this week, we explore some of the latest innovations created by and for women... menopause is basically what happens when a woman's ovaries stop working. the access to these kind of data basically allow us to read the dna of over 200,000 women who are menopausal. ..the digital platform providing a safe space for women... communia is a first—of—its—kind social network that builds for social health. so you can connect with yourself as much as you connect with others. ..and the ai—generated couture collection. it was something that i wanted to wear in the metaverse, but it was also something i wanted to wear in real life. no longer taboo, the menopause has finally become a hot topic, with what many women can go through hopefully becoming better understood.

so i've had a bit of a rubbish day today with feeling quite anxious. i had quite a bad night's sleep last night. hey, so i'm just between cases today at work. ijust had a quite embarrassing hot flush. i'm struggling with the light. i'm struggling to see. so, it's 6am on sunday morning and i'm wide awake. i've been perimenopausal for the last... ..seven or so years. definitely one of the most challenging symptoms i've found over the last few years has been the brain fog. i'm trying not to be too, erm, too upset about it. maybe, though, the way that women's reproductive health plays out doesn't need to be inevitable. i've been to meet some scientists who are working on the idea of delaying menopause. at the buck institute for aging in california, neuroscientist jennifer garrison studies

the connection between the brain and the ovaries. menopause is basically what happens when a woman's ovaries stop working. essentially, it leads to a whole host of really dramatic health consequences. so ovaries are producing not just eggs for, for making babies, but also a whole host of really important hormones that are absolutely essential for overall health. when those beneficial hormones go away, what happens is a woman's risk of osteoporosis, heart disease, stroke, cognitive decline, all sorts of things — arthritis, depression — all of those risks go way up. if we don't address age at menopause or reproductive span in women, then, essentially, we're going to be making gender inequality worse and not better. and that's because female humans born today can expect to live on average about 100 years. and so what that means in practice is that, soon, women are going to be living more of their lives after menopause than before.

well, i can see the problem, but can menopause be delayed? we hope so. there are very few animal species that actually go through menopause. so, what that means to me as a scientist is that it's probably not a biological imperative. there's no benefit to it that i can see. combine the latest scientific understanding of menopause and the often symptomatic years running up to it, the perimenopause, with big data and things get really interesting. at cambridge biomedical centre, genomicist stasa stankovic is trying to develop reliable menopause prediction tests. the access to these kind of data basically allow us to read the dna of over 200,000 women who are menopausal. we can basically analyse and understand what are the differences in their dna

that actually determine at what age they will become menopausal? some of the scientists i've spoken to have been focused more on health equality. it seems, for you, this is also about fertility. we actually capture both sides. it is really necessary for the tests in the clinic to have long—term predictive potential. and, at the moment, theyjust tell you whether you are menopausal or not. exactly, but once you detect the problem of infertility, you're usually too late to do anything about it, such as go through ivf or cryopreservation. what our tests might do is the long—term predictive capability, which means that you will be able to plan your family and fertilityjourney extremely early on so that you don't end up in the situation of unexpected infertility where you don't have a solution how to battle it. how close are we to tests that can do that reliably being available for anyone to use? we are at about 60% reliability, which means we lack around 20% more

to enter the clinical practice. experts can't agree on exactly how much genetics impact the exact time of menopause. stasa estimates it to be around 60%, the rest being down to lifestyle or health, stress or medical issues. but, particularly for those who do face it early, these tests could give some clarity. when i found out i was going through an early menopause, i think i was quite taken aback. i'd been on the oral contraceptive pill for quite a number of years, and i recently had a relationship break down, so i came off that, and it was whilst i'd come off the pill that i started getting some hot flush symptoms, and i hadn't really thought much of it at the time. but after it was happening every day, i went to the doctor to get some blood tests, and everything kind of started to unravel slowly from there, really. and it wasn't until i went through several diagnostic

tests that i actually found that it was too late and i'd gone through the menopause and i wasn't then able to have children and i was infertile. so that was quite a lot to take on at the age of 31. unless, of course, you could then take a drug to delay it. the imperative for someone like siobhan may be greater but research into developing therapeutics to do so is aimed at all women. back in cambridge, scientists are replicating in mice the signs that have been identified in human dna. so, to test the genes that we find in humans, we have to work with lab scientists. so you can see here gerry working on some mouse cells, validating our targets that we discovered in humans. 0k. so what we can do with this is, first, find out what, _ what the reason is, - or what the function of that protein is, so that then we can hopefully try to target that - as a drug therapy. so, so far what we've done very well is categorise the kinds - of variations that you find in large data into -

