The most frequently reported reasons for medicinal cannabis use are for pain relief and improvements in sleep. Although cannabis is believed to have an interconnected role with both pain and sleep, its effects on chronic pain and sleep architecture have been studied largely in isolation. New research from UT Dallas’ Center for BrainHealth aims to fill this gap. “Interactions Between Cannabis Use and Chronic Pain on Sleep Architecture: Findings from In-Home EEG Recordings” was recently published in Neurotherapeutics A total of 339 nights of in-home sleep electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings ...

Joining ResearchGate allows Aging-US authors to connect their work with a wider network of peers, fostering collaboration, advancing understanding of the biology of aging, and helping translate discoveries into better health outcomes. BUFFALO, NY— December 17, 2025 — We are pleased to announce that we have officially joined ResearchGate, the professional network for scientists and researchers. This collaboration enhances the visibility, accessibility, and impact of research published ...

Lung cancer is the second-most common cancer and the leading cause of cancer death in the United States. Over 80% of lung cancers are non-small cell lung cancers, in which tumor cells are larger and grow more slowly than those in small cell lung cancer. Many gene mutations are associated with non-small cell lung cancer, including the gene KRAS, which is important for cell growth and division and is mutated in 30% of cases. Patients with tumors that have these mutations have shorter survival times and often become resistant to therapies. In ...

The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) has recognized the Mount Sinai Health System with a Level 9 designation, the second-highest level, in both the Acute Care and Ambulatory Care categories for the 2025 CHIME Digital Health Most Wired survey. The internationally recognized benchmarking program honors health care organizations that have an exceptional commitment to excellence in digital health, recognizing Mount Sinai’s ongoing digital transformation and early adaptation of cutting-edge innovation to improve patient outcomes and support clinicians. The CHIME Digital Health Most Wired survey annually ...

Animals help disperse seeds and spores for many plant and fungal species. This typically happens when animals eat the fruiting bodies of plants and fungi and pass seeds and spores through their digestive systems. Mycorrhizal fungi form symbiotic associations with plant roots, enhancing water and nutrient uptake and playing a central role in forest productivity, regeneration and resilience to environmental stress. Through these connections, mycorrhizal fungi shape forest structure and function by influencing plant establishment, growth and responses to drought and disturbance. Some fungal species produce above-ground fruiting bodies (mushrooms) that release ...

A new study finds menopause symptoms to be very frequently reported by female endurance athletes, with many perceiving a negative effect on their training and performance. The findings are published December 17, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS One by Heather Hamilton of Old Dominion University, U.S., and colleagues. Physical activity has been reported to mitigate the negative effects of menopause, particularly when it comes to musculoskeletal changes and quality of life. However, at the same ...

Democratic congressmembers are significantly more likely to post on social media following a mass shooting event in the US compared to Republican congressmembers, according to a study published December 17, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS Global Public Health by Dmytro Bukhanevych from New York University, United States, and colleagues. Social media is now a key tool for politicians to communicate directly with the public, especially in the wake of important events. Previous studies have shown that voters perceive social media ...

DAEJEON, SOUTH KOREA – A joint research team from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and the Unmanned Exploration Laboratory (UEL) has developed a transformative wheel capable of navigating the Moon’s most extreme terrains, including steep lunar pits and lava tubes.   The study presents a novel "origami-inspired" deployable airless wheel that can significantly expand its diameter to traverse obstacles that would trap traditional rovers. The research was published in the December ...

The genome differs from person to person in thousands of positions. In some cases, this means that proteins have a different building block in certain regions, rendering some antibody-based therapies ineffective, report researchers from the University of Basel, Switzerland. Antibody-based therapies are used to treat numerous diseases, from cancer to rheumatic disorders and multiple sclerosis. Antibodies recognize and bind to very specific structures. This allows them to direct active substances to exactly the right target structure in the body, for example. Researchers from the University of Basel’s Departments of Biomedicine and Biozentrum now report in ...

Cancer immunotherapy is a strategy that turns the patient’s own immune cells into a “search-and-destroy” force that attacks the tumor’s cells. The “search” immune cells are the dendritic cells, which collect and present identifying parts of the cancer cells (antigens) to the “destroy” part (T cells), the immune system's killer cells. The problem is that many tumors “learn” how to evade detection by the patient's dendritic cells. Clinicians address this by collecting dendritic cells from the patient’s blood, loading them in the laboratory with tumor material – antigens that train ...

December 17, 2025 – New research among World Trade Center (WTC) responders with chronic post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has uncovered measurable physical changes in their brain structure, consistent with changes in the balance of myelinated to unmyelinated neurons (fast- and slow-conducting nerve cells) across both hemispheres of the brain. These changes were most strongly associated with re-experiencing symptoms in individuals with PTSD. The cortical differences found in this sophisticated imaging study in Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive ...

Organizations aiming to help homeless people with either housing or health care can be more effective when they form partnerships with other service groups, a Rutgers study has found. “Our paper describes how homeless services and health care providers are working together to tackle the challenge of providing healthcare to the unhoused,” said Joel Cantor, director of the Rutgers Center for State Health Policy, a Distinguished Professor at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy and coauthor of the paper published in The Milbank ...

