitive to the presence of subsurface melts.

Bennington and her colleagues carried out a wide-scale magnetotelluric survey across the Yellowstone Caldera, and used the resulting data to model the distribution of the melt reservoirs lurking therein.

Their results revealed that there are at least seven distinct regions of high magma content, some of which are feeding into others, at depths between 4 and 47 kilometers (2.5 to 30 miles) beneath the ground – down to the boundary of the crust and mantle.

The most interesting melt storage was in the northeast. There, huge reservoirs of basaltic magma in the lower crust heat and maintain chambers of rhyolitic magma in the upper crust. These chambers of rhyolitic magma contain an estimated melt storage volume of around 388 to 489 cubic kilometers – almost an order of magnitude higher than melt storage zones to the south, west, and north, where previous eruptions took place.

This volume, the researchers note, is also comparable to the melt volume of previous caldera-forming eruptions in Yellowstone.

The rhyolitic caldera-forming eruptions, the researchers note, were interspersed with smaller, basaltic eruptions within the caldera. However, it's unclear exactly how these kinds of eruptions work. The team's research suggests that the rhyolitic magma chambers have to cool completely before the basaltic magma can move in.

Exactly when and how these future eruptions are going to take place will, the researchers say, require further analysis.

The research has been published in Nature.

Low doses of a drug used to treat ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) could help people focus on the road when driving for long, monotonous stretches risks sending their mind wandering.

Researchers from Australia's Swinburne University were curious about risks and benefits the pharmaceutical methylphenidate might have on driving performance, specifically in cases of individuals who don't have ADHD.

Up to 90 percent of people medicated for their ADHD are prescribed the drug, which is commonly sold under the brand name Ritalin. For a medicated person with ADHD, driving without it can feel a bit like driving without their glasses.

Adults with ADHD are more at risk for road accidents, motor vehicle injuries, traffic tickets, and hard braking events. Taking methylphenidate is known to improve their driving performance. All this probably contributes to the fact that ADHD medication can literally add years to some people's lives.

Yet many individuals take methylphenidate without a prescription. In the US alone, 5 million adults misuse prescription stimulants by taking them at higher doses, longer durations, or simply without a script. It's important to know how these people may be affected while driving under the influence of unauthorized stimulants, especially those tasked with long and monotonous journeys.

This study enlisted 25 mentally and physically healthy drivers without a diagnosis of ADHD to learn what impact methylphenidate might have on their driving performance.

The volunteers were given 10 mg of methylphenidate or a placebo 85 minutes before stepping behind the wheel of a driving simulator that mimics a 105-kilometer (65-mile) bi-directional, four-lane highway with standard Australian road markings and signage. The experiment was undertaken twice, with different participants allocated the placebo and drug.

They were asked to 'drive' for 40 minutes, maintaining a steady 100 kilometers per hour speed in the left-most lane. Occasionally, traffic conditions required them to overtake other vehicles.

While the participants focused on the 'road', a machine kept close watch on their eye movements, tracking eye fixation duration and rate via a driver-facing camera mounted on the dashboard, and the computer recorded how far the drivers deviated from the center of their lane.

A mathematical algorithm assessed how dispersed or focused the drivers' gazes were during the task, as well as how random or structured their visual scanning behaviour was.

"Methylphenidate significantly improved driving performance by reducing lane weaving and speed variation, particularly in the latter half of the drive," the authors report.

"Although a significant reduction in fixation duration was observed, all other ocular metrics remained unchanged."

Methylphenidate reduced the drop in performance drivers usually experience during driving tasks, and in comparison to the placebo, drivers who took the drug had better vehicle control and maintained a more constant speed.

It didn't cause any problems with people's visual scanning, although it didn't seem to improve it, either.

Previous studies raised concerns about a 'tunnel vision' effect associated with psychostimulants that could limit a driver's ability to respond to sudden or unexpected obstacles entering from the periphery, like a pedestrian or car.

While this effect didn't show up in the latest study, the authors suggest it may be because they used a relatively low dose taken short-term.

This study doesn't capture the effects that might be seen at higher doses or taken for longer, which, they write, "are arguably more common in real-world misuse scenarios and likely associated with road traffic collisions."

