A research team led by Professor Leo Tianshuo Zhao from the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the Faculty of Engineering, University of Hong Kong (HKU), has developed the world’s smallest fully printed infrared photodetectors, which are an innovative room-temperature nano-printing platform that overcomes the limitations of traditional silicon-based technology. Near-infrared (NIR) technology is essential for applications such as autonomous systems, biomedical sensing, and high-speed optical communications. However, conventional silicon-based CMOS technology cannot directly detect NIR wavelengths. Current solutions ...

Background Understanding the dynamic neural mechanisms of sleep-wake cycles is a major challenge in sleep science and neuroengineering. Sleep, essential for maintaining brain homeostasis and cognitive function, relies on the intricate coordination between neuronal electrical activity and neurochemical signals in specific brain regions. The nucleus accumbens, a key node in the reward and motivation circuit, has been identified as critical for regulating sleep-stage transitions through dopamine dynamics and neuronal firing patterns. However, existing neural sensing technologies face significant ...

Microvascular endothelial dysfunction (MiVED) is implicated in several health conditions, such as hypertension, atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (CVD), and diabetes. MiVED is considered an early marker of endothelial impairment that often precedes dysfunction in larger arteries. Our study aims to address the lack of suitable technologies for detailed in-vivo MiVED observation by introducing fast raster-scan optoacoustic mesoscopy (fRSOM), which can resolve cutaneous MiVED features at single-capillary resolution.   The ...

Organised by the Beijing-Hong Kong Academic Exchange Centre, the results of the annual selection for the ‘Top 10 Innovation & Technology News in Hong Kong 2025’, have recently been announced. The University of Hong Kong (HKU) is pleased to report that three of its groundbreaking research projects have made it onto this prestigious list, leading among all local institutions. These selected projects in the fields of medical health and astronomical sciences highlight HKU's strong capabilities ...

This study is led by associate professor Gan Ai and associate professor Jinding Liu (College of Plant Protection, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, China). Nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat (NLR) proteins function as key intracellular receptors in the plant immune system, recognizing pathogens’ effectors and activating defenses. Identifying NLRs is a critical step in breeding disease-resistant crops. However, NLRs are frequently misannotated or entirely overlooked in automated genome annotations due to their complex genomic structures and ...

For quota_Anchor, collinear gene pairs are initially identified by a dynamic programming algorithm analogous to those implemented in DAGchainer and MCScanX. The algorithm then identifies the highest-scoring block and determines the number of query and reference genes within that block, taking into account the alignment depth constraint. This iterative process continues until the score of the collinear block falls below the predefined minimum threshold (default: 3), at which point the iteration terminates.   The authors hypothesized that inversion alters the regulatory context of collinear ...

Quantum information storage is a cornerstone technology for the emerging quantum internet and quantum computation. While current quantum communication networks face fundamental limitations due to signal loss over long distances, quantum memories offer a promising solution by enabling quantum repeaters that can extend the range of quantum networks through entanglement swapping operations.   In a breakthrough published in Light: Science & Applications, a research team led by scientists from the Humboldt-Universität ...

Fluorescence microscopy is a cornerstone of modern biological research, widely used to reveal cellular structures, molecular interactions, and dynamic life processes. Computational fluorescence microscopy(CFM) has further revolutionized this field by integrating molecular specificity with optical modulation and algorithmic demodulation, enabling high resolution and multidimensional imaging far beyond the limits of conventional wide field microscopy. However, its full potential is still hindered by a long standing challenge: accurate characterization of the imaging system. Traditional approaches either rely on ...

This study is led by Professor Guangcun Li (State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China). The authors evaluated 14 restriction enzymes to select optimal restriction enzymes in multiple crop species, as the restriction enzyme used affects the evenness and spacing of markers.   Then they present BacPhase, an innovative sequence-based approach in which constructed BACs are digested with a restriction enzyme and self-ligated to produce small inserts that can be ...

This study was led by Prof. Jianghua Chen from the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences. The authors identified four WOX1 homologs in soybean and uncovered their roles in leaf development. They found that GmWOX1a and GmWOX1b are specifically expressed at the initiation sites of leaf primordia and in the middle domain of leaf primordia.   Using CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing, they generated multiple knockout mutants and demonstrated the functional redundancy among four WOX1 genes. Triple mutants Gmwox1acd and Gmwox1bcd showed ...

Perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have emerged as promising alternative for next generation photovoltaics due to their superior power conversion efficiencies (record currently at 34.9% for perovskite-silicon tandem) and low-cost manufacturing. One fully-printable implementation of perovskite solar cells uses mesoporous layers. However, the complex mesoporous architectures present a significant challenge for accurate modelling, especially considering the enhanced interfacial effects. Then, the influence of the manufacturing texturing on the charge ...

This study was led by Professor Kabin Xie (National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China). The authors found that overexpression of ADARdd in rice protoplasts leads to abundant off-target editing, a phenomenon not observed in leaves of stable transgenic rice plants overexpressing ADARdd (ADAR deaminase domain). To investigate the underlying mechanisms, the authors systematically explored the effects of ADARdd expression levels, protoplast physiology, and the presence of RNA-binding domains or a nuclear localization signal (NLS) on off-target editing. The results indicated that off-target editing by ADARdd was independent ...

Academician Yu-Zhong Wang's team at Sichuan University proposed an innovative "LEGO" strategy, successfully upgrading and recycling waste polyethylene (PE) into high-performance materials with multiple functions. This strategy degrades PE into oligomers, which are then modularly assembled with different functional monomers through dynamic imine bonds. This allows for customized functionalization, achieving multiple functions such as flame retardancy, antistatic properties, UV shielding, and dyeability. Simultaneously, the resulting material exhibits good physical and chemical recyclability. ...

