The discovery of new fossils and a new species of ancient ancestor may help shift the perception of human evolution from linear evolution to that of a tree with many branches, new UNLV research published today in the journal Nature shows. UNLV anthropologist Brian Villmoare and a team of international scientists discovered new fossils at a field site in Ethiopia that indicate Australopithecus, and the oldest specimens of Homo, coexisted between 2.6 and 2.8 million years ago at the same place in Africa. The ...

Iceberg calving occurs when masses of ice break away from the edge of glaciers and crash into the ocean. This process is one of the major drivers of the rapid mass loss currently affecting the Greenland ice sheet. An international research team led by the University of Zurich (UZH) and the University of Washington (UW) has now used fiber-optic technology to measure for the first time how the impact of falling ice and its subsequent drift is driving the mixing of glacial melt with warmer subsurface seawater. “The warmer water increases seawater-induced melt erosion and eats away at the base of the vertical wall of ice at the glacier’s edge. This, in turn, ...

AMHERST, Mass. — An international team of researchers led by the University of Massachusetts Amherst has tracked changes in more than 114,000 rivers in High-mountain Asia over a 15-year period. The paper, published in AGU Advances, reported that nearly 10% of these rivers saw an increase in flow, with an increasing proportion of that water coming from glacial ice melt compared to precipitation.     This water serves billions of people from China, India and Southeast Asia to Turkmenistan; is sensitive to climate change; and plays a key role in the sustainable development of this region through ...

“The ability of PCAIs to mitigate various cancer hallmarks in the various cancer cell lines has been well established.” BUFFALO, NY – August 13, 2025 – A new research paper was published in Volume 16 of Oncotarget on July 29, 2025, titled “PCAIs stimulate MAPK, PI3K/AKT pathways and ROS-Mediated apoptosis in aromatase inhibitor-resistant breast cancer cells while disrupting actin filaments and focal adhesion.” In this study, led by first author Jassy Mary ...

INDIANAPOLIS -- Regenstrief Institute’s latest LOINC® content update on August 12, introduces two new linguistic variants: Arabic, for users in Jordan, and Czech, for users in the Czech Republic. With these additions, LOINC is now available in 22 languages. “Expanding the number of supported languages improves the accessibility and adoption of LOINC around the world,” said Marjorie Rallins, DPM, M.S., executive director of Health Data Standards (HDS) at Regenstrief. “Making LOINC content available in more languages strengthens interoperability by enabling users to work with data in ...

LOS ANGELES — A new drug-releasing system, TAR-200, eliminated tumors in 82% of patients in a phase 2 clinical trial for individuals with high-risk non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer whose cancer had previously resisted treatment.   In the majority of cases, the cancer disappeared after only three months of treatment, and almost half the patients were cancer-free a year later.  “Traditionally, these patients have had very limited treatment options. This new therapy is the most effective one reported to date for the most common form of bladder cancer,” said Sia Daneshmand, MD, director of urologic oncology with Keck ...

A public-private partnership between Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS), the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and Oak Ridge National Laboratory has led to a new artificial intelligence (AI) approach that is faster at finding what’s known as “magnetic shadows” in a fusion vessel: safe havens protected from the intense heat of the plasma.  Known as HEAT-ML, the new AI could lay the foundation for software that significantly speeds up the design of future fusion systems. Such software could also enable good decision-making during fusion operations by adjusting the plasma so that ...

Late nights, alcohol, and smoking on weekends may be doing more than disrupting your Monday mornings, they could be triggering a newly identified sleep health concern known as ‘social apnea’, warn researchers from Flinders University. Published in the prestigious American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, the international study introduces social apnea as a novel trend in sleep medicine referring to the weekend spike in Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) severity, driven by lifestyle choices and irregular sleep patterns. The research, which analysed data from over 70,000 people worldwide, found a consistent ...

Florida Atlantic University’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Science has been awarded a $700,000 grant from the United States Environmental Protection Agency Gulf of America Division to support a novel research project aimed at advancing water quality monitoring in one of Florida’s most critical freshwater ecosystems. Led by Natalia Malina, Ph.D., principal investigator and an assistant professor in FAU’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry within the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, the three-year project titled, “Developing ...

For years, scientists at Washington State University’s Puyallup Research & Extension Center have been working to untangle a mystery: Why do coho salmon in Puget Sound creeks seem to suffocate after rainstorms—rising to the surface, gaping, and swimming in circles before dying? In 2018, the die-offs were linked to bits of car tires shed by friction and washed into the stormwater runoff. In 2020, researchers zeroed in on one particular chemical culprit, a tire preservative known as 6PPD.   Now, research led by WSU PhD student Stephanie ...

Aqueous zinc-ion batteries (ZIBs) are gaining attention as a safer and more affordable alternative to lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). While LIBs remain the most widely used energy storage technology, they come with safety risks due to their reliance on flammable organic electrolytes. In contrast, aqueous ZIBs use water-based electrolytes, making them non-flammable, environment friendly, and more affordable. Unfortunately, during charging and discharging, zinc-anodes in ZIBs undergo repeated plating and stripping that can trigger undesirable side reactions and sharp dendrite formation. This severely impacts their ...

