Babies are born with just about all the neurons they'll ever have -- about 100 billion of them. Though only one quarter the size, a baby's brain looks exactly like ours.

Over the next three years, that brain triples in size, establishing more than 1,000 trillion intricate and complicated connections between neurons. Anyone who has cared for a child has witnessed this explosive growth, from that ungainly infant to a running, shouting toddler with a sense of self and opinions to share.

This magical and sometimes stressful window of rapid growth, when the brain's malleability is at its peak, can set the stage for future learning and healthy development throughout life, according to neuroscientists and child development experts. "Most aspects of brain development after birth depend on experience occurring during this sensitive period," he says. If those experiences don't happen, "then development can go awry. The longer the brain goes without those critical experiences, the harder it is to recover from that."

Our understanding of this sensitive period has helped explain why Romanian orphans raised in institutions with little normal stimulation, children Nelson has researched for more than a decade, can suffer from profound deficits in learning and behavior. It's also why many can recover if they're placed in good foster care before too many years have passed.

It's also why there's so much attention, funding, resources and interventions for low-income children, who are the most likely to suffer neglect, aimed at this time period. Children can learn and grow throughout their lives, but the payoff for heading off trouble early is theoretically the highest, the experts say. 

Coronation Street legend Liz Dawn is fighting for her life after being rushed to hospital. 

The actress who played Vera Duckworth for 34 years has been taken to hospital after suffering fluid on the lungs and chest pains.

The 77-year-old is a former heavy smoker who has lung condition emphysema. Last year she had a pacemaker fitted following a health scare. 

She has recently been restricted to a wheelchair and has been housebound for weeks.  

A family source said her usually upbeat demeanor had been affected by her ailing health.

'She's been in and out of hospital quite a few times in the last few years and normally the family are quite upbeat, but this time they seem more concerned,' they told The Sun. 

'She's not in a good way and her loved ones are obviously very worried. Liz was on the programme 4 years before quitting the cobbles through ill-health in 2008. 

In June she had surgery linked to a heart condition. 

At the time she said: 'I've got no energy but once the operation is done I will be looking forward to being as back to my normal self and getting my energy back.'

In 2013 she had a pacemaker fitted after a heart attack while on holiday in Spain.

She admitted at the time: 'My health is very bad these days.'

The actress first appeared on the famous soap in 1974. 

Her chemistry with on-screen husband Jack kept fans delighted for decades. 

Actor Bill Tarmey who played Jack died in 2012. 

Amir Khan 'had sex with a beauty therapist in an airport hotel before calling her a "daft white shit" as he publicly accused his wife of cheating on him' Boxer Amir Khan had sex with a beauty therapist before calling her a 'daft white s**t' in a vicious string of messages, she claims.

Emily Volkova, 21, of Crawley, West Sussex, says she met up for sex with the former world champion at an airport hotel last month.

At the time Khan, 30,  was involved in a very bitter split with his wife Faryal Makhdoom, 26, in which he publicly accused her of having an affair with fellow boxer Anthony Joshua. Ms Volkova, a Muslim convert, told the Sunday People the star was initially very 'respectful' and repeatedly told her she was beautiful when they spent the night together.

But it all turned sour after a friend of hers allegedly posted their messages online.

Ms Volkova claims she was subject to abuse from the star on Whatsapp. She said: 'Maybe I got carried away when he said I was the kind of girl he would like to take home with him.

'But the abuse he gave me when he made it clear the one night we spent together was all it was showed him up for the horrible piece of work he is.

'Calling me a 'daft white shit' and 'dirt bag' was really uncalled for. I would never have ­spoken about him if he hadn't turned that nasty.'  

Ms Volkova said she sent Khan a message on August 10 when his feud with his wife was at its peak and the two began chatting before arranging to meet up. They allegedly stayed at Heathrow's Radisson Blu Edwardian hotel before the star caught a plane to Las Vegas where he attended the Mayweather-McGregor fight.

Ms Volkova's claims come just days after Khan announced to his followers on Snapchat that he had filed for a divorce from his wife.

He also addressed his wife's claims that she was expecting a second child after she posted a photo of a baby scan on the app. The couple already have a three-year-old daughter called Lamaisah.

Khan said on Friday: 'So me and Faryal are not together. I have filed for a divorce. I hear that she has just announced that she is pregnant. She didn't tell me. I had to read it on social media.

'I'm always going to be there for my kids [if] we're not married. We're not together but my kids are everything to me.  

'I don't know if it's true that she is pregnant or not, time will tell, but in the meantime I'm there for Lamaisah. She's everything to me.

'If there is another kid then I am going to be there to show my support and be there for Faryal, but we both think it's not healthy to be together. 