URBANA, Ill. — For centuries, scientists have known that plants "breathe" through microscopic pores on their leaves called stomata. These tiny valves are the gatekeepers that balance the intake of carbon dioxide into the leaf for photosynthesis against the loss of water vapor from the leaf to the atmosphere. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have developed a groundbreaking new tool that allows them to watch and quantify this process in real-time and under strictly controlled environmental conditions. The study, published in the journal Plant Physiology, introduces a system dubbed "Stomata In-Sight." It solves a long-standing ...

Anorexia nervosa is a psychiatric condition characterized by a fear of weight gain and reduced calorie consumption that can result in dangerous weight loss. This condition is thought to affect around 1-4% of all women, and those who suffer from it, or have suffered from it, are estimated to be three times more likely to die prematurely than those who have never had it.   Anorexia nervosa (or AN) doesn’t just result in fat loss. It can also result in a 20-30% loss of skeletal muscle strength and size, which is critical to longevity and the ability to do basic activities like grocery shopping or picking up babies. Along with treating the psychiatric component, ...

ITHACA, N.Y. – Shifting from numerical to narrative-based performance reviews can significantly impact employees’ perceptions of fairness and their likelihood of improving performance based on the feedback, according to Cornell University-led research. The study, published in the Academy of Management Discoveries, compared responses to performance feedback delivered in one of three formats: numerical-only, narrative-only or a combination of both. Their findings suggest that narrative-only feedback was generally perceived as the fairest, and gives ...

Scientists have taken a major step toward improving how wastewater treatment systems deal with emerging contaminants such as pharmaceuticals, antibiotics, and endocrine disrupting chemicals. In a new perspective article published in New Contaminants, researchers present a comprehensive framework explaining how advanced oxidation processes, or AOPs, remove these hard to eliminate pollutants from water. Emerging contaminants are often present at very low concentrations, but they can pose long term risks to ecosystems and human health. Many conventional ...

A new comprehensive review highlights how converting biomass into gaseous fuels such as hydrogen, methane, and syngas could play a critical role in the global transition to low-carbon energy systems. By combining techno-economic analysis with life-cycle assessment, the study provides one of the clearest pictures to date of when and where biomass-based gaseous fuels can be both climate-friendly and economically viable. The review, published in Energy & Environment Nexus, examines thermochemical conversion pathways that transform agricultural residues, forestry waste, and other ...

  Climate change is not only warming the planet and disrupting rainfall, it is also quietly rewiring the way nitrogen moves through the world’s croplands, forests, and grasslands. This hidden shift in the global nitrogen cycle carries major consequences for food security, water quality, biodiversity, and climate policy. Nitrogen is a basic building block of proteins and DNA, and healthy terrestrial ecosystems depend on a steady but balanced flow of nitrogen through soils, plants, and microbes. When that balance is disturbed, harvests can fall, rivers can turn green with algae, and more greenhouse gases can escape into the atmosphere.​ “In a warming world, nitrogen ...

Embargoed for release until 5:00 p.m. ET on Monday 5 January 2026    Follow @Annalsofim on X, Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky, and Linkedin              Below please find summaries of new articles that will be published in the next issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. The summaries are not intended to substitute for the full articles as a source of information. This information is under strict embargo and by taking it into possession, media representatives are committing ...

EVANSTON, Ill. --- A groundbreaking new study reveals that changes to the gut microbiome can change the way the brain works. Humans have the largest relative brain size of any primate, but little is known about how mammals with larger brains evolved to meet the intense energy demands required to support brain growth and maintenance. A new study from Northwestern University provides the first empirical data showing the direct role the gut microbiome plays in shaping differences in the way the brain functions across different primate species. “Our study shows that microbes are acting on traits ...

Public health researchers at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health used computer modeling to reconstruct how the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic and the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic unfolded in the U.S. The findings highlight the rapid spread of pandemic respiratory pathogens and the challenges of early outbreak containment. The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is the first to comprehensively compare the spatial transmission of the last two respiratory pandemics in the U.S. at the metropolitan scale.  In the U.S., the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic was responsible for 274,304 hospitalizations ...

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Researchers at Northwestern University and the University of Bern in Switzerland have conducted the first cross-temporal, multinational study to compare views of gender using data collected 30 years apart. An international study reveals that people’s beliefs about the attributes of women and men follow from the differing social roles that they typically occupy in homes and workplaces in their respective societies. The goal driving the research was to understand the sources of stereotypes of men as assertive and ambitious and of women as the kinder and more caring gender. The study showed that these stereotypes reflect the differing social ...

A study by researchers at Mass General Brigham highlights the opportunity for orthopedic surgeons to play a critical role in identifying patients who have experienced intimate partner violence (IPV). While orthopedic surgeons are experts in musculoskeletal injuries, screening patients to identify IPV is not routine. This is highlighted by the findings that only 0.3% of referrals for IPV from orthopedic surgeons compared to 29% from the emergency department. Correcting misperceptions about the prevalence of IPV, ...

When observing small worms under a microscope, one might observe something very surprising: the worms appear to make a sweeping motion to clean their own environment. Physicists at the University of Amsterdam, Georgia Tech and Sorbonne Université/CNRS have now discovered the reason for this unexpected behavior. Brainless sweeping When centimeter-long aquatic worms, such as T. tubifex or Lumbriculus variegatus, are placed in a Petri dish filled with sub-millimeter sized sand particles, something surprising happens. Over time, the worms begin to spontaneously clean up their surroundings. They sweep particles ...