A new study examining fossil evidence shows large land predators were already hunting big plant-eating animals more than 280 million years ago. University of Toronto Mississauga researchers Jordan M. Young, Tea Maho, and Robert Reisz studied bite marks on the skeletons of three young herbivores from the early Permian of Texas revealing feeding patterns from multiple predators and a glimpse into how animals hunted and interacted with each other. “This discovery shows predator-prey hierarchies were formed earlier than previously expected,” said Professor Reisz, co-author of Earliest direct evidence of trophic interactions between terrestrial apex predators and large herbivores. ...

EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL 4:00 P.M. ET, MONDAY, MARCH 2, 2026 Highlights: A new study has found people whose drinking water came from newer groundwater had a higher risk of Parkinson’s disease than those whose water came from older groundwater. The study does not prove that newer groundwater causes Parkinson’s; it only shows an association. Older groundwater typically contains fewer contaminants because it is usually deeper and better shielded from contaminants. Researchers found drinking water drawn from ...

Researchers at Ohio University have discovered what may be a new way to fight lung cancer that is resistant to other treatments. The study published in the International Journal of Molecular Science and led by Goll-Ohio Eminent Scholar and distinguished professor John J. Kopchick, Ph.D., and his graduate student Arshad Ahmad at the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine, found that blocking the growth hormone receptor may help make lung cancer treatments more effective. Lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States and worldwide. The ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Starting elementary school is a major milestone, but it can be a difficult transition as children can experience separation anxiety or have trouble adapting to school rules and structure. However, a team led by Penn State researchers found that consistent routines in the home can reduce the likelihood that children will struggle with the school transition. In a publication in Developmental Psychology, the researchers found that when rural, low-income families had stronger routines — ...

When Fang Peng was in fourth grade, the remote mountain village in China where he grew up received electricity for the first time. Today, Peng is a professor at the University of Pittsburgh and internationally recognized in the field of electric power research. But long before his storied career began, the light bulb would be his inspiration. His family had one bulb attached to an extension cord, and as the eldest son, Peng got to carry it around the house. He was fascinated that electricity could travel so far to produce the ...

SAN ANTONIO — March 2, 2026 — Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), on behalf of the Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS®) Consortium, has released a new version of the NPSS software, the industry-leading aerospace software package for simulating and designing propulsion systems. NPSS 3.3 adds new functionalities, data types, and communication interfaces that provide improved flexibility and software compatibility while reducing model and component development times. NPSS allows the aerospace industry to model turbomachinery, ...

AURORA, Colo. (Jan. 29, 2026) – Scientists have identified molecular and structural changes in taste buds that may explain why a small subset of people experience long-term taste loss after COVID-19 infection. The study, published last month in Chemical Senses, provides the first direct evidence linking patients’ reported taste changes to measurable biological abnormalities inside taste cells. What causes long-term taste loss after COVID-19? Researchers from the University of Colorado Anschutz and two Swedish universities studied 28 non-hospitalized patients who reported persistent taste disturbances more than one year after contracting COVID-19. Key findings: 8 ...

Atmospheric rivers carry unfathomable amounts of water across the sky, bringing moisture to drought-stricken regions like the Western U.S. But whether a particular incoming atmospheric river storm will result in disastrous flooding has long been difficult for researchers to determine with confidence. Now, a new DRI-led study demonstrates that accounting for soil saturation levels can substantially improve our early warning of potentially destructive flooding events.   The research, published February ...

When Congress passed the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act in 2022, it brought long-overdue relief to veterans denied benefits because there wasn’t enough scientific evidence tying burn pit exposure to their illnesses. What few know is that Rutgers researchers helped lay the scientific groundwork that made it possible to link certain illnesses to military service in the Middle East. In December 2024, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) officially adopted rules to implement PACT that included a new method ...

BALTIMORE, March 2, 2026 — New research published in the INFORMS journal Information Systems Research finds that giving low-wage workers access to their earned wages before payday can significantly increase saving behavior, financial monitoring and long-term planning. The study found that On-demand Wage Access (OWA), a fast-growing fintech service, raises monthly saving frequency by 3.7%, dashboard monitoring by 12.9% and financial goal-setting by 1.3%. In other words, by not waiting until a specific payday, employees are more likely to save and actively engage in responsible personal financial management. The study, “Working Daily, ...

EMBARGOED UNTIL 12 P.M. PACIFIC TIME MONDAY, MARCH 2, 2026 Irvine, Calif. — A comprehensive 30-year study led by University of California, Irvine glaciologists has produced a circumpolar ice grounding line migration map of Antarctica. An amalgamation of three decades of satellite data compiled and analyzed by the researchers revealed that while most of Antarctica remains remarkably stable, vulnerable sectors are losing grounded ice equivalent to the size of Greater Los Angeles every three years. The study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows that 77 percent of Antarctica’s coastline has experienced no grounding line ...

AMHERST, Mass. — Members of the arachnid class—think spiders, scorpions and harvestmen (daddy long legs)—are often the targets of revulsion, disgust and fear. Yet, they are crucial for ecosystems to thrive. Given the crash in worldwide biodiversity, including what some call the “insect apocalypse,” a pair of ecologists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst decided to check in on the general state of insects and arachnids in the U.S.—only to discover massive gaps in the data. Their research, published recently in PNAS, points to an urgent need to assess, protect and value insects and arachnids, a key pillar of planetary health. “Insects ...