different groups. we know that some affect how many eggs that - a woman is born with. and we know that some affect the survival - of the eggs into adult life. and so that's already a big step forward in trying - to understand mechanistically the different causes _ of infertility. there are already start—ups working in this space. new york—based oviva therapeutics is currently trialling its menopause delay drug in animals, this being an engineered form of the anti—mullerian hormone, which plays a crucial role in regulating reproductive potential. what oviva is developing is a therapeutic that essentially can be used to extend the ovarian reserve or the number of eggs that we have at any given point in time, and using this as a means to extend ovarian function. now, what's interesting about this is, mechanistically, this is something you could take at any given point in your life, and it would essentially be working as an anti—ageing contraceptive. and this therapeutic is something that you could

start taking once you're in your 40s. whether you're finished having your family, or perhaps you don't want children, it would be easily used at a later date, closer to when you might enter menopause, as a means to really stave that off. health risks vary pre— and post—menopause. exposing the body to hormones for longer can be associated with a higher risk of breast, ovarian or endometrial cancers. whether this method of delay might impact that cancer risk in humans is unclear, though, so far, there's no evidence of this in animal studies. the likelihood of toxicity is quite low, but there's a lot that we need to better understand about the consequences of having that as a therapeutic, but then also of extending the function of the ovaries for longer. so i think ideally we'd be able to take this therapeutic for a number of years, essentially for as long as we would want to forestall menopause. but have there been moody mice? the question of whether mood will be impacted is an interesting one, and i think we know that this

is acting very early in the cycle to basically pause the eggs and follicles from entering that maturation pathway. and, in doing so, you're actually creating a little light suppression on the cycle of oestrogen in particular. progesterone, i don't think we've seen any direct impact on. but i think the critical thing here is we just need more data. whilst initial signs are promising, daisy�*s questions over extending women's hormonal lives are echoed by other experts. before moving into health tech, dr stephanie kuku was a gynaecologist also researching women's cancers. what do you think of the concept of creating therapeutics to delay menopause? delaying menopause might mean that you are exposing the body to hormones for longer than we are naturally used to, so perhaps we need to think about what the side—effects of that could be. the trouble is that we need really long periods of testing to really see these side—effects. so, whilst initial, preclinical

studies might show that delaying the menopause is safe, i think long—term clinical studies in humans will be really important to guarantee the safety and efficacy of therapeutics to delay the menopause. if we had better treatments and more access to hrt, because hrt does work, then perhaps it wouldn't be such a topic of conversation that menopause should be delayed rather than just managed better. i definitely think if there was something along those lines then that would be really encouraging because it could... yeah, it could really, really change some people's lives. and i think, mainly for me, it's been the fertility side that's had such a big impact because that's something that's now been taken away. so i think if i could've maybe had a bit more time with that, i'd, yeah, it would definitely be interesting. it's hard to look back and see, but i think it's very exciting that these things are possibly out there. and there is something else. there's been a big problem with

underfunding in women's health. do you think that menopause delay is actually the right place to be investing money? so we have to think about delaying menopause in the context of prioritising women's health needs. what is mission—critical is...investing in trials to find better therapeutics for the very deadly ovarian cancer that has sort of limited treatment options, the right way to invest? or should we be really thinking about delaying menopause in the context of who it would be most beneficial to delay menopause for? clearly, women's experiences vary hugely. and this is controversial. but as we start to recognise the impact menopause has on countless women's health and wellbeing, the case for better or different safe treatments strengthens.

hello, it is shown with this week's techniques. amazon have announced the chatbot powered by artificial intelligence. q is said to help businesses do things like summarise businesses and group chats. amazon also that it will protect company from copyright issues around the use of its robot. google drive users have reacted angrily to a witch leaving some unable to access files from the last six months. google said it was investigating the issue and it is not known how many are affected. google drive has more than 3 billion users worldwide. puma has successfully tested biodegradable shoes. they are a redesign of the iconic puma suede trainers. the experiment allowed 500 wearers to test trainers out the six months before returning to undergo biodegradation.

