A study published in Nature by researchers at IRB Barcelona and the University of Washington shows that smoking and biological sex influence how mutated cells expand in healthy bladder tissue. The findings may help explain why men and smokers are more likely to develop bladder cancer. The novel approach used in this study reveals many more mutations than previously detected. The research aims to pave the way for prevention and early detection tools in bladder cancer. Barcelona, 8 October 2025 – Bladder cancer is one of the most common cancers worldwide. Men are around four times more likely to develop it than women, and smoking is the main known environmental risk factor. However, ...

Researchers have refined a powerful DNA sequencing tool that can uncover hidden mutations that occur naturally in our bodies as we age. In the largest study to date, they have used the tool to provide insights into the earliest steps of cancer development and the role of mutations in healthy tissue. The new study, published today (8 October) in Nature, was led by researchers from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, in collaboration with the TwinsUK study at King’s College London. The researchers introduce an improved version of nanorate sequencing (NanoSeq) – an ultra-accurate DNA sequencing technique.   By applying targeted NanoSeq ...

Harmful genetic changes in sperm become substantially more common as men age because some are actively favoured during sperm production, new research has revealed.  In a landmark study published today (8 October) in Nature, researchers from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, in collaboration with the TwinsUK study at King’s College London, have comprehensively mapped how harmful DNA changes in sperm cells can increase across the genome as men age.  The findings create new possibilities to explore how lifestyle and environmental factors might influence genetic risks passed on to future generations. In ...

U.S. Census data shows no systematic age differences between men and women in the workforce over the past decade. And globally, women on average live about five years longer than men. But that’s not what you’ll see if you search Google or YouTube or query an AI like ChatGPT. A study published today  in the journal Nature analyzed 1.4 million online images and videos plus nine large language models trained on billions of words and found that women are systematically presented as younger than men. The researchers looked at content from Google, Wikipedia, IMDb, Flickr, and YouTube, and major large language models including GPT2, and concluded ...

“ACTM-838 showed durable anti-tumor efficacy in multiple murine tumor models and synergized with anti-PD1 therapy in combination.” BUFFALO, NY – October 8, 2025 – A new research paper was published in Volume 16 of Oncotarget on October 6, 2025, titled “ACTM-838, a novel systemically delivered bacterial immunotherapy that enriches in solid tumors and delivers IL-15/IL-15Rα and STING payloads to engage innate and adaptive immunity in the TME and enable a durable anti-tumor immune response.” In this study, led by first author Kyle R. Cron and corresponding ...

The future of the electricity market may depend less on big power plants and more on everyday choices made at home. Nayeem Rahman’s dissertation at the University of Vaasa shows how consumers are gaining influence through energy flexibility, with direct implications for sustainability and costs. For decades, the low cost of electricity provided little incentive for consumers to change their energy consumption habits. However, as prices surged due to the energy crisis that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, many ...

(WASHINGTON — October 8, 2025) – Most individuals living with sickle cell disease who presented to the emergency department with a pain crisis, known as vaso-occlusive crisis (VOC), were not triaged appropriately according to established national guidelines, reveals a study published today in Blood Advances. Patients triaged with a less severe category waited nearly three times as long for their first dose of pain medication when compared to individuals with sickle cell disease who were triaged appropriately. “Pain is a significant burden in the day-to-day lives of those living with sickle cell ...

ROCKVILLE, Md. — Oct. 8, 2025 — The Association for Molecular Pathology, the premier global molecular diagnostic professional society, today announced the publication of new best practice recommendations for improving how complex molecular profiling information is presented to oncologists and other healthcare providers. The manuscript, titled “Developing Consensus for a More Provider-Friendly Next-Generation Sequencing Molecular Biomarker Report: A Joint Consensus Recommendation of the Association for Molecular Pathology and College of American ...

