NEW ORLEANS – Ochsner Children’s has achieved a major milestone by performing the first robotic-assisted pediatric spine deformity surgery in Louisiana and the Gulf South. This recently completed procedure represents a significant step forward in patient safety and precision reaffirming Ochsner Children’s leadership in innovative pediatric orthopedic care.   The procedure was performed by Ochsner Children’s pediatric orthopedic surgeons, Ryan Farmer, MD and Lawrence Haber, ...

A new study delving into the genetic drivers of a rare and aggressive childhood cancer called Malignant Peripheral Nerve Sheath Tumor (MPNST) has revealed metabolic frailties in the cancer cells that might be exploited to improved treatments for patients.  MPNST is a rare and deadly childhood cancer, which mainly affects teenagers and young adults. These tumors grow quickly, spread easily, and don’t respond well to current treatments. Metastasis is the leading cause of death in MPNST and there currently are no targeted ...

Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere enters the ocean at the surface and has been increasing the acidity of Pacific waters since the beginning of the industrial revolution over 200 years ago. A new study, led by University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa oceanographers, revealed that the ocean is acidifying even more rapidly below the surface in the open waters of the North Pacific near Hawai‘i. Their discovery was published recently in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans.  “Ocean ...

Research led by investigators at Mass General Brigham suggests that the health benefits of more aggressive blood pressure control outweigh concerns about overtreating people with high blood pressure readings. Results of the simulation study are published in Annals of Internal Medicine.  The study used data from the Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT) trial, the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), and other published literature to simulate lifetime health outcomes—including heart attack, stroke, and heart failure—for patients whose systolic blood pressure targets were set at <120 mm Hg, <130 mm Hg, and <140 mm Hg. Recognizing ...

CAMBRIDGE, MA – MIT researchers have developed a reconfigurable antenna that dynamically adjusts its frequency range by changing its physical shape, making it more versatile for communications and sensing than static antennas. A user can stretch, bend, or compress the antenna to make reversible changes to its radiation properties, enabling a device to operate in a wider frequency range without the need for complex, moving parts. With an adjustable frequency range, a reconfigurable antenna could adapt to changing environmental conditions and reduce the need for multiple antennas. The word “antenna” ...

**EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL AUG. 18 AT 3 P.M. ET** Two studies led by Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, Ludwig Center, and Johns Hopkins Whiting School of Engineering researchers report on a powerful new method that significantly improves the reliability and accuracy of artificial intelligence (AI) for many applications. As an example, they apply the new method to early cancer detection from blood samples, known as liquid biopsy. One study reports on the development of MIGHT (Multidimensional Informed Generalized Hypothesis Testing), an AI  method that the researchers created to meet the high level of confidence needed for AI tools used in clinical decision making.  To illustrate ...

MEDIA EMBARGO: 3 p.m. EASTERN TIME AUGUST 18, 2025 They feel like lightning — sudden, brilliant and seemingly impossible to predict. But according to new research, those mind-flashing “aha” moments of insight may leave detectable traces before they strike. Scientists have developed a way to identify subtle behavioral changes that happen minutes before a breakthrough, offering a new window into the elusive mechanics of human creativity. The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Shadab Tabatabaeian, who earned her Ph.D. in Cognitive and Information Sciences from the University of California, Merced, is lead author, ...

Using a corkscrew, writing a letter with a pen or unlocking a door by turning a key are actions that seem simple but actually require a complex orchestration of precise movements. So, how does the brain do it? According to a new study by researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Coimbra, the human brain has a specialized system that builds these actions in a surprisingly systematic way. Analogous to how all of the words in a language can be created by recombining the letters of its alphabet, the full repertoire ...

Roads, buildings and farms are preventing Michigan’s only rattlesnake from finding mates outside of their population. A 15-year study shows that fragmentation into smaller, more isolated patches is likely reducing the threatened snake’s chances of survival.  Michigan State University conservation biologists traced the family histories of more than 1,000 Eastern Massasauga rattlesnakes caught and released in a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service-funded project. The new findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, surprised even the researchers – the most inbred snakes were ...

Malaria, caused by Plasmodium falciparum, remains a major global health threat, claiming 600,000 lives annually, mostly young children in sub-Saharan Africa. Immunity to severe malaria develops after repeated infections and is mediated by antibodies blocking the parasite’s highly diversified PfEMP1 adhesion proteins from binding to the human endothelial protein C receptor (EPCR) on blood vessel walls. In the collaborative study, researchers from the National Institute for Medical Research in Tanzania and the University of Copenhagen first identified donors with immune plasma able to ...

SAN ANTONIO — August 18, 2025 — New research led by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) has confirmed decades-old theoretical models about magnetic reconnection, the process that releases stored magnetic energy to drive solar flares, coronal mass ejections and other space weather phenomena. The data was captured by NASA’s Parker Solar Probe (PSP), which is the only spacecraft to have flown through the Sun’s upper atmosphere. Magnetic reconnection occurs when magnetic field lines in plasma sever and reconnect in a new configuration, releasing large amounts of stored energy. ...

A new study published in The Annals of Thoracic Surgery, a journal from The Society of Thoracic Surgeons, has identified early hemodynamic valve deterioration (HVD) in more than 6% of patients just one year after undergoing transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI), raising new questions about valve durability in younger, lower-risk populations. The retrospective study, which analyzed 10 years of procedures from 2012 to 2022, evaluated 2,123 patients who had complete echocardiographic follow-up data. Researchers found that patients with 1-year HVD were more likely to be younger and have smaller aortic annuli than those without HVD. Importantly, ...