The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) announced today that it has exceeded the university’s goal of raising more than $500 million through its largest fundraising effort in university history, Be Bold: A Campaign for Our Future. The ambitious campaign aimed to accelerate student success, advance research excellence and expand the university’s community impact. First conceived in 2017 and set to run for 10 years alongside the university’s strategic plan, the Be Bold campaign garnered support from more than 60,000 ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Scientists from the Illinois Natural History Survey and the Illinois Department of Natural Resources have updated the state conservation status ranks, or S-ranks, of threatened and endangered plants in Illinois. The update includes some plants not recorded in the state for decades and finds many that, while still threatened, are doing better than previously thought. Their findings are detailed in the Natural Areas Journal. The 331 plants on the list are as fascinating as they are rare, said Brian Charles, an INHS scientific specialist in botany who led the multiyear effort. They include ...

DARIEN, IL – The American Academy of Sleep Medicine is accepting abstracts and innovation award entries as part of Sleep Medicine Disruptors 2025, which will be held in-person in Austin, Texas, and livestreamed Friday and Saturday, Nov. 14-15.  This biennial event attracts clinicians, scientists, technology developers, start-up founders, venture capitalists, and other health care innovators. Speakers will explore technology innovation, artificial intelligence, and other disruptions that are poised to change the landscape of sleep health, patient care, and health care delivery. ...

Hamilton, ON (August 13, 2025) --- A study published in Nature Biotechnology reveals a powerful new use for artificial intelligence: designing small, drug-like molecules that can stick to and break down harmful proteins in the body — even when scientists don’t know what those proteins look like. The breakthrough could lead to new treatments for diseases that have long resisted traditional drug development, including certain cancers, brain disorders, and viral infections. The study was published on August 13, 2025 by a multi-institutional team of researchers from McMaster University, Duke University, and Cornell University. The AI tool, called PepMLM, ...

One of the best places to study stars is inside “open clusters”, which are groups of stars that formed together from the same material and are bound together through gravity. Open clusters act as laboratories, showing how stars of different masses and ages behave. At the same time, some stars known as “variable stars”, regularly change in brightness, and  their flickers and pulses help scientists learn about the physics inside stars and about the wider galaxy. Until now, astronomers studied clusters and variable stars separately, and ...

Popular generative AI web browser assistants are collecting and sharing sensitive user data, such as medical records and social security numbers, without adequate safeguards, finds a new study led by researchers from UCL and Mediterranea University of ​​Reggio Calabria. The study, which will be presented and published as part of the USENIX Security Symposium, is the first large-scale analysis of generative AI browser assistants and privacy. It uncovered widespread tracking, profiling, and personalisation ...

Traditional veterinary practices utilize rectal measurements to assess body temperature, but this method is stressful and does not capture continuous changes in body temperature. Fortunately, recent advancements have introduced infrared thermography, which can non-invasively measure body temperatures. However, it is still difficult to continuously monitor temperature changes over time with this method. Moreso, parts of the image data are set manually, which can cause data variations due to setting positions. These drawbacks ...

How many ads do you see on social media? It might be more than you realize. Scientists studying how ads work on Instagram-style social media have found that people are not as good at spotting them as they think. If people recognized ads, they usually ignored them - but some, designed to blend in with your friends’ posts, flew under the radar. “We wanted to understand how ads are really experienced in daily scrolling — beyond what people say they notice, to what they actually process,” said Maike Hübner, PhD candidate at the University ...

Exosomes, naturally derived vesicles responsible for intercellular communication, are emerging as next-generation drug delivery systems capable of transporting therapeutics to specific cells. However, their tightly packed, cholesterol-rich membranes make it extremely difficult to encapsulate large molecules such as mRNA or proteins. Conventional approaches have relied on techniques like electroporation or chemical treatment, which often damage both the drugs and exosomes, reduce delivery efficiency, and require complex purification steps—all of which pose significant barriers to commercialization. A joint research team led by Dr. Hojun Kim at the Center ...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (August 13, 2025)—Adults aged 65 years and older are becoming the fastest-growing demographic, yet, the sexual health of older women is often understudied and untreated. A new study demonstrates their rate of sexual problems is similar to that of midlife women, although they are less likely to report distress related to their sexual problems. Results of the study are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The Menopause Society. Although sexual activity declines with age, sexual health remains relevant throughout life ...

The need for biodegradable packaging material has never been higher. Currently, most packaging is "single use" and is made with plastic materials, derived from nonrenewable sources like crude oil that take hundreds of years to decompose in the environment. On top of this, only 9% of plastic is recycled. This has resulted in the formation of floating piles of plastic garbage in the ocean, called the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch." But maybe even more concerning is the discovery of micro- and nano-plastics in the environment. Research has found that plastic breaks down into tiny ...

An international study surveying people in a dozen countries found that when it comes to making complex decisions, people all over the world tend to reflect on their own, rather than seek advice. Researchers from the University of Waterloo led the new study that surveyed more than 3,500 people from megacities to small Indigenous communities in the Amazon rainforest to learn how they make decisions. This work is the broadest test of decision-style preferences across cultures to date. The researchers ...

Gait analysis and pain measures show that subtly adjusting the angle of the foot during walking may reduce knee pain caused by osteoarthritis. This approach may also slow progression of the condition, an uncurable disease in which the cartilage cushion inside a joint breaks down. Led by a team of researchers at NYU Langone Health, the University of Utah, and Stanford University, a new study explored whether changing the way patients position their feet when walking could lessen extra loading — stress on the joint during motion — and help treat the disease. For ...

There seem to be reciprocal links between certain groups of gut bacteria and the risk of insomnia, suggests a Mendelian randomisation study, published in the open access journal General Psychiatry. Certain types of bacteria seem to boost or lower the risk of the sleep disorder while insomnia itself seems to alter the abundance of certain types of bacteria, the findings indicate. Several studies have explored the effects of the gut microbiome on various sleep characteristics, but it’s not yet clear how different groups ...