Science
press releases.

Science9 Feb 2026

UK’s growing synthetic opioid problem: Nitazene deaths could be underestimated by a third

Deaths due to synthetic opioids nitazenes have likely been underestimated by up to a third. King’s College London research, published today in Clinical Toxicology, sheds light on the UK’s growing synthetic opioid problem. The presence of nitazenes on the unregulated drug market has risen steeply in the last seven years – prompting UK and international bodies to issue public health warnings about their use. Nitazenes are a class of synthetic opioids which can have potencies of up to 500 times that of heroin. They can be readily manufactured at low cost. These potent synthetic opioids were ...

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Science7 Feb 2026

How rice plants tell head from toe during early growth

Tokyo, Japan – Scientists from Tokyo Metropolitan University have uncovered how fertilized rice seeds begin to divide and establish their “body axis.” Using a new imaging method, they discovered that while the first cell divides in an asymmetric way initially, this is followed by random growth and the apparently “collective” determination of a body axis. This is a significant break with known pathways, a rare glimpse into the birth and growth of plant embryos. A key puzzle in plant science is how plants ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Palmitoylation of Tfr1 enhances platelet ferroptosis and liver injury in heat stroke

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apsb.2025.10.027 This new article publication from Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica B, discusses how palmitoylation of Tfr1 enhances platelet ferroptosis and liver injury in heat stroke. Heat stroke (HS) is a severe medical emergency characterized by coagulation and high mortality due to organ injury. This study identifies a novel mechanism in which platelet ferroptosis, driven by transferrin receptor 1 (Tfr1) palmitoylation, significantly contributes to liver injury in HS. ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Structure-guided design of picomolar-level macrocyclic TRPC5 channel inhibitors with antidepressant activity

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apsb.2025.10.028 This new article publication from Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica B, discusses how structure-guided design of picomolar-level macrocyclic TRPC5 channel inhibitors with antidepressant activity. Recent advances in ion channel structural biology have enhanced structure-based drug design, yet lipid-occupied binding pockets—often large and flat—remain a major hurdle for developing selective small molecules. TRPC5, a brain-enriched channel regulating depression and anxiety, is a promising therapeutic target, but current preclinical candidates suffer from moderate off-target effects. To address ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Rice lab to help develop bioprinted kidneys as part of ARPA-H PRINT program award

HOUSTON – (Feb. 6, 2026) – Rice University bioengineer Antonios Mikos is part of a team of researchers led by the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine awarded up to $24.8 million over five years to help address the nation’s growing organ donor shortage by bioprinting on-demand kidney tissues. The new funding, from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), will enable the team to produce bioprinted, vascularized kidney tissue that augments renal function in patients suffering from kidney ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Mechanism-guided prediction of CMAS corrosion resistance and service life for high-entropy rare-earth disilicates

Materials scientists have long sought to enhance the durability of thermal/environmental barrier coatings (T/EBCs) under extreme conditions, particularly against corrosion caused by calcium‑magnesium‑alumino‑silicate (CMAS) melts. Understanding the corrosion mechanisms and accurately predicting the long‑term service life of coating materials remain critical challenges for aerospace and energy applications. Recently, a research team from Harbin Institute of Technology and Shanghai University achieved a significant breakthrough. They designed two novel high‑entropy rare‑earth disilicates—(Er1/4Y1/4Lu1/4Yb1/4)2Si2O7 and ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Seeing the unseen: Scientists demonstrate dual-mode color generation from invisible light

Invisible light beyond the range of human vision plays a vital role in communication technologies, medical diagnostics, and optical sensing. Ultraviolet and near-infrared wavelengths are routinely used in these fields, yet detecting them directly often requires complex instrumentation. Developing materials that can convert invisible light into visible signals could serve as essential components for measurement technologies and sensors, and play a major role in understanding the fundamental photophysical processes. However, developing those materials remains a key challenge in ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

I’m walking here! A new model maps foot traffic in New York City

Early in the 1969 film “Midnight Cowboy,” Dustin Hoffman, playing the character of Ratso Rizzo, crosses a Manhattan street and angrily bangs on the hood of an encroaching taxi. Hoffman’s line — “I’m walking here!” — has since been repeated by thousands of New Yorkers. Where cars and people mix, tensions rise. And yet, governments and planners across the U.S. haven’t thoroughly tracked where it is that cars and people mix. Officials have long measured vehicle traffic closely while largely ignoring pedestrian traffic. Now, an MIT research group has assembled a routable dataset of sidewalks, ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Power of tiny molecular 'flycatcher' surprises through disorder

