Researchers at the University of Waterloo have discovered a way to turn plastic waste into acetic acid, the main ingredient of vinegar, using sunlight.  The breakthrough offers a promising new approach to reducing plastic pollution through photocatalysis, while simultaneously creating a useful, value-added chemical product through a process inspired by nature.  “Our goal was to solve the plastic pollution challenge by converting microplastic waste into high-value products using sunlight,” said Dr. Yimin Wu, a professor of mechanical and mechatronics engineering and ...

Munich astronomers image and model extremely rare gravitationally lensed supernova Measuring the expansion of the universe with cosmic fireworks An image that could solve a long lasting cosmic mystery Unprecedented chance to measure the growth of the universe Collaboration between TUM, LMU and Max Planck Institutes That the universe is expanding has been known for almost a hundred years now, but how fast? The exact rate of that expansion remains hotly debated, even challenging the standard model ...

A horse’s whinny is an unusually distinctive mix of sounds including both high and low frequencies. Reporting in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on February 23, researchers demonstrate how horses produce high-frequency sounds that defy their large size while simultaneously producing lower tones: they whistle through their larynx while vibrating their vocal folds as a human does while singing. Horses likely ...

About The Study: The findings of this study indicate declines of more than 10 percentage points in newborn hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccination in the last 2 years, following 6 years of growth. These estimates derived from large-scale hospital and clinic electronic health records align with WHO and CDC coverage through 2022 and provide interim surveillance for 2023-2025, a period not yet reflected in national or global reports. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Joshua M. Rothman, MD, MS, email jmrothman@health.ucsd.edu. To access the embargoed study: ...

An attractive influencer couple chats in a kitchen as they prepare dinner. A wine bottle sits on the counter. Someone takes a sip. It looks less like an ad than a slice of ordinary life, the kind of moment that can pass unnoticed during an aimless scroll on social media. But a randomized experiment from Rutgers Health and Harvard University suggests those casual cues matter. Young adults who viewed influencer posts with alcohol were significantly more likely to desire a drink than peers who watched similar posts – from the same influencers – with no alcohol involved. The study in JAMA Pediatrics, led by Jon-Patrick Allem, an associate professor at the Rutgers School ...

About The Study: Exposure to alcohol-promoting social media content was associated with desire to drink across varying levels of prior alcohol use, and social media influencers may contribute to normalization of alcohol consumption among young people. This experimental evidence adds to a growing body of research showing that exposure to alcohol-promoting content, particularly on social media, is associated with alcohol-promoting attitudes and behaviors in young adults.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Jon-Patrick Allem, PhD, MA, email jon.patrick.allem@rutgers.edu. To ...

About The Study: This study found that as community disadvantage increased, access to dialysis facilities decreased in a stepwise fashion. Patients with end-stage kidney disease in socioeconomically disadvantaged communities had significantly fewer options for receiving hemodialysis and were more likely to live in areas without nearby dialysis facilities.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Renee Y. Hsia, MD, MSc, email renee.hsia@ucsf.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this ...

About The Study: The results of this study reveal that healthy diets, exemplified by the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet for blood pressure control and diets with lower hyperinsulinemia and inflammation potentials, were associated with a lower subjective cognitive decline risk and better cognitive function. These findings underscore the importance of a healthy diet for maintaining long-term cognitive health. Corresponding Authors: To contact the corresponding authors, email Changzheng Yuan, ScD, (chy478@zju.edu.cn) and Kjetil ...

New research from UCLA Health suggests that certain inhalers used to treat chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are not only less harmful to the environment but can also lead to slightly better patient outcomes. Inhalers are essential therapies for COPD and other lung conditions, but many commonly used devices rely on propellants that are potent greenhouse gases. The study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, found that inhalers with a lower carbon footprint in one commonly used therapeutic class—the combined long-acting muscarinic ...

Plants have an immune system, like people, and when it is triggered by threats like disease or pests, a plant's defenses are activated. But there’s a downside to this protective mechanism: The plant’s growth is suppressed when its immune system is turned on. Colorado State University researchers have found a way to boost a plant’s growth while maintaining its immunity through a hormone treatment that shows promise for food production. A plant threatened by disease will defend itself by producing hormones that can keep the plant alive but also stunt its growth – which is a problem if the plant is needed for ...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE In a new Johns Hopkins Medicine study, researchers found that male and female patients with early Lyme disease present with different signs of the disease in the symptoms they report, their physical exams and their laboratory test results. The study was published on February 7 in Clinical and Experimental Medicine. Researchers found that males were more likely to have a positive test and to have more obvious, severe disease indicators, including other laboratory abnormalities, at diagnosis, yet there were ...

Can students be the front lines of conservation? A new Canada-wide study, published in Metabarcoding and Metagenomics, suggests they can. The efforts of some 5000 students produced data detailed enough to reveal complex ecological networks hidden inside a small PVC and cardboard tube home. Cavity-nesting bees and wasps play key roles in pollination and pest control, yet their distributions and feeding relationships are often poorly known because they can be small, secretive and difficult to observe directly. As part of the Bees@Schools community science program, Sage Handler (University of Guelph), Nigel ...

SAN ANTONIO — February 23, 2026 — Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) continues to expand its unique drug synthesis capabilities and expertise to advance the scalable manufacturing of safer antidotes to combat exposure to organophosphorus nerve agents (OPNAs) and pesticides. Unlike existing manufacturing processes, SwRI’s novel approach avoids cancer-causing compounds during synthesis of oxime antidotes HI-6, Obidoxime and HLö 7. This makes for safer antidotes and supports the kilogram-scale manufacturing needed to sustain a domestic supply of OPNA antidotes for the United States military. End-to-end antidote production in the U.S. ...