"There is a clear need for further research in this area, particularly studies aimed at identifying more pronounced alterations in ocular behaviour caused by methylphenidate and other psychostimulants," the authors conclude.

The research was published in Journal of Psychopharmacology.

If you're looking to improve your performance, both cognitively and physically, you need to start by giving a crap.

No, quite literally. Go to the toilet and empty your bowel. If you're about to compete in a triathlon, it will make you both faster and smarter, according to two recent studies.

The latest research involved 13 triathletes, a cognitive test called the Stroop test, and a magnesium oxide laxative.

The result? The athletes performed measurably better on the cognitive test after voiding their large intestines, a finding that suggests an underexplored link between the rectum and cognitive function. This potential link has interesting implications, not just for peak performance, but for understanding cognitive decline.

"The most striking finding of this study is the unequivocal improvement observed in Stroop test performance for all participants consuming magnesium oxide," writes a team of researchers led by biochemist Chen-Chan Wei of the University of Taipei in a new paper.

"Even in the absence of magnesium oxide, defecation led to improved Stroop test results for 9 out of 13 individuals."

A Stroop test is one that presents you with a visual of conflicting information. The word "red" might appear in blue text, for example; the test participant needs to say aloud the color of the text, not the color word that is written. It evaluates cognitive flexibility and response time.

A 2022 study found that patients with early-stage Parkinson's disease can exhibit mild cognitive impairment when constipated, suggesting a link between the rectum and the brain. Such a concept isn't without precedent. Your gut contains hundreds of millions of neurons, and the gut microbiome may play a role in your mood, as well as neurological and mental health disorders.

Wei and colleagues wanted to investigate the link for athletes. Triathlons, involving three different sports disciplines, are taxing on both mind and body. The athlete needs to make fast decisions to navigate the course, have the fortitude to last the distance, and in the process try to best their fellow athletes.

The researchers previously showed that having a poop before getting on a bike resulted in improved performance – and improved blood flow in the prefrontal cortex region of the brain – in triathletes. The next step, after establishing a link between an empty bowel and increased physical performance, was to try to identify if there was a similar link to cognitive performance.

"When you do exercise, especially long-distance exercise, your brain is going to be sending high amounts of commands to the muscles," explains physiologist Chia-Hua Kuo of the University of Taipei.

"Whether or not you can sustain muscle contraction is not really depending on whether your muscle has wrung out the energy, it's whether your brain is able to challenge your muscle."

Each of the 13 triathletes in the study participated in three sessions of Stroop testing. For the first session, the test was taken without a prior bowel movement. For the second session, after a careful diet, the test was administered an hour after a bowel movement. Finally, for the third session, the athletes were given magnesium oxide; they took the test 13 hours after taking the laxative, and an hour after defecation.

More than two thirds of participants performed better on the test with empty bowels in the second session. Intriguingly, 100 percent saw improvement after a laxative-aided defecation.

Although the sample size was small, the difference in performance between the sessions suggests that emptying one's bowels could be linked to improved cognition.

The link and the reasons for it have not been definitively established, but the researchers believe that it may have something to do with finite resources in the body. When you have material in your digestive tract, blood and oxygen are used to help break it down. With no material to digest, those resources can be used elsewhere.

In fact, insufficient resourcing during exercising is thought to be the cause of the well-known phenomenon of runners' diarrhea, in which athletes lose control of their bowels while engaged in intense exercise.

In a 2012 review, scientists found that "During physical exercise, the increased activity of the sympathetic nervous system redistributes blood flow from the splanchnic organs to the working muscles… A severely reduced splanchnic blood flow may frequently cause gastrointestinal ischemia."

That means that the body redirects blood away from the gastrointestinal organs to work on the exercise; and the reduced blood flow causes gastrointestinal pyrotechnics.

It's all connected in strange and wonderful ways. Or, as Kuo puts it: "Our spirit is not only inside the skull, but also in other parts. And the rectum is also part of the brain."

The researchers caution against taking laxative drugs. If you are having issues maintaining gastrointestinal regularity, seek help from a medical professional.

The findings have been published in Sports Medicine and Health Science.

We could be producing concrete that's 30 percent stronger by processing and adding charred coffee grounds to the mix, researchers in Australia discovered.