we have to consider all aspects of sustainability in having a product that biodegradable be part of our future. the swedish start—up have created the world does make biggest tidal energy kite which is to be installed off the coast of the faro islands. dragon 12 has a wingspan of 12 metres with the ability to power 1,000 homes. the kite swims under water against the current and generate electricity. next, we hearfrom olivia deramus, the founder of a new online platform called communia. it's designed as a safe online space for women, and was set up in light of olivia's own experience of assault. laura jones has been speaking to her and a warning that this report does contain references to sexual assault. i was sexually assaulted and my story doesn't end there. i was actually sued by the perpetrator and so i learned

what it was like not to be able to have a voice. olivia was locked in a legal battle for years, during which she was unable to speak out. i was 19. there were a lot of parties happening. i actually felt really scared at this party and thought that this person was safe to leave with. after reporting the assault, their university ruled in olivia's favour, but the ordeal didn't stop there, with the perpetrator pushing for a review and then suing for defamation. abusers, especially wealthy abusers, use the grey area in the law to try to silence their victims. the thing i kept telling my mum was...if people knew what was happening... ..they wouldn't be ok with it. and...if i could just talk to someone who got it, who had been through something similar, that... ..it would feel more bearable.

after the lawsuit came to a close, olivia wanted to create the safe space she felt she had desperately needed. she decided to found communia, a social media app aimed at women and nonbinary people. communia is the first of its kind, a social network that builds for social health, so you can connect with yourself as much as you connect with others, through a unique digital journalling format. you can find community support, things like mood tracking, goal setting and guided journals. and then, as well as that, we do have a more twitter—esque feed. and there's also an anonymous feature. there will always be things that you find difficult to say with your identity attached, whether you're being sued or not. for some, online visibility can come with a risk. according to refuge, a third of women in the uk have experienced online abuse. suswati basu, a podcaster and formerjournalist based in london, responded to a post on x, formerly known as twitter, about asylum seekers, with her thoughts on how they're

treated in the uk. ijust got flooded. flooded with just homophobic, sexist, racist comments. itjust puts you in a really vulnerable position because there's no content moderation any more. if you report accounts, it doesn't really do anything. i felt annoyed with the tech companies. theyjust kept saying, "block. just use the block button. "it's your friend." it's unacceptable and there just needs to be way more responsibility for the tech companies. they're not pulling their weight. x declined to comment. to tackle problems like trolling, communia verifies all members by email and if they want to talk about certain topics, like sex or the me too movement, they have to be verified using a photo id. when i told people in the industry that we were requiring id verification, they thought i was out of my mind. but our conversion rates hover around 75% and that is astronomically higher than industry average.

the other thing that we do differently is that we will always have a human element of our moderation, even as we scale. we've seen big tech companies create incredible harm in societal conflicts through not investing in real people to moderate. and how concerned are you that the human content moderators are going to be able to keep up with the kind of growth that you're hoping for? you'd be surprised by how scalable human moderators are, and i would invest in them over maybe some surface level accoutrements that you really don't need. for one communia user, these safety features were a big draw. lucy — not her real name — was trying to recover from an eating disorder and used tumblr to find support. i'd befriended someone who, on the surface, seemed to be another minor who was also suffering with anorexia and we'd sort of decided to be accountability partners. he had started asking

for photographs to, like, check that i'm not, you know, slipping back into my old habits. the messages were getting to be things that were making me more and more uncomfortable, and when i'd realised he was, essentially, sort of fetishizing the disorder, i'd stopped interacting and he proceeded to send several half nude photographs. the fact that it was clearly a man was quite startling. at the time, when i reported it, it was not deemed harassment. i felt really violated by it. it just didn't feel safe. tumblr declined to comment. lucy's experience on other more mainstream platforms wasn't much better. no matter where you go, if you admit you're a woman, it's like the environmentjust becomes sexualised automatically and that was quite distressing. which is why a platform like communia was so appealing. the positive space for women is really important. with more than 100,000 downloads, olivia now hopes to scale the communia app to become more profitable

via subscriptions. a key challenge will be not compromising on the safe space she sought to provide. even though he sued me for millions, i didn't pay a penny. there was a moment where i had a choice to make. i could have attempted to get personal justice for myself, or i could have started communia with the funds that i had left for that legal battle. i will be damned if i don't force something positive to come out of that experience. and if i can support other women in whatever it is that they're going through, then that's enough justice for me. and if you've been affected by issues raised in this film, details of support are available at...

ope m is an american artist and designer. she won this year's ai fashion week competition by clothing retailer revolve. this is ope�*s story. my name is ope and i am a fashion futurist. it was something that i was always into. the first thing that i did with a pencil was draw some clothing. that's my first memory. it was hard for my father to accept me as an artist because it was just not what he wanted me to do. he wanted me to be a doctor. i always wanted to be a designer, a fashion designer. once i left school, after my father passed away, i started to manage stores. and then years later, i went and became a fashion stylist. i was always looking for subjects. i started to dabble into photography, creative

direction, painting, and i was incorporating some of my paintings into all of the artwork that i was creating. so i was doing a lot. ijust started to experiment more with digital fashion avatars and metaverse technology. if metaverse is gamification of life, then the nft gets you into the game. it is the game token. at that time it was novel, it was new, and so i created my first nft artwork for an art gallery inside the metaverse. it's a long process, but the short form is that i go into a programme called gravity sketch and i create my artwork in gravity sketch in 3d form, and then i take my 3d render and i put that into another application that renders it into voxels, that voxelizes it, makes it into like box—like figures.

