Brick manufacturing is a central component of the economy in South Asia, but also a major source of greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution, as the practice releases carbon dioxide (CO₂), fine particulate matter (PM2.5), and other contaminants into the environment. This coal-powered industry poses a serious threat to human health, agriculture, and the environment in low- and middle-income countries that lack the capacity to monitor and regulate these largely informal operations. As scientists continue to sound the alarm on the increasing dangers of fossil fuels, a new study by researchers at Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH), Stanford ...

-With images- A peculiar spiny fossil, once thought to represent one of the earliest molluscs, has now been conclusively reclassified by scientists from Durham University and Yunnan University as something entirely different – a distant relative of sponge-like creatures known as chancelloriids. This striking revelation is set to reshape our understanding of early animal evolution. The fossil, named Shishania aculeata, hails from 500-million-year-old Cambrian deposits in Yunnan Province, southern China, ...

New report shows drastic decline in endangered primates and calls for conservation measures An international team of primate researchers has published the 25 most endangered primate species in Asia, Africa, Madagascar and South America for the years 2023 to 2025. The publication, supported by the German Primate Center (DPZ) - Leibniz Institute for Primate Research in Göttingen, emphasizes how urgently global conservation measures need to be implemented now to save irreplaceable biodiversity. "The situation is dramatic. If we don't act now, we will lose some of these species forever," warns Christian Roos, geneticist at the German Primate Center. “But ...

Imagine if doctors could precisely print miniature capsules capable of delivering cells needed for tissue repair exactly where they are needed inside a beating heart. A team of scientists led by Caltech has taken a significant step toward that ultimate goal, having developed a method for 3D printing polymers at specific locations deep within living animals. The technique relies on sound for localization and has already been used to print polymer capsules for selective drug delivery as well as glue-like polymers to seal internal wounds. Previously, scientists have used infrared light ...

KINGSTON, JAMAICA – May 8, 2025 – The Global Virus Network (GVN), in partnership with The University of the West Indies (UWI) Mona Campus and the State University of New York (SUNY) at the University of Buffalo, convened top virologists, epidemiologists, public health experts, and government officials for the 2025 GVN Regional Meeting: Caribbean and Latin America in Kingston, Jamaica held May 1-2, 2025. The two-day summit focused on collaborative strategies to bolster viral surveillance, diagnostics, vaccine research, and pandemic preparedness ...

HOUSTON ― The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center’s Research Highlights showcases the latest breakthroughs in cancer care, research and prevention. These advances are made possible through seamless collaboration between MD Anderson’s world-leading clinicians and scientists, bringing discoveries from the lab to the clinic and back. Comprehensive spatial map provides insights into pancreatic cancer metastases Read summary | Read in Nature Pancreatic cancer is notoriously difficult to treat, resulting in a five-year survival rate of roughly 12%. Approximately half of patients develop metastases shortly ...

A new analysis of a fatal landslide that occurred on 13 February 2024 at theÇöpler Gold Mine in Türkiye reveals that the site of the landslide had been slowly moving for at least four years prior to the failure. “Additionally, our analyses detected deformation anomalies in other sectors of the mining operation, which could potentially lead to similar catastrophes,” said Pınar Büyükakpınar of the GFZ German Research Centre For Geosciences, who published the study in The Seismic Record with her colleagues. The Çöpler Gold ...

Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientists have developed a new approach to countering citrus greening and potato zebra chip diseases, two economically devastating agricultural diseases in the U.S. Their method uses spinach antimicrobial peptides, known as defensins, which naturally defend plants against a broad range of pathogens. In a recent study published in the Plant Biotechnology Journal, researchers showed that some spinach defensins can confer similar protection to citrus and potatoes — and possibly other crops. The effects show significant progress toward recovering ...

About The Study: Between February 28, 2025, and April 8, 2025, 694 National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants were terminated across 24 of the 26 institutes and centers (including the Office of the Director) that administered active NIH grants. Targeted grant terminations have affected more than $1.8 billion in NIH funding. Terminations were spread across nearly all NIH institutes and centers, although cuts disproportionately impacted the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (30% of all funding). Corresponding ...

Sulfur applied to sugarcane crops in South Florida is flowing into wetlands upgradient of Everglades National Park, triggering a chemical reaction that converts mercury into toxic methylmercury, which accumulates in fish, new research from University of California, Davis finds. In a paper published in Nature Communications, researchers collected water and mosquito fish across wetlands fed by agricultural canals. They documented how sulfur runoff can dramatically increase methylmercury concentrations in fish — sometimes up to 10 million times greater than the waters in which they lived, posing a risk ...

A study published today in the journal Cell marks the first reported instance of generative AI designing synthetic molecules that can successfully control gene expression in healthy mammalian cells. Researchers at the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) created an AI tool which dreams up DNA regulatory sequences not seen before in nature. The model can be told to create synthetic fragments of DNA with custom criteria, for example: ‘switch this gene on in stem cells which will turn into red-blood-cells but not platelets.’  The model then predicts which combination of DNA letters (A, T, C, G) are needed for the gene expression patterns required in specific types of cells. Researchers ...

U.S. veterans with depression had a 14% higher risk of heart failure, a new Vanderbilt University Medical Center-led study found, even after adjusting for traditional risk factors. The study, “Depression and Heart Failure in U.S. Veterans,” was published May 8 in the journal JAMA Network Open. Corresponding author Evan Brittain, MD, MSCI, professor of Medicine, said the study suggests implications for patient care. “Patients and clinicians have another reason to screen for and treat depression in order to prevent potential future heart failure,” he said.  Brittain, who holds the Cardiology Division Directorship, noted the study is the largest ...