Their clever recipe could solve multiple problems at the same time.

Every year the world produces a staggering 10 billion kilograms (22 billion pounds) of coffee waste globally. Most ends up in landfills.

"The disposal of organic waste poses an environmental challenge as it emits large amounts of greenhouse gases including methane and carbon dioxide, which contribute to climate change," explained RMIT University engineer Rajeev Roychand.

With a booming construction market globally, there's also an ever increasing demand for resource intensive concrete causing another set of environmental challenges too.

"The ongoing extraction of natural sand around the world – typically taken from river beds and banks – to meet the rapidly growing demands of the construction industry has a big impact on the environment," said RMIT engineer Jie Li.

"There are critical and long-lasting challenges in maintaining a sustainable supply of sand due to the finite nature of resources and the environmental impacts of sand mining. With a circular-economy approach, we could keep organic waste out of landfill and also better preserve our natural resources like sand."

Organic products like coffee grounds can't be added directly to concrete because they leak chemicals that weaken the building material's strength. So using low energy levels the team heated coffee waste to over 350 °C (around 660 °F) while depriving it of oxygen.

This process is called pyrolyzing. It breaks down the organic molecules, resulting in a porous, carbon-rich charcoal called biochar, that can form bonds with and thereby incorporate itself into the cement matrix.

Roychand and colleagues also tried pyrolyzing the coffee grounds at 500 °C but the resulting biochar particles were not as strong.

The researchers cautioned that they still need to assess the long term durability of their cement product. They're now working on testing how the hybrid coffee-cement performs under freeze/thaw cycles, water absorption, abrasions and many more stressors.

The team is also working on creating biochars from other organic waste sources, including wood, food waste and agricultural waste.

"Our research is in the early stages, but these exciting findings offer an innovative way to greatly reduce the amount of organic waste that goes to landfill," said RMIT engineer Shannon Kilmartin-Lynch.

"Inspiration for my research, from an Indigenous perspective, involves Caring for Country, ensuring there's a sustainable life cycle for all materials and avoiding things going into landfill to minimize the impact on the environment."

Their research was published in the Journal of Cleaner Production.

An earlier version of this article was published in September 2023.

Brain damage can cause major personality changes, and in some rare cases, patients can become pathological jokesters, unable to suppress the urge to make silly jests or childish puns, even in inappropriate situations.

A notable case study from 2016 describes a 69-year-old man, who suffered a stroke and developed a compulsive need for humor.

The patient's desire to share a knee-slapper was so great, he would often wake his wife during the night just to tell her one of his funnies. So she kindly asked that he write them down instead.

When first meeting a team of neurologists, the man brought along "approximately 50 pages filled with his jokes, most of which were either puns or silly jokes with a sexual or scatological content."

The man was diagnosed with Witzelsucht, which is a collection of symptoms characterized by an incessant desire for humor. Oftentimes, the jokes are inappropriately timed or of an offensive nature, yet the joke-teller remains oblivious and highly entertained by their own wit.

The term Witzelsucht (a combination of the German words for 'joke' and 'addiction') was first introduced in 1890 by a German neurologist named Hermann Oppenheim, who noticed that damage to the right frontal lobe, either through injury or disease, sometimes led to overly humorous behavior in his patients.

In 1929, the German neurosurgeon Otfrid Foerster was conducting brain surgery on an awake patient, when he prodded a certain part of the brain that caused the patient to suddenly start cracking puns in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and German.

This helped neuroscientists narrow in on the area involved in humor, but in all the decades since this discovery, it's still not entirely clear how often witzelsucht occurs, or how it can be treated. Case studies are few and far between.

Neurologist Mario Mendez has authored more than most. He and his colleagues at UCLA were the ones who received 50 pages of jokes, and they have reported several other case studies of Witzelsucht since 2005.

Today, scientists know that Witzelsucht can often exist alongside or overlap with another collection of neurological symptoms called moria, which is characterized by pathological giddiness.

Both behavioral changes are associated with damage to the orbitofrontal circuit, which is involved in decision-making and which can be associated with tactlessness when damaged.