The United Kingdom (UK) has a relatively small HIV epidemic, with an estimated 101,200 people living with HIV in 2015. This equates to an HIV prevalence of 1.6 per 1,000 people aged 15 and over.1 In the same year, 6,095 people were newly diagnosed with HIV and 594 people died of AIDS-related illnesses. 

Despite testing and treatment being free and universally available in the UK, around 13,500 people are unaware of their HIV infection.

In 2015, 96% of people living with HIV were receiving antiretroviral treatment (ART).3However, late diagnosis of HIV remains a key challenge in this country, despite declining rates.

Although the figure for undiagnosed cases has fallen by 11% since the estimate of 24% in 2014, it still means that around 13,500 people are unaware of their infection, despite testing and treatment for HIV being free and universally available in the UK.

The annual number of new diagnoses – 6,095 people – represents a notably high rate of 11.3 per 100,000 people. Western Europe’s average is 6.3 per 100,000.

The epidemic in the UK mainly affects men who have sex with men and black African women. But in its 2016 report, Public Health England emphasised the diversity of people living with HIV in the UK. In 2015, for the first time since the 1990s, the proportion of people diagnosed with HIV who were born in the UK (52%) exceeded the proportion born abroad (48%). Since the 1980s, men who have sex with men have remained the group most at risk of HIV in the UK. In 2014, the most recent data available, an estimated 45,000 men who have sex with men were living with HIV. This means roughly 1 in 20 men who have sex with men aged 15 to 44 are living with the virus. The prevalence rate is 4.9% nationally among this group, rising to 9% in London.

The number of men who have sex with men newly diagnosed with HIV continues to rise, from 2,860 in 2010, to 3,320 in 2015.

In 2014, men who have sex with men aged between 25 and 44 years old accounted for two-thirds of new diagnoses. 6% were over 55 at the time of their diagnosis. Over half (51%) of these new diagnoses were made in London. Four out of five men who have sex with men newly diagnosed with HIV were white (81%), 2% were black African, 2% black Caribbean and 14% described as other/mixed race.8

Increases in HIV diagnoses can be partly explained by increased HIV testing as well as ongoing HIV transmission. 14% of men who have sex with men living with HIV in the UK are believed to be unaware of their infection. Those living in London have a lower rate of late diagnosis (23%) than those who live outside of the capital (36%).

Heterosexual men, women, and black Africans

In 2014, an estimated 21,300 heterosexual men and 32,700 heterosexual women were living with HIV in the UK. Of this number, 55% of men and 62% of women were of black African ethnicity (much higher than the percentage of black Africans in the UK population). Indeed, the number of black Africans living with HIV continues to rise.

In 2015, there were 2,360 new HIV diagnoses as a result of heterosexual sex – 1,350 among heterosexual women and 1,010 among heterosexual men. This is about half the diagnoses made ten years ago when this figure stood at 4,340. The fall is largely due to changing migration patterns, with fewer people born in sub-Saharan Africa being diagnosed with HIV in the UK.

Of the 88,769 people accessing HIV treatment in the UK in 2015, 41,945 were men and women who had acquired HIV through heterosexual sex and 41,016 were men who had acquired HIV through homosexual sex.

Of those who acquired HIV via heterosexual sex, 16,291 men and 25,654 women were accessing care. Among this group, 60% of people were black African, 24% white, 4% black Caribbean, 4% Asian and 3% of other black ethnicity.

Just over half (51%) of the heterosexual men and 60% of the heterosexual women living with HIV were aged 25 to 44. As with other groups in the UK, the proportion of heterosexual people diagnosed at an older age has increased. The median age of HIV diagnosis for heterosexuals has risen from 34 in 2005 to 40 in 2014. 24% of all heterosexual men and 18% of heterosexual women living with HIV were unaware of their HIV status. This difference is largely due to the effectiveness of the UK’s antenatal screening programme. 

Among the black African population living with HIV, roughly 16% of men and 12% of women were living with an undiagnosed infection. HIV prevalence is comparatively higher among this group. For example, nearly 18 (17.9) out of 1,000 black African heterosexual men and nearly 44 (43.7) out of 1,000 black African women were living with HIV in 2014 compared to 0.5 per 1,000 non-black African men and nearly 1 (0.7) per 1,000 non-black African women. 

Conor McGregor at higher risk of dementia? MMA fighters display signs of long-term brain damage linked to the disease, study finds.     Conor McGregor, the Irish UFC star known by many as 'The Notorious', may be at risk of dementia, research suggests.

The MMA fighter, who recently, and unsuccessfully, turned his hand to boxing, has spent his career taking powerful jabs to his head.