The University of Miami business technology faculty has earned the nation’s top research productivity ranking in information systems, one of the most relevant academic disciplines in today’s AI era. The Business Technology Department ranked No. 1 in the nation for research, a prestigious recognition that places the University of Miami at the very top of the information systems discipline for the first time. This ranking, released by the Association of Information Systems Research Rankings Service, is based on a numerical ...

CU Boulder researchers have built high performing optical microresonators opening the door for new sensor technologies. At its simplest form, a microresonator is a tiny device that can trap light and build up its intensity. Once the intensity is high enough, researchers can perform unique light operations.  “Our work is about using less optical power with these resonators for future uses,” said Bright Lu, a fourth-year doctoral student in electrical and computer engineering and a lead author on the study. “One day these microresonators can be adapted for a wide range of sensors from navigation to identifying chemicals.” For this endeavor, ...

When lawmakers name bills after victims of tragedy – such as Megan’s Law or the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 – public support surges, but this emotional boost may come at the expense of sound policymaking, according to research published by the American Psychological Association. The study, published in the journal Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, examined whether eponymous bills –  those named for victims – receive more public backing than identical bills without a name or story. Across three ...

In everyday life, we can easily tell whether objects are packed tightly (high density) or spread out sparsely (low density) just by looking at them. But when dealing with time-series event data, scattering along a timeline, it is not as straightforward to objectively identify when the density is high or low. In this situation, a statistical method called kernel density estimation is useful. By assigning a probability to each data point and overlaying these distributions, the method provides a smooth estimate of how event density changes over time. It is particularly effective ...

PULLMAN, Wash. – When the federal government brings its toughest environmental enforcement actions against polluters, they tend to be in communities of greater wealth, not the most polluted places. That’s the takeaway from a new paper co-authored by a Washington State University researcher that examined criminal prosecutions by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from 2011 to 2020 in every U.S. county. The findings were published in the journal Nature Sustainability. “You might reasonably expect the government to use its most consequential enforcement mechanism ...

A technology has been developed that uses robots rather than humans to evaluate the performance of newly developed catalysts. By operating 45 times faster than manual work while also improving precision, it is expected to significantly shorten catalyst development timelines. A research team led by Dr. Ji Chan Park of the Clean Fuel Research Laboratory at the Korea Institute of Energy Research (KIER; President Yi, Chang-Keun) has developed a system that fully automates complex and repetitive catalyst performance evaluation experiments. To develop new catalysts, large-scale ...

The Consortium for Enhancing Resilience and Catastrophe Modeling (CERCat)—a landmark partnership between Lehigh University and Rice University—convened at Rice University between Feb. 5-6, 2026, for its semi-annual meeting.  Established in April 2025, CERCat is a dynamic research hub uniting academia and industry to advance the science of catastrophic risk modeling and resilience assessment. By bridging the gap between academic innovation and the practical needs of the private and public sectors, CERCat ensures the next generation ...

Engineers at the University of Pennsylvania and Rice University have refined a technology for editing individual genetic “base pairs” to a new level of precision, opening the door to safer, more reliable therapies for a wide range of genetic diseases, and to potential treatments for some cystic fibrosis patients that may yield better outcomes than existing therapies. Unlike infectious diseases, many of which respond to the same treatments — like antibiotics that neutralize multiple types of bacteria — ...

Taking a dog for a walk, cuddling a cat, watching fish glide through a tank, or just having a pet around may help many middle-aged and older adults with their health or well-being, a new poll finds. But the costs of caring for those pets strains the budgets of 31% of pet owners age 50 and older, the poll shows. And 33% of people over 50 who don’t have pets say such costs are a main reason why. The findings, from the University of Michigan National Poll on Healthy Aging, give an updated look at an issue that the poll last explored seven years ago in people ages 50 to 80. The percentage of adults in that age range who have ...

Cryptococcus neoformans is one of four fungi classified as ‘critical priority’ on the WHO's Fungal Pathogens Priority List, which was published in October 2022 following decades of research and calls for fungal pathogens to be classified alongside their bacterial and viral counterparts.   The fungus infects people through inhalation of spores or yeast cells in the environment, first colonising the lungs and can then spread to the brain. In 2020, an estimated 112,000 deaths were associated globally to fungal meningitis caused by C. neoformans. Increasing evidence shows that co-infection ...

As members of the public increasingly turn to AI with health concerns, University of Birmingham researchers are leading a global programme to build the first definitive guide for safely navigating health information on AI powered chatbots.   The initiative is announced today in a correspondence published in Nature Health. The project team is now inviting the public to help shape the development of The Health Chatbot Users’ Guide, a resource designed to offer a pragmatic and neutral approach that focuses on harm reduction and maximising benefits to users.   With the advent of AI Large ...

Research Highlights: Although women typically have less artery-clogging plaque than men, a study of more than 4,200 adults found that it did not shield women from cardiovascular events. The risk of heart attack and chest pain in women appeared to manifest with a lower amount of plaque and increased more rapidly, particularly after menopause, than they do for men. Embargoed until 4 a.m. CT/5 a.m. ET Monday, Feb. 23, 2026 DALLAS, Feb. 23, 2026 — Less artery-clogging plaque in women’s arteries did not appear to protect them from heart disease compared to men, according to a study ...