Just a few years ago, Mendez and UCLA colleague Leila Parand shared the story of a 63-year-old man, who had been shot in the head, losing much of his right frontal lobe and part of his left orbitofrontal cortex.

The individual, who once suffered from frequent depression and suicidal ideation, suddenly showed persistent feelings of mirth and happiness in recovery, at one point declaring, "You will never find me in a miserable state".

"On examination, he was observed to be unconcerned, frequently jesting, punning, or making light-hearted teasing comments to others, and generally not taking his situation seriously," his doctors report.

"He would occasionally [exhale against a closed mouth] to self-inflate his craniotomy defect in order to surprise and amuse anyone around him."

While there is no standard treatment for Witzelsucht or moria, Mendez and his colleagues at UCLA note that clinicians may start by prescribing serotonin reuptake inhibitors. These often don't work, in which case other treatments are tried, such as psychoactive antiseizure medications or atypical antipsychotics.

But while some drug mixes seem to alleviate episodes of laughter in certain individuals, it's harder to get rid of the compulsion for jokes.

In a paper from 2019, psychiatrists wrote that research on moria and Witzelsucht has helped us better understand patients with neuropsychiatric disease.

These symptoms, they say, "shed light on the neural underpinnings of some of the most complex positive mental phenomena that make up human life, including humor, creativity, and joy."

It's hard to make light of that.

We celebrate getting older on the same day each year, but parts of our bodies can actually age at different speeds. A new study points to some of the lifestyle choices that influence the rate of aging in our brains.

Led by researchers from the Karolinska Institute and the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, an international team looked at various biological signals to estimate brain age in 70-year-olds with no cognitive impairment.

What stood out from their analysis of 739 people was the importance of vascular (blood vessel) health when it comes to keeping brains looking young. Habits such as regular physical activity, sticking to a healthy diet, cutting out smoking, and managing glucose levels can improve vascular health.

"A take-home from the study is that factors that adversely affect the blood vessels can also be related to older-looking brains, which shows how important it is to keep your blood vessels healthy to protect your brain," says neurobiologist Anna Marseglia, from the Karolinska Institute.

Older-looking brains were linked to physical inactivity, having diabetes, and having had a stroke, as well as higher levels of inflammation and higher levels of blood glucose – indicating a mix of interconnected factors having an impact.

There were some variations between men and women – with glucose levels making more of a difference to brain age in men, for example – which is something the researchers are keen to follow up on in the future.

The team used a deep learning AI model to assess brain age from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, having previously trained it on more than 18,000 scans of people without any cognitive issues.

Information from blood samples was then cross-referenced with the assessed brain ages, together with data collected by the researchers on various lifestyle factors, medical conditions, and cognitive tests.

"The algorithm is both accurate and robust, yet easy to use," says clinical geriatrician Eric Westman, from the Karolinska Institute.

"It's a research tool that still needs further evaluation, but our aim is for it also to be of clinical use in the future, such as in dementia investigations."

That link to dementia is an important one: older brains tend to be more at risk of developing dementia conditions such as Alzheimer's disease, and the findings suggest ways of protecting against that cognitive decline.

Previous research has tied brain age to numerous factors – including blood sugar levels, as found in this study, and living in poverty – and many of them we can do something about, either on an individual or societal level. Ultimately, researchers are looking for ways we can stop dementia from developing in the first place.

"Despite the recent introduction of new Alzheimer's drugs, they will not work for everyone with dementia, so we want to study what can boost the brain's resilience against pathological aging processes," says Marseglia.

As women and men appear to have different factors that relate to brain aging, the team now plans to investigate how we develop resilience with a closer look at biological determinants (such as hormones) and sociocultural factors.

"Next year, we'll launch a study to understand how social health – including social engagement, connectedness, and support – in middle and older age, along with sleep and stress, influence brain resilience, with a focus on women's health factors," Marseglia says.

The research has been published in Alzheimer's & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association.

As Earth completes yet another full orbit around the Sun, an encroaching storm is expected to bathe the planet in a glorious glow of auroral light.

On December 29 and 30 , the Sun unleashed a series of huge eruptions, flares, and coronal mass ejections, possibly right in our direction.