For decades, scientists assumed that order drives efficiency. Yet in the bustling machinery of mitochondria — the organelles that crank out adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the universal “energy currency” of cells — one of the most enigmatic components is a protein that appears anything but orderly. ATP powers nearly every biological task, from muscle contraction to neural signaling, by breaking high-energy phosphate bonds and being continually recharged through metabolism. This life-sustaining energy cycle depends on highly coordinated flows of electrons within respiratory supercomplexes. ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Before crisis strikes — smartwatch tracks triggers for opioid misuse

Opioid overdoses continue to take a devastating toll across the United States. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2023, the nation recorded roughly 105,000 drug overdose deaths overall, with nearly 80,000 deaths involving opioids. Worldwide, opioids are also responsible for the majority of drug-related deaths. A University of California San Diego study is working on a potentially life-saving measure that may be as simple as strapping on a smartwatch. Researchers have ...

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Science6 Feb 2026

Statins do not cause the majority of side effects listed in package leaflets

Cardiovascular disease results in around 20 million deaths worldwide and causes around a quarter of all deaths in the UK. Statins are highly effective drugs that lower LDL (“bad”) cholesterol levels and have been repeatedly proven to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. However, there have been concerns about possible side effects. The researchers gathered data from 23 large-scale randomised studies from the Cholesterol Treatment Trialists’ Collaboration: 123,940 participants in 19 large-scale clinical trials comparing the effects of statin therapies against a placebo (or dummy tablet), and 30,724 participants in four trials comparing more intensive versus less intensive ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

UMD team finds E. coli, other pathogens in Potomac River after sewage spill

COLLEGE PARK, Md. – Following one of the largest sewage spills in U.S. history, University of Maryland researchers have detected high levels of fecal-related bacteria and disease-causing pathogens in the Potomac River, raising urgent public health concerns and underscoring the risks posed by aging sewer infrastructure. Water sample results collected at the site by researchers show high levels of E. coli are present along with Staphylococcus aureus (the bacteria that causes Staph infections). An antibiotic-resistant strain of S. aureus, MRSA, was also identified at the site of the sewage overflow. “People coming into contact with the impacted ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Apes share human ability to imagine

In a series of tea party-like experiments, Johns Hopkins University researchers demonstrate for the first time that apes can use their imagination and play pretend, an ability thought to be uniquely human. Consistently and robustly across three experiments, one bonobo engaged with cups of imaginary juice and bowls of pretend grapes, challenging long-held assumptions about the abilities of animals. The findings suggest that the capacity to understand pretend objects is within the cognitive potential of, at least, an enculturated ape, and likely dates back 6 to 9 million years, to our common evolutionary ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Increasing toxicity trends impede progress in global pesticide reduction commitments

Around the world, the total toxicity and ecological harm from agricultural pesticides are rising, despite recent United Nations commitments to halve pesticide use and risks by 2030. The findings establish a global, toxicity-weighted baseline for pesticide use and identify a subset of pesticides, crops, and countries driving the most biodiversity impacts. The widespread use of agricultural pesticides is a growing threat to global biodiversity. To address this concern, the 15th United Nations Biodiversity Conference set the goal of halving pesticide use and risk by 2030 and recently adopted a new global indicator – total applied toxicity (TAT) – that captures not just ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Boston College scientists help explain why methane spiked in the early 2020s

Chestnut Hill, Mass (2/5/2026) – A combination of weakened atmospheric removal and increased emissions from warming wetlands, rivers, lakes, and agricultural land increased atmospheric methane at an unprecedented rate in the early 2020s, an international team of researchers report today in the journal Science. A sharp decline in hydroxyl radicals – the primary “cleaning agent” that breaks down methane in the atmosphere – during 2020–2021 explains roughly 80 percent of the year-to-year variation in methane accumulation, according to the team, including Boston College Professor of Earth and Environmental Science Hanqin Tian. At the same time, ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Tenecteplase for acute non–large vessel occlusion 4.5 to 24 hours after ischemic stroke

About The Study: Among patients with non–large vessel occlusion acute ischemic stroke and salvageable brain tissue, intravenous tenecteplase, a modified human tissue plasminogen activator, administered 4.5 to 24 hours after onset resulted in a greater likelihood of an excellent functional outcome at 90 days than standard care but had an increased risk of symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Junwei Hao, MD, PhD, email haojunwei@vip.163.com. To ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Sport: ‘Football fever’ peaks on match day