Just as smart traffic management ensures smooth vehicular movement during peak hours, our body relies on a molecular traffic system to manage the surge in glucose levels after a meal. Pancreatic β-cells play a major role in this system by taking up glucose from the blood and triggering insulin release into the bloodstream. Inside these cells, glucose uptake is managed by glucose transporters (GLUTs) – proteins that move to the β-cell surface when blood glucose levels rise and facilitate the entry of glucose into the cell ...

With a $1 million Impact Award from the U.S. Department of Defense, Tianfu Wu, a University of Houston biomedical engineer, is developing a method to send medication directly to the spleen where certain immune cells cause the disease known as lupus, or Systemic Lupus Erythematosus.  Lupus is a debilitating autoimmune disease characterized by uncontrolled disease activity, frequent flares, long-term immunosuppression, increasing infection rates, cumulative organ damage and decreased quality of life.  The spleen has often been called the security guard of the bloodstream, filtering out old or damaged blood cells while housing millions of white blood cells, or lymphocytes, that carry ...

Innovative intervention delivered by trained community health workers – meaning nonclinical personnel with deep knowledge of the community – increased treatment utilization among participating families with children who have ADHD, according to a pilot study published in the Journal of Attention Disorders. This intervention for parents and caregivers, covering topics that range from education about ADHD to discussions of stigma and barriers to care, intends to reduce inequities in access to evidence-based treatment and boost family engagement in ADHD care. “We know from previous studies that compared to White youth, Black, Hispanic, and Asian ...

Zhengang Lu and Russell Epstein, from the University of Pennsylvania, led a study to explore how people maintain their sense of direction while navigating naturalistic, virtual reality cities.  As reported in their new JNeurosci paper, the researchers collected neuroimaging data while 15 participants performed a taxi driving task in a virtual reality city. Two brain regions represented forward-facing direction as people moved around. This neural signal was consistent across variations of the city with different visual features. The signal was also ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – When it comes to adopting artificial intelligence in high-stakes settings like hospitals and airplanes, good AI performance and a brief worker training on the technology is not sufficient to ensure systems will run smoothly and patients and passengers will be safe, a new study suggests. Instead, algorithms and the people who use them in the most safety-critical organizations must be evaluated simultaneously to get an accurate view of AI’s effects on human decision making, researchers say. The team also contends these evaluations should assess how people respond to good, mediocre and poor technology performance ...

The American Geriatrics Society (AGS) has released a landmark update to its list of alternatives to medications listed in the 2023 AGS Beers Criteria® — the most widely adopted guidelines to help clinicians identify potentially inappropriate medications for older adults. This new effort delivers not only a comprehensive suite of safer pharmacologic options, but also a strong emphasis on effective non-pharmacologic treatments for common conditions impacting frail and aging populations. The AGS panel is comprised of 19 national experts from 14 states, ...

When health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recently fired an entire federal vaccine advisory panel, he described the unprecedented move as necessary to rid the committee of industry influence. However, new research from the USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics finds that reported conflicts on that Centers for Disease Control and Prevention panel had been at historic lows for years before Kennedy’s abrupt dismissal. Furthermore, the type of conflict typically considered the most concerning—income ...

About The Study: Among patients with severe chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps treated with a daily intranasal corticosteroid, stapokibart, a novel monoclonal antibody, reduced polyp size and severity of nasal symptoms at 24 weeks. Corresponding Authors: To contact the corresponding authors, email Luo Zhang, MD, (dr.luozhang@139.com) and Chengshuo Wang, MD, (wangcs830@126.com). To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi:10.1001/jama.2025.12515) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions ...

A new study reports evidence of a link between prenatal exposure to the widely used insecticide chlorpyrifos (CPF) and structural abnormalities in the brain and poorer motor function in New York City children and adolescents. The findings are the first to demonstrate enduring and widespread molecular, cellular, and metabolic effects in the brain, as well as poorer fine motor control among youth with prenatal exposure to the insecticide. The study by researchers at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, Children’s ...

About The Study: Study participants with hearing loss with hearing aids showed reduced risk for dementia among those younger than age 70 at the time of hearing evaluation, when followed up for up to 20 years. This finding highlights the importance of early intervention for hearing loss for possible prevention of dementia. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Sudha Seshadri, M.D., email seshadri@uthscsa.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi: 10.1001/jamaneurol.2025.2713) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including ...

About The Study: In this cross-sectional study of U.S. individuals obtaining oral contraception, the oral contraceptive pill was accessed over-the-counter (OTC) by many who previously used no method or less-effective contraception. These findings suggest that OTC access may improve equitable access to contraception. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Maria I. Rodriguez, M.D., M.P.H., email rodrigma@ohsu.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.27438) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional ...

Two years ago, the Food and Drug Administration approved the sale of an over-the-counter birth control pill for the first time in the United States without a prescription. A nationwide study published today reveals the decision has dramatically improved access to contraception, especially among women who otherwise would have had no birth control at all, either because they lack insurance or routine access to health care. The study was conducted by researchers at Oregon Health & Science University. Published in the journal ...

Researchers have identified key factors that influence the flavour of chocolate during the cocoa bean fermentation process, a discovery that could offer chocolate producers a powerful tool to craft consistently high-quality, flavour-rich chocolate. Scientists from the University of Nottingham’s School of Biosciences examined how cacao bean temperature, pH, and microbial communities interact during fermentation and how these factors shape chocolate flavour. The team identified key microbial species and metabolic traits associated with fine-flavour chocolate and found that both abiotic factors (such as temperature and ...