i started to create for a competition called ai fashion week. it included runway, it included front row, it included street style. in order to create a sketch, i have to use language to communicate to the ai what it is i want to see, and the ai will generate that item for me. so i did this repetitively to create the collection that is now seen. at that time, it was a 50—piece collection. by the time it got to revolve, it had to be edited because it was a more, you know, fantastical design. the clothes that i'm creating do feel a bit more powerful. i do come from wanting to see more romantic styles, but something that is also very fashion—forward. it's like romance with a hard edge. and so i went through a lot of iterations with revolve to create what became a 12—piece capsule collection.

it was something that i wanted to wear in the metaverse, but it was also something i wanted to wear in real life. it's so exciting that these pieces have been able to go from al sketches to actual physical, tangible pieces that i could see from the design to the fit model has been incredible because i did not imagine that that was going to be our end result. so i'm looking forward to all of the things that we can do, translating ai fashion into actual physical product. and that's it for this women in tech special. thank you for watching. we shall be back next week. bye— bye.

hello. friday was the first day of meteorological spring — but it was also a day that winter refused to relinquish its grip. here in northern ireland, enniskillen, seeing a fresh fall of fairly chunky snow. there were also some snowfall over the peak district — this is the cat and fiddle road — road that goes between macclesfield and buxton — it's quite high up, but we had some problems reported on that, as well. low pressure then has been across the uk, with this cold air mass in place. we've got lots of showers at the moment, particularly across england and wales, northern scotland, and this band of rain and hill snow across parts of the far north of england and southern scotland. now there is a chance of seeing a centimetre or two of snow across the cheviots, the north pennines, the southern uplands over the next hour or two, so it could get quite icy here. and also in the showers affecting the higher parts of wales — again, above 200 metres elevation,

you might come across an odd centimetre or two of snow across the high ground here. temperatures getting close, if not below freezing in a few areas, so there will be a risk of a few icy patches heading into the first part of saturday morning. then we've got this clump of more organised showers working across wales in the midlands — well, they could have a bit of sleet or snow mixed in, probably struggling to settle, and quite a few of those showers will still have just cold rain. it is a day where showers will be really widespread on saturday, some of them with hail and thunder. and, although there'll be a bit of sunshine between the showers, those sunnier moments, probably quite short—lived. temperatures below average, about 6—9 celsius. now, the same area of low pressure stays with us through saturday night and into sunday. it will tend to drift northwards, tending to weaken somewhat. and so, of the two days of the weekend, sunday looks like it's likely to be the better, in terms of weather. should be a fair bit of dryer weather after a locally misty and foggy start to the day, a better chance of seeing some sunshine. there'll still be a few showers around, particularly for

scotland and northern ireland, 1—2 for wales and western england, but bigger gaps between those showers and a bit more in the way of sunshine. it will continue to feel cool though, for the time of year. into next week, low pressures continue to move in off the atlantic from the west, but they're running into this area of high pressure that's centred over scandinavia. and so, we'll get something of an east—west split with the weather. for western areas, it stays quite cloudy with the threat of further outbreaks of rain. eastern areas tending to become drier, sunnier, and a bit milder, as well. that's the latest, bye for now.

live from washington, this is bbc news special report. as the 2024 us presidential election draws ever closer, what's at stake for reproductive rights? in alabama, lawmakers move to protect ivf services after fertility clinics shut down in the wake of a ruling that frozen embryos are children.

meanwhile, in missouri, a law prevents pregnant women from getting a divorce. we'll speak to a state lawmaker trying to change that. plus, with france set to become the first country to enshrine access to abortion in its constitution, we'll take a closer look at reproductive rights around the world. i'm helena humphrey, good to have you with us. here in the us, when it comes to presidential elections, it's women who consistently vote at a higher rate than men. and while they're far from being single issue voters — reproductive rights are expected to play a large role in the upcoming presidential election. debate has raged in the us since the supreme court rescinded the nationwide right to a termination injune 2022.

but polling shows why this is proving a difficult