We mostly take it for granted that the position shown by our GPS is correct. But if we are in a new city and use the map app on our phone to find our way back to the hotel, it can often look like we are jumping around from one point to another – even though we are actually walking perfectly normally on the same pavement the whole time. “Cities are brutal for satellite navigation,” explained Ardeshir Mohamadi. He is a doctoral fellow at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) ...

A Northwestern University-led team of astronomers has captured the most detailed glimpse yet of a doomed star before it exploded. Using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the international team identified a supernova’s source star, or progenitor, at mid-infrared wavelengths for the first time. These observations — combined with archival images from the Hubble Space Telescope — revealed the explosion came from a massive red supergiant star, cloaked in an unexpected shroud of dust. The discovery may help solve the decades-old mystery of why massive red supergiants rarely explode. Afterall, theoretical models predict red ...

Embargoed until 7 a.m. CT/8 a.m. ET, Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2025 DALLAS, Oct. 8, 2025 — Amit Khera, M.D., FAHA, director of preventive cardiology and clinical chief of cardiology at the University of Texas (UT) Southwestern Medical Center, will receive the 2025 Chairman’s Award at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions. The meeting, to be held Nov. 7-10, 2025, in New Orleans, is a premier global exchange of the latest scientific advancements, research and evidence-based clinical practice updates in cardiovascular science. Dr. Khera will receive the ...

Root-knot nematodes (RKNs) are worm-like parasites of the genus Meloidogyne that are found in many parts of the world. They attack the roots of plants, causing them to wilt and eventually die. It is estimated that crops worth nearly USD 173 billion are lost every year due to RKN infestations. While chemical pesticides are effective in controlling RKNs, they also kill other microorganisms that are beneficial to plants, thereby reducing soil fertility. New, less toxic control methods are needed to prevent the loss of crops and soil fertility to RKNs.   Cellular slime mold ...

Keloids are raised, overgrown scars that can develop after skin injuries or surgery, often extending beyond the original wound boundaries. For many people, keloids are more than just a cosmetic concern; they often cause distressing symptoms such as chronic pain, itching, and restricted movement. While various treatment options exist, such as surgical removal, steroid injections, and radiation, keloids are notoriously difficult to manage, with recurrence rates reaching as high as 30%. Even after decades of study, it is still unclear why keloids grow uncontrollably, unlike hypertrophic scars. The current understanding is that an overproduction of extracellular ...

(Boston)—The prevalence of Alzheimer disease (AD) is approximately two times higher in African Americans (AA) compared to White/European-ancestry (EA) individuals living in the U.S. Some of this is due to social determinants of health such as disparities in health care access and quality of education, biases in testing and higher rates of AD risk factors such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes in those who identify as African American.   Although many studies have examined differences in gene expression (measure of the amount of protein encoded by a gene) in brain tissue from AD cases and controls in EA or mixed ancestry ...

In the form of a ‘nasal spray’, tiny gold particles act as carriers, delivering a treatment directly to the brain: developed by scientists at the Università Cattolica Rome campus/Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS, a new nanotechnological device for the treatment and prevention of neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases. These are lithium-loaded gold nanoparticles (lithium is already in clinical use for manic-depressive syndrome, but in oral formulation, not free from side effects) to combat neuropsychiatric diseases such as bipolar disorder, neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, and brain infections such as those caused ...

Many Americans choose food based on cost and nutrition, but personal values, such as animal welfare and environmental concerns, also shape what ends up on our plates.   Now, researchers at the Gerald J. and Dorothy R. Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University and the University of Nottingham Rights Lab and School of Geography have measured the risk of forced labor behind ingredients in recommended U.S. diets. By showing when healthy eating may come at the expense of exploited workers, the findings ...

A new study co-led by the University of Oxford and Google Cloud has shown how general-purpose AI can accurately classify real changes in the night sky — such as an exploding star, a black hole tearing apart a passing star, a fast-moving asteroid, or a brief stellar flare from a compact star system — and explain its reasoning, without the need for complex training. Published today (8 October) in Nature Astronomy, the study by researchers from the University of Oxford, Google Cloud, and Radboud University demonstrates that a general-purpose ...