A new study from North Carolina State University found that neutrophils – white blood cells that are a key part of the immune system – play a role in the early stages of atopic dermatitis flares in dogs. The work is a first step toward understanding the role that these immune cells may play in the early stages of allergic skin response, and could have implications for human sufferers of atopic dermatitis. Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a type of eczema associated with allergic reactions and characterized by inflamed itchy patches of ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. — As rates of obesity, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes and sleep apnea increase, cases of advanced chronic liver disease and resulting liver scarring or cirrhosis also are rising. Patients often are diagnosed based on symptoms, such as gastrointestinal bleeding, fluid retention or jaundice, which happen when liver disease has progressed to a late stage. This problem led Mayo Clinic researchers to develop an artificial intelligence (AI) model that resulted in twice the number of advanced chronic liver disease diagnoses in patients without symptoms, helping physicians treat them before the disease ...

More than half of teenage girls experienced heavy bleeding and 40 per cent had an iron deficiency. The research, led from Lund University in Sweden, also shows that young teenage girls who experience heavy menstrual bleeding – and are therefore at greater risk of iron deficiency – can be identified using a simple questionnaire. As many as half of the teenage girls in the study published in PLOS One experienced heavy menstrual bleeding, and four out of ten had an iron deficiency. The 2023 study was carried ...

Researchers at the University of East London have published a new study examining how middle-aged, middle-class British women describe the effects of regular open water swimming on their wellbeing, including its impact on symptoms of menopause. The research, published in the European Journal of Ecopsychology, uses in-depth interviews to understand women’s own accounts of swimming in outdoor water and how they feel it supports their lives. The study looks at the patterns that emerged when women talked about ...

Jurassic Park — and its never-ending sequels and spinoffs — starts with a basic premise: extracting the DNA of long-dead dinosaurs from mosquitoes frozen in amber. It turns out mosquitoes really are as voracious as Michael Crichton imagined. A new study reveals that, within a small area in central Florida, mosquitoes fed on a whopping 86 different species of animals, capturing nearly all the vertebrate biodiversity in the area. “They say Jurassic Park inspired a new generation of paleontologists, ...

CHICAGO—December 17, 2025—Illinois Institute of Technology (Illinois Tech) university life trustee Marty Cooper (EE ’50, M.S. ’57)—a pioneer in the field of mobile communications who’s considered the “Father of the Cell Phone”—has been awarded the 2025 Marconi Society Lifetime Achievement Award. Cooper, an Illinois Tech alumnus and former professor, was recognized for his lifetime of leadership in wireless communications, entrepreneurship, and public service, and for inspiring others through his work, mentorship, and ...

Lymphedema after head and neck cancer is considerably more common than previously assumed and can persist long after cancer treatment has finished. Researchers at Lund University in Sweden have discovered that patients with a low level of physical activity face a higher risk of developing lymphedema. They have also noted that a lymph scanner objectively measures changes in the condition – a method that has now been introduced in Sweden’s Southern Healthcare Region. Head and neck cancer is a collective term for several types of cancer that ...

BOSTON and MINNEAPOLIS, December 17, 2025—NEJM Evidence and the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP), today launched Public Health Alerts, a new series published in NEJM Evidence and on CIDRAP’s site. Public Health Alerts deliver information and early warnings about emerging health threats, enabling swift, informed responses across the U.S. and globally. The first Public Health Alerts “Influenza Virus Characteristics in Department of Defense Populations, 2024 – 2025” and “Detection of Community Transmission of Clade Ib Mpox Virus in the United States” are now live and freely available ...

A new study lead by UCC palaeontologists discovered that frogs have conserved their ecology in the last 45 million years. Dr Daniel Falk, together with colleagues from UCC, Germany and the United States, studied 45-million-year-old frogs from the Geiseltal fossil site in central Germany. Remarkably, the fossils preserve skin remnants and layers of microscopic fossilised cell structures called melanosomes. These cell structures synthesise, store, and transport melanin - the pigment responsible for skin, hair, and eye colour. Similar to modern frogs, these melanosomes occur in different body areas including the eyes, the internal organs and the ...

To the point: Three-dimensional multicellular human liver model: For the first time, a 3D human organoid model, developed with liver tissue from patients, consists of three liver cell types, derived from adult hepatocytes, cholangiocytes, and liver mesenchymal cells. Retaining structure and function: The novel complex organoid models, or assembloids, reconstruct essential structural and functional features of the human periportal liver region and have patient-specific traits. They capture key aspects of human liver physiology in a dish, including drug detoxification and metabolism. Liver disease investigation: When manipulated, ...

Imagine sitting down for an appointment with a therapist – or any care provider. Perhaps it's the first time you've seen this provider, or the first time in a while. You'll likely need to fill out a form with a set of questions to ensure they know why you're there or how you're doing. Now imagine that the symptom questionnaire is quite confusing, to the point where you need to ask someone to clarify what the questions are asking. Many people don't have to imagine – this confusion is common, according to a study led by a University of Arizona psychologist. Questionnaires like these have been the standard since the 1990s. The Patient Health ...

LA JOLLA (December 17, 2025)—Young minds are easily molded. Each new experience rewires a child’s brain circuitry, adding and removing synaptic connections between neurons. These wiring patterns become more stable with age, but biology has left some wiggle room to ensure that adult brains can still adapt and refine their circuitry as needed. This flexibility is called neuroplasticity, and our ability to learn, make new memories, and recover from injury all depend on it. So how does your brain ...

Can the weakened immune systems of older individuals be rejuvenated? Researchers from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), the HI-STEM* institute, and the Broad Institute have demonstrated that this is possible with an innovative approach. In a study now published in Nature, the team showed that mRNA technology can be used to transform the liver in mice into a temporary source of important immune regulatory factors that are naturally lost during aging. This restores the formation of new immune cells, allowing older animals ...