Scientists claim these repeated blows, which have led to McGregor being worth almost $40 million (£30.4 million), cause build-ups of proteins in the brain.

Accumulations of the toxic clumps are considered a hallmark of the disease and are deemed responsible for the memory loss symptoms in old age.

The Cleveland Clinic findings, dubbed 'interesting', add to a growing body of evidence that show a link between repeated blows to the head and dementia. Despite not being confirmed, experts have previously claimed boxing to be a risk factor for the devastating disease that needs further investigation.

The new research furthers calls for more investigations to explain why jabs to the head to the head can trigger dementia.

How was the study carried out? 

For the latest study, a team of neurologists measured two biological markers of brain injury in 438 participants.

More than half of these were active professional fighters, involved in boxing or MMA somehow. The rest were retired fighters and ordinary adults. Blood samples were then taken from all of the volunteers to measure the markets, both of which were brain proteins. 

One, called tau, accumulates when the brain suffers damage. It occurs naturally with age and can be found in abundance in dementia patients.

The other, neurofilament light chain, has also been suggested as a potential blood marker of dementia. 

Father who downed eight cans of Fosters and slept as his terrier mauled his three-week-old son to death in a frenzied 20 minute attack is jailed for 21 months.     A father who drunkenly slept through a sustained fatal attack by the family's terrier on his three-week-old son was jailed for 21 months today.

Reggie Young's mother, Maria Blacklin, screamed in horror when she came home to find the baby barely alive, with partner Ryan Young and Lakeland Terrier-cross Tricky asleep.

Newcastle Crown Court heard that the attack by the foot-tall dog could easily have been stopped, but the father did not wake up and the mauling may have lasted up to 20 minutes.

Young later told police he had drunk eight cans of Foster's lager, and a taxi driver came forward to say he had been asked to deliver eight more to the address in Sunderland on the evening in June 2015.

Miss Blacklin's grandmother had died that day and she had gone out to console her family, leaving her partner, a roofer, to look after Reggie, who was in a bouncer in the lounge.

The court heard that the dog was kept in the garden and normally only allowed in the kitchen, but there were no concerns over its temperament around children; it was not a fighting dog or used in vermin control. Shaun Dodds, prosecuting, said: 'The officers who arrived described the defendant as appearing drunk.'

He refused to give a breath test and the amount he had drunk was not clear.

Inquiries suggested the baby fell or was dragged from the bouncer and was mauled by the terrier.

The animal had not been introduced to the newborn and may have been driven to attack by Reggie's 'unco-ordinated' movements.

Mr Dodds said: 'Had the defendant not been asleep in drink, he would have been able to stop the attack.' 

Young, who admitted being the owner of dog that resulted in the death while dangerously out of control at a previous hearing, wept loudly throughout the proceedings.

Young carried his son's coffin ahead of his funeral service, Caroline Goodwin QC, defending, said. 

'He is absolutely devastated,' she said. 'Nothing he can do can turn back the clock and bring back his own child. 'It was all the more harrowing for the family when he carried his child's coffin before the service. It has been a long two years, this is a life sentence for this man.'

Miss Goodwin said the dog had no history of aggression but behaved 'naturally and instinctively' on the night.

The dog had been acquired from a nearby relative from being a puppy and was around two years old.

Judge Gittens said Young's alcohol intake that night 'significantly intoxicated' him, 'if not to the point of stupor, then into a very deep sleep'.

He said: 'Reggie was subjected to a most dreadful, torturous, confusing attack and he sustained horrific and painful injuries.

Up to 44 MILLION Britons may have had their data stolen in massive cyber attack on US credit rating firm Equifax Millions of Britons may have been caught up in a cyber attack against an international credit rating company.

Equifax, which is used by BT, Capital One and British Gas among others, was hacked this summer, the company revealed yesterday.

Cyber criminals stole around 209,000 credit card numbers and the personal information of around 182,000 US citizens. But the company also confirmed the hackers had stolen 'limited personal information' from British and Canadian citizens. 

The credit rating company is believed to hold data on around 44million Britons.

James Dipple-Johnstone, of the Information Commissioner's Office, said: 'We are already in direct contact with Equifax to establish the facts including how many people in the UK have been affected and what kind of personal data may have been compromised. 'We will be advising Equifax to alert affected UK customers at the earliest opportunity. 

'In cyber attack cases that cross borders the ICO is committed to working with relevant overseas authorities on behalf of UK citizens.'

A BT spokesman told MailOnline: 'We are aware of the developing story and are monitoring the situation closely.

'Like many companies in the UK, BT uses Equifax services. We are working on establishing whether this breach has any impact on those services.