Researchers at Arizona State University have uncovered a key scientific principle that governs how what’s coated on the surfaces of engineered nanoparticles may ultimately control how they work in our bodies.   In a new study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the team directly measured how water interactions influence nanoparticle biological performance.   “Water is necessary for all life,” said Navrotsky, the lead author of the study, Regents Professor in the School of Molecular Sciences and director of Arizona State University’s Center for Materials of the Universe. “And ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — In a world where increasing demands for food security and energy strain existing resources, scientists are looking for new ways to maximize both. One potential option, agrivoltaics, integrates solar photovoltaics with crops. A new study examines the agricultural and economic trade-offs that come with installing solar arrays on working farms across the Midwest. The study found that agrivoltaics can increase or reduce yields and profits, depending on the crop and where such agrivoltaic systems are deployed. The new findings are reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Led by scientists ...

In the context of the rapid development of artificial intelligence and big data, neuromorphic computing, which mimics the working mode of the human brain, has become a research hotspot to break through the limitations of traditional computing architectures. Memristors, as core devices for constructing neuromorphic systems, have always faced challenges such as poor stability and inconsistent performance during long-term operation. A latest study published in Nano Research has made significant progress in solving these problems.   The research team developed a self-rectifying memristor (SRM) array based on the Pt/TaOx/Ti structure. What is particularly noteworthy is its outstanding ...

Solid electrolytes are promising candidates for safe, high-energy battery systems. Composite solid electrolytes, in particular, hold the potential to combine high ionic conductivity with stable electrode interfaces. However, a fundamental trade-off often exists between ion conduction and mechanical properties. In a study published in Nature Nanotechnology, a team led by Prof. CHENG Huiming and PENG Jing from the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with Prof. HU Renzong from South China University of ...

People with alcohol use disorders tend to prioritize alcohol over alternative rewards, and the neural underpinnings of this are unclear. New from JNeurosci, researchers led by Nathan Marchant, from Amsterdam Medical University Center, used rats to explore the role of a brain region involved in planning and making decisions in pursuing alcohol or socializing with peers.  After training rats to lever press for alcohol and social reward, the researchers discovered that rats ...

Elena Mainetto, from Radboud University, Margaret Westwater, from the University of Oxford, and colleagues at the University of Cambridge explored whether they could change how much people enjoy beverages containing sugar or artificial sweeteners by manipulating previous expectations about the drinks. This work is published in JNeurosci.  The researchers screened 99 healthy adults averaging 24 years of age, selecting those with similar perceptions of sugar and artificial sweeteners. Participants largely reported liking artificial sweeteners as much as they liked ...

Ultrasound AI, a pioneer in artificial intelligence applications for medical imaging, today announced it has received FDA De Novo clearance for its flagship Delivery Date AI technology, a cloud-based SaMD that determines a Predicted Delivery Date (PDD) solely from standard ultrasound images and seamless integration into current OB/MFM prenatal visit workflows; PDD is provided in real-time for actionable decision-making by the clinical team.   Trained on millions of de-identified ultrasound images across diverse pregnancies and clinical settings, the technology leverages an ensemble of deep-learning neural networks to analyze entire ultrasound images, including ...

Cavities at protein-protein interaction interfaces are often considered "undruggable" because their shallow or large geometries hinder the stable binding by small molecules. A study published in Journal of the American Chemical Society and led by Prof. LI Yang from the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology (SIAT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences elucidated the molecular mechanisms governing nanoparticles (NPs) recognition and selective targeting of protein surface cavities. Using SARS-CoV-2 ...

In recent years, "blue tears" chasing has become a popular tourism activity along coasts to witness the spectacular natural phenomenon. However, the occurrence and movement of algal blooms are unpredictable, which impacts the quality of tourist experiences while posing safety risks and ecological pressures. In a study published in Ecological Informatics, a team led by Prof. LI Jianping from the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with the collaborators from the Ministry of Natural Resources, developed an innovative real-time video ...

About The Study: The findings of this study show a broad increase in insufficient sleep across all demographic groups, driven largely by increasing reports of very short sleep (5 hours or less). Notably, insufficient sleep increased as much or more among students without behavioral risks, suggesting that structural and environmental factors affecting most adolescents, rather than specific behaviors such as electronic media use, substance use, or sedentary activity, are contributing to wide spread sleep loss. These trends highlight the need for population-level rather than targeted interventions. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding ...

About The Study: In 2024, 8.3% of U.S. adults—an estimated 21.3 million—reported ever having long COVID (LC), among whom nearly 6 in 10 reported recovery, consistent with RECOVER initiative findings showing similar LC prevalence in 2023 and 2024 and longitudinal Veterans Affairs data demonstrating declining LC prevalence. Yet many adults, particularly those 35 years or older, continue to experience lasting symptoms. With no LC treatment demonstrating clear efficacy, greater investment in understanding biological mechanisms, including immunotypic differences between those who recover and those who do not, may provide insights ...

About The Study: This study found stark disparities in birth outcomes by poverty status, with inequities growing for low birth weight in recent years. These disparities point to the need for more support during pregnancy and birth for low-income families. Antipoverty policies can provide needed resources to promote better maternal and child health, although the availability and generosity of these programs vary across states.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Emily C. Dore, PhD, MPH, MSW, email edore@hsph.harvard.edu. To ...

About The Study: In this systematic review and meta-analysis, glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs) produced greater weight loss among women than men; however, their efficacy was consistent across other important subpopulations. These findings may inform clinical decision-making.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, G. Caleb Alexander, MD, MS, email galexan9@jhmi.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2025.8222) Editor’s ...