About The Study: In this cohort study of 12,480 mother-offspring pairs, researchers found that pre-pregnancy obesity, gestational diabetes, and hypertensive disorders of pregnancy, alone or in various combinations, were prospectively associated with higher offspring blood pressure at an early age and with an increased rate of blood pressure change from age 2 to 18 years, with the most profound associations with diastolic blood pressure among female offspring and with systolic blood pressure among Black offspring. These findings suggest that ...

About The Study: In this cohort study, depression among veterans was associated with an increased hazard of incident heart failure after controlling for demographic and cardiovascular risk factors. Higher incident heart failure rates in patients with depression remained consistent in an otherwise low-risk cohort. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Evan L. Brittain, MD, MSc, email evan.brittain@vumc.org. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.9246) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, ...

About The Study: In this cross-sectional study, a patient-centered measure of adverse experiences in vulvovaginal care was developed. Participants reported common past experiences with gaslighting (a patient’s concerns are dismissed without proper evaluation) and substantial distress; they frequently considered ceasing care. There is an urgent need for education supporting a biopsychosocial, trauma-informed approach to vulvovaginal pain and continued development of validated instruments to quantify patient experiences. Corresponding Author: To ...

A vitamin supplement that improves metabolism in the eye appears to slow down damage to the optic nerve in glaucoma. Promising results have been published in the journal Cell Reports Medicine. The researchers behind the study have now started a clinical trial on patients. In glaucoma, the optic nerve is gradually damaged, leading to vision loss and, in the worst cases, blindness. High pressure in the eye drives the disease, and eye drops, laser treatment or surgery are therefore used to lower the pressure in the eye and thus slow down the disease. Unfortunately, however, the effect ...

Eggs are less likely to crack when dropped on their side than when dropped vertically, finds research published in Communications Physics. Controlled trials simulating the ‘egg drop challenge’, a common classroom science experiment, found that the shell of an egg can better withstand an impact when dropped side-on. The goal of the ‘egg drop challenge’ is for students to prevent an egg from cracking when dropped from a set height. A common belief is that an egg is stronger and less likely to crack when dropped vertically, with this assumption often ...

Children born to mothers with obesity, gestational diabetes mellitus or a hypertensive disorder of pregnancy have higher systolic and diastolic blood pressure than children born to mothers without these risk factors, according to a new USC study. Among children whose mothers had at least one risk factor, blood pressure also rose more quickly between ages 2 and 18 compared to their peers. The findings, which suggest that blood pressure interventions could start as early as pregnancy, were just published in JAMA Network Open. Across the ...

At a glance: Researchers have created an AI tool called EVE-Vax that can predict and design viral proteins likely to emerge in the future. For SARS-CoV-2, panels of these “designer” proteins triggered similar immune responses as real-life viral proteins that emerged during the pandemic. EVE-Vax could give scientists valuable clues to help them develop vaccines that protect against future versions of rapidly evolving viruses. Effective vaccines dramatically changed the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, preventing illness, reducing disease severity, and saving millions of ...

PHILADELPHIA – In the United States, breast, colorectal, endometrial, pancreatic, and kidney cancers are becoming increasingly common among people under age 50, according to a study published in Cancer Discovery, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR). The findings may have implications for early-onset cancer prevention and screening efforts, the researchers noted. Early-onset cancers, defined in this study as those diagnosed in individuals under age 50, are rising in incidence for reasons that remain unclear, according ...

In the hunt for a remedy, when the baton is passed from dedicated academic scientists to an innovative company to trusted community advocates, outcomes for society can be especially powerful. Today, thanks to that sequence of contributions, the first HIV drug to offer long-lasting protection from infection — eliminating the need for people to take a daily pill — exists. For their role in ensuring that drug, lenacapavir, came to life and to market, the AAAS Mani L. Bhaumik Breakthrough of the Year Award is being awarded to Wesley Sundquist, chair of the University of Utah Department of Biochemistry; Moupali Das, vice president, Clinical Development, HIV Prevention ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Scientists have engineered a monoclonal antibody that can protect mice from a lethal dose of influenza A, a new study shows. The new molecule combines the specificity of a mature flu fighter with the broad binding capacity of a more general immune system defender. The protective effect was enhanced by delivering the antibody in a nasal spray that disperses these molecules throughout the respiratory tract, where they stick to the slippery mucus lining to lie in wait for invading viral particles. The ...

What makes people think an AI system is creative? New research shows that it depends on how much they see of the creative act. The findings have implications for how we research and design creative AI systems, and they also raise fundamental questions about how we perceive creativity in other people. ‘AI is playing an increasingly large role in creative practice. Whether that means we should call it creative or not is a different question,’ says Niki Pennanen, the study’s lead author. Pennanen is researching AI systems at Aalto University and has a background in psychology. ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) — Nicknamed the “king of the kelp forest,” giant sea bass are among scuba divers’ favorite characters to spot off the California Coast. But very few of these charismatic fish remain. A team led by researchers at UC Santa Barbara has conducted the first direct population estimate of this critically endangered species in Southern California. Using photos sourced from the diving community, they found slightly more than 1,200 adult giant sea bass within Southern California waters from 2015 to 2022. The results, published in the Marine Ecology Progress Series represent an increasing trend in their numbers, suggesting ...

Drowning is the leading cause of unintentional death for children aged 1 to 4 in Florida, and children with autism face even greater danger – many times more likely to drown than their neurotypical peers. One key factor behind this alarming statistic is wandering, also known as elopement. Nearly 50% of children with autism will wander from a safe environment at some point. These incidents can happen in a split second and often lead to children being drawn to nearby water sources such as pools, ponds or canals – many of which are unprotected. Children ...