The flash of electromagnetic radiation caused brief radio blackouts on our planet's dayside just 8 minutes after leaving the Sun. But coronal mass ejections (CMEs) are huge eruptions of plasma that take hours to days to follow as they billow out through the Solar System.

On reaching us, CMEs slam into Earth's magnetic field, resulting in an event known as a geomagnetic storm – the most spectacular effect of which is the multi-hued aurorae that shimmer across the sky at high latitudes around the planet's poles.

The three eruptions in question took place over the course of 29 and 30 December 2024 UTC. On December 29, the Sun produced an X1.1 flare from sunspot region AR 3936. X-class flares are the most powerful class of flares. Then, on December 30, an X1.5 flare from the same region was followed by an X1.1 flare from sunspot region AR 3932.

Meanwhile, smaller flares popped up all over. There were 18 M-class flares – the second-most powerful category – counted on December 29 .

The CMEs are another matter. These are often released at the same time as flares, but the one that may be responsible for a geomagnetic storm on December 31 was recorded an hour prior to the first flare on December 29.

A second, smaller CME was recorded later the same day, with the possibility of a less powerful geomagnetic storm on January 1.

Lot's of activity on the Sun today! Many M-class solar flares and even an X1 solar flare! This coronal mass ejection which left the Sun at 6 UTC is the talk of the town today and is the reason why the NOAA SWPC issued a strong G3 geomagnetic storm watch for 31 December. However… pic.twitter.com/rIA2Mh9jVt

— SpaceWeatherLive (@_SpaceWeather_) December 29, 2024

The NOAA has issued an alert for a powerful geomagnetic storm, but there are some caveats. Neither CME is expected to deliver a full frontal blow to Earth, which makes forecasting difficult.

And, as SpaceWeatherLive points out, based on the data we have, it's unclear whether the coronal mass ejections took place on the side of the Sun facing us at all. It's possible they erupted from the Sun's far side, in which case they're not headed our way at all.

Which, when you think about it, is perfect. What better way to end the year than a practical joke played by the Sun?

Keep an eye on the NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center for updates.

In recent years there's been a significant rise in the number of pet dogs and cats exposed to cocaine in their homes, new research shows – a trend that raises concerns about animal health and safety.

The study was carried out by public health researcher Orrin Ware, from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and veterinary toxicologist Renee Schmid, from the Pet Poison Helpline. They analyzed calls made to the international helpline across the years 2019 to 2023.

Data was logged on reports of dogs or cats' exposure to either cocaine or methamphetamine and the team calculated an annual percent change (APC) – a useful way of identifying an overall trend in figures that may experience fluctuations in the short term.

While there was no significant increase in pets coming into contact with methamphetamine, there was a concerning rise in reports of exposure to cocaine.

For cats, the numbers showed an APC of 52 percent (based on a total of 63 cocaine-related reports), while for dogs the APC was 39 percent (433 reports). An APC of 38 percent for dogs exposed to either cocaine or methamphetamine was also notable.

"Animals are highly sensitive to the stimulatory and sympathomimetic effects of cocaine and methamphetamine," write the researchers in their published paper.

"Any degree of exposure should be considered concerning, as there is the risk of severe toxicity and death, even with aggressive medical therapy."

The data in the study doesn't cover what the results were of the calls to the helpline, nor does it look at how the exposures happened. However, the study period coincided with the coronavirus pandemic, when a lot of us were spending more time at home.

Cocaine and methamphetamine are the most commonly used banned stimulant drugs in the US. According to the statistics, 1.8 percent of Americans took cocaine and 0.9 percent of Americans used methamphetamine in the last 12 months.

Pets encountering these drugs are at risk of eating or sniffing the toxic substance, as these inquisitive animals will tend to do. The effects of significant levels of exposure can range from vomiting and tremors to hemorrhaging and death.

And while pet owners are not likely to want to admit to having illicit substances in their homes, the researchers say they have a duty to make sure whatever they're taking isn't kept in a place where their canine or feline friends can find it.

"This study is critical because it raises awareness about the potential consequences of unsecured illicit stimulants," write the researchers.

"The importance of veterinary medicine cannot be understated, as cats and dogs are crucial members of households, often providing comfort and emotional support, highlighting the intrinsic relationship between human and animal health."

The research has been published in JAMA Network Open.