Baltimore, MD — October 8, 2025 — Researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Center for Vaccine Development and Global Health (CVD) have completed a successful Phase 1 clinical trial of a novel vaccine designed to protect against both typhoid fever and invasive non-typhoidal Salmonella--two major causes of illness and death among children in sub-Saharan Africa. Results were published today in the journal Nature Medicine. The investigational Trivalent Salmonella Conjugate Vaccine (TSCV) includes sugar molecules taken from the outer coating of the Salmonella typhi bacteria that cause typhoid and ...

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- One of the newest weapons that scientists have developed against cancer is a type of engineered immune cell known as CAR-NK (natural killer) cells. Similar to CAR-T cells, these cells can be programmed to attack cancer cells. MIT and Harvard Medical School researchers have now come up with a new way to engineer CAR-NK cells that makes them much less likely to be rejected by the patient’s immune system, which is a common drawback of this type of treatment. The new advance may also make it easier to develop “off-the-shelf” ...

Vat photopolymerization is a 3D printing technique in which a light-sensitive resin is poured into a vat, and then selectively hardened into a desired shape using a laser or UV light. But this process is mostly used only with light-sensitive polymers, which limits its range of useful applications. While some 3D printing methods have been developed to convert these printed polymers into tougher metals and ceramics, Daryl Yee, head of the Laboratory for the Chemistry of Materials and Manufacturing in EPFL’s School of Engineering, explains that materials produced with these techniques suffer from serious structural setbacks. “These materials tend to be ...

Some colourful lizards and a mathematical formula from the finance sector have been used to build a new framework to model evolution. Developed by Dr Simone Blomberg from The University of Queensland’s School of the Environment, it is the first mathematical model to combine short-term natural selection (microevolution) with the way species evolve over millions of years (macroevolution). “There has been a big debate about whether microevolution can explain all of macroevolution,” Dr Blomberg said. “We ...

Androgenetic alopecia is a common form of hair loss in both men and women—also called male pattern baldness and female pattern hair loss. Topical minoxidil is an approved treatment, but it has poor water solubility and skin permeability. New research in Advanced Healthcare Materials reveals that stevioside, a natural sweetener derived from the Stevia plant, can improve the drug’s absorption into the skin. In a mouse model of alopecia, a dissolving patch formulation of stevioside with minoxidil effectively promoted hair follicles to enter the growth phase, leading to new hair development. “Using stevioside to enhance minoxidil delivery represents ...

Reindeer are iconic in the Arctic and subarctic, but their numbers are declining. As described in research published in Wildlife Monographs, investigators developed an environmental quality standard, or norm, for reindeer populations to evaluate their overall status, and gave them simple status categories of poor, medium, and good. The standard has indices for the status of population performance, lichen resources, and human-related habitat loss and fragmentation. The scientists implemented their environmental quality standard for 10 national and 14 smaller wild reindeer areas in Norway. They found that only 1 population had a good status; 11 populations ...

A study in Medical and Veterinary Entomology investigated whether Culicoides biting midges—tiny insects that can carry serious livestock viruses—are being accidentally exported from Africa to Europe in shipments of cut flowers. Although researchers did detect small numbers of these insects near and inside greenhouses on a Kenyan flower farm, they found none in packaging or transport areas. This suggests that the risk of midges being shipped with flowers is very low, but not zero. Given that northern Europe has experienced several unexpected outbreaks of livestock diseases spread by midges in recent years, the findings highlight the need ...

A recent analysis reveals that older adults with prior incarceration report worse physical and mental health than their peers, even if they were incarcerated in the distant past. The findings are published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. Among the 1,318 US adults aged 50 years and older who responded to the Family History of Incarceration Survey, 21% had been incarcerated. Formerly incarcerated older adults were more likely to be men, non-Hispanic Black or “other” race/ethnicity, ...