The mean stress level of fans of the football club Arminia Bielefeld was 41% higher on the day of the German Football Association’s (DFB-Pokal) 2025 Cup final compared to non-match days, according to a study published in Scientific Reports. The authors suggest that this reaction, known as ‘football fever’, may be driven by the intensity of fans’ emotions towards their ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Scientists describe a window into evolution before the tree of life

All life on Earth shares a common ancestor that lived roughly four billion years ago. This so-called “last universal common ancestor” represents the most ancient organism that researchers can study. Previous research on the last universal common ancestor has found that all the characteristics we see in organisms today, like having a cell membrane and a DNA genome, were already present by the time of this ancestor. So, if we want to understand how these foundational characteristics of life first emerged, then we need to be able to study evolutionary history prior to the last universal common ancestor. In a new article ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Low-temperature-activated deployment of smart 4D-printed vascular stents

Cardiovascular diseases constitute a major global health concern. Various complications that affect normal blood flow in arteries and veins, such as stroke, blood clot formation in veins, blood vessel rupture, and coronary artery disease, often require vascular treatments. However, existing vascular stent devices often require complex, invasive deployment procedures, making it necessary to explore novel materials and manufacturing technologies that could enable such medical devices to work more naturally with the human body. Moreover, the development of ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Large study shows scaling startups risk increasing gender gaps

When startups scale quickly, founders often make hurried hiring decisions that unintentionally disadvantage women, according to new study from the Stockholm School of Economics in Sweden. The study shows how the pressures of rapid growth increase the likelihood that founders rely on mental shortcuts and make biased decisions. Drawing on large‑scale Swedish data, the study shows that scaling—when companies hire far more people than their usual growth trend would predict—puts pressure on founders to decide swiftly, which increases the use of mental shortcuts. These ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

A rapid evolutionary process provides Sudanese Copts with resistance to malaria

An international study investigating the genomic diversity of the Sudanese population reveals that the Copts originating in Egypt –who settled in the country between the seventh and eleventh centuries– have acquired a genetic variant that protects them from contracting malaria. “The acquisition of this variant has taken place very quickly, in just 1,500 years, after a group of Copts mixed with Sudanese populations with sub-Saharan characteristics”, explains David Comas, principal investigator at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology (IBE: CSIC-Pompeu Fabra University) and a full ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Breathing in the past: How museums can use biomolecular archaeology to bring ancient scents to life

Recent advances in biomolecular archaeology have revealed that ancient objects can retain the molecular fingerprints of past aromatic practices. These molecules provide unprecedented insight into ancient perfumery, medicine, ritual, and daily life. In a new publication, an interdisciplinary research team led by archaeo-chemist Barbara Huber (Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and the University of Tübingen), shows how museums can use this molecular evidence to engage audiences with the sensory worlds of the past. The team combined their expertise to create a new workflow ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Natto your average food

Supersulfide molecules, metabolites from plants that are important in cellular metabolism, are attracting attention in the medical and nutritional fields for their potential in supporting health and disease prevention. Natto, a Japanese food made from soybeans fermented with the Bacillus subtilis var. natto microorganism, is rich in these molecules. However, the mechanism by which they are produced during fermentation has remained unclear. To better understand this complex process, a research group led by Professor Hideshi Ihara at Osaka Metropolitan University’s ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Family dinners may reduce substance-use risk for many adolescents

A new study from researchers at Tufts University School of Medicine finds that regular family dinners may help prevent substance use for a majority of U.S. adolescents, but suggests that the strategy is not effective for youth who have experienced significant childhood adversity. The findings provide important insights for practitioners looking to help families prevent substance use, as well as for researchers aiming to develop interventions that better account for adolescents’ unique experiences. For the study, ...

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Science5 Feb 2026

Innovation at a crossroads: Virginia Tech scientist calls for balance between research integrity and commercialization

As federal policymakers weigh potential changes to how biomedical research is funded and regulated in the United States, a Virginia Tech scientist highlights the importance of preserving the nation’s ability to turn discovery into life‑saving therapies. In a commentary published this week in Nature Biotechnology, Robert Gourdie, professor at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC, notes that well‑intentioned but overly restrictive policies could inadvertently undermine the technology‑transfer ecosystem ...

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