We might become less sociable as we age as brain scans of adults across the lifespan show disruption of brain connectivity, suggesting impairments in our ability to form and maintain relationships

Llamas may have been domesticated in the semi-arid North of Chile prior to the Incas, according to multi-proxy analysis of early camelid remains Article URL: https://plos.io/4mzZabZ  Article title: Multi-proxy analysis of El Olivar camelids (1,090-1,440 cal AD): Evaluating the presence of llamas (Lama glama, Linnaeus 1758) in the Semiarid North of Chile before the arrival of the Inca Author countries: Chile, Denmark, Argentina Funding: Work funded by the El Olivar Archaeological Project. ...

In order to truly decolonize the field of global health, it may be necessary for institutions from the Global North to practice “ruinous solidarity,” according to a study published May 21, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS Global Public Health by Daniel Krugman from Brown University, United States, and Alice Bayingana from the University of Sydney, Australia.    Even as scholarship related to decolonizing global health advances, global health institutions from the Global North still largely dominate the field via a “soft money” structure (funded by repeatedly winning ...

Refugees in Sweden who lived in institutional housing during the asylum process are prescribed more anti-anxiety and anti-depressant medication and visit hospital more than those who lived in self-organized housing, with the associations persisting for years.  ### Article URL: https://plos.io/3Ztgx3U   Article Title: Housing during the asylum process and its association with healthcare utilization for common mental disorders among refugees in Sweden: A nationwide cohort study Author Countries: Sweden Funding: The author(s) received no specific funding ...

Cats spend longer sniffing the odor of a stranger than that of their owner, suggesting that they can identify familiar humans based on smell alone, according to a study publishing May 28, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS One by Yutaro Miyairi and colleagues at Tokyo University of Agriculture, Japan. Cats use their sense of smell to identify other cats and communicate with each other, but whether they can also use smell to distinguish between different humans has not previously been studied. The researchers investigated whether ...

In a new study of college undergraduates in Japan, the students’ self-perception of their own athletic ability was linked with several internal and external factors, such as personality traits, family characteristics, leisure activities, and others’ perceptions. Sho Ito of Nanzan University, Japan, and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS One on May 28, 2025. Self-perception of one’s own athletic ability could influence one’s motivation to engage in physical activity. For young people, the sense of one’s own athleticism may affect their participation in sports and other physical activities, ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New research brings together 7,000 years of history in South Arabia to show how ancient pastoralists changed placement and construction of monuments over time in the face of environmental and cultural forces.   In a study published today (May 28, 2025) in PLOS One, an international team of archaeologists documents how monuments changed as the climate transitioned from a humid environment to, eventually, an arid desert.   Early monuments were built by larger groups at one time. But as people dispersed with the increasingly drier climate, smaller groups began constructing monuments and eventually built many of them in several visits.   “The ...

In 2022, after U.S. troops withdrew from Afghanistan and the Taliban regained power, Afghans reported an average life satisfaction of 1.28 on a scale from 0 to 10—or from the worst possible life to the best possible life—a global, all-time low, according to a new study published today in Science Advances.  That is lower than life satisfaction scores recorded in more than 170 countries since 1946, when global ratings were first tallied. In 2022, the global mean life satisfaction rating recorded in the Gallup World Poll was 5.48.  Afghans also showed little hope for the future. When asked to imagine what their lives would be like in five years on the same ...

How do we think, feel, remember, or move? These processes involve synaptic transmission, in which chemical signals are transmitted between nerve cells using molecular containers called vesicles. Now, researchers have successfully modeled the vesicle cycle in unprecedented detail, revealing new information about the way our brain functions. A joint study, published in Science Advances, between researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST), Japan, and the University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG), Germany, has applied a unique computational modeling system, which considers the complicated interplay of vesicles, their cellular environments, activities and interactions, ...

The 120-mile Tijuana River flows from Baja California into the United States and discharges millions of gallons of wastewater — including sewage, industrial waste and runoff — into the Pacific Ocean every day, making it the dominant source of coastal pollution in the region. Wastewater pollution has been an ongoing problem for decades and is so severe that the nonprofit environmental group American Rivers recently named the Tijuana River America’s second most endangered river.  A new study from the University of California San Diego examines how pollutants ...

Runaway cell death and inflammation triggered by severe trauma may be interrupted by a drug used to prevent alcohol abuse – and it may be particularly effective in females, according to new research led by University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine surgeon-scientists and published today in Science Translational Medicine. The findings, based on observations in human patients and tested in mice, may lead to therapies that, if given in the first few hours after severe trauma – such as a falls or vehicle accidents – could ...