The melding of visual information (microscopic and X-ray images, CT and MRI scans, for example) with text (exam notes, communications between physicians of varying specialties) is a key component of cancer care. But while artificial intelligence helps doctors review images and home in on disease-associated anomalies like abnormally shaped cells, it’s been difficult to develop computerized models that can incorporate multiple types of data. Now researchers at Stanford Medicine have developed an AI model able to incorporate visual ...

​​As computer chips continue to get smaller and more complex, the ultrathin metallic wires that carry electrical signals within these chips have become a weak link. Standard metal wires get worse at conducting electricity as they get thinner, ultimately limiting the size, efficiency, and performance of nanoscale electronics. In a paper published Jan. 3 in Science, Stanford researchers show that niobium phosphide can conduct electricity better than copper in films that are only a few atoms thick. Moreover, these films can be created and deposited at sufficiently low temperatures to be compatible with modern computer ...

Chestnut Hill, Mass (01/08/2025) – Nations must start testing and regulating chemicals and chemical products as closely as the current systems that safeguard prescription drugs or risk rising rates of chronic illnesses among children, according to a New England Journal of Medicine report by a group of experts writing as the Consortium for Children’s Environmental Health. Global chemical inventories contain an estimated 350,000 products – such as manufactured chemicals, chemical ...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Media Contact: Levi.Gadye@ucsf.edu, (415) 502-6397 Subscribe to UCSF News The discovery of a new type of stem cell in the brain could usher in better treatments for the deadliest brain tumor. UCSF scientists have discovered a stem cell in the young brain that’s capable of forming the cells found in tumors. The breakthrough could explain how adult brain cells take advantage of developmental processes to instigate the explosive growth seen in deadly brain cancers like glioblastoma. They made the discovery while taking a broad genomic survey of human brain ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. – If you like the smell of spring roses, the sounds of summer birdsong and the colors of fall foliage, you have the stabilization of the ozone layer to thank for it. Located in the stratosphere where it shields the Earth from harmful ultraviolet radiation, the ozone layer plays a key role in preserving the planet’s biodiversity. Now, we may have a better idea of why that took more than 2 billion years to happen. Michigan State University researcher Dalton Hardisty contributed to a new Yale University-led study finding that Earth’s early atmosphere hosted a battle royal between ...

Thanks to in-kind donations of tens of thousands of rare books, scientific journals, and articles, and reports over the past two years, The University of Texas at Arlington’s Amphibian and Reptile Diversity Research Center (ARDRC) has become one of the largest publicly accessible herpetology libraries in the world. “Thanks to 12 independent donors, including the Joseph Rex Dinardo Jr. Herpetology and Natural History Science Research Trust in Philadelphia, Dr. Jonathan Campbell, William Lamar, Drs. Jay and Rebecca Savage, and Louis Porras, we now have thousands ...

Affordable and stable housing is critical to improving health across a person's lifespan. People with disabilities, including autism, comprise a significant share of people in need of housing assistance. However, the intersection of housing and health among individuals with autism is largely unknown because data on public housing and public health are not connected. Researchers from Drexel University’s A.J. Drexel Autism Institute examined how many autistic people in the United States received housing ...

Researchers have amassed vast single-cell gene expression databases to understand how the smallest details impact human biology. However, current analysis methods struggle with the large volume of data and, as a result, produce biased and contradictory findings. Scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital created a machine-learning algorithm capable of scaling with these single-cell data repositories to deliver more accurate results. The new method was published today in Cell Genomics.  Before single-cell analysis, bulk gene expression data ...

MINNEAPOLIS – Older people wait an average of just over a month to see a neurologist for specialty care after being referred by their primary care physician or another physician, according to a study published in the January 8, 2025, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. The study, which looked at people who have Medicare insurance, also found some people wait more than three months to see a neurologist. “Neurologists provide important and ongoing care for people ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Ferroelectrics are special materials with polarized positive and negative charges — like a magnet has north and south poles — that can be reversed when external electricity is applied. The materials will remain in these reversed states until more power is applied, making them useful for data storage and wireless communication applications. Now, turning a non-ferroelectric material into one may be possible simply by stacking it with another ferroelectric material, according to a team led by scientists from Penn State who demonstrated the phenomenon, called proximity ferroelectricity. The ...

LA JOLLA, CA—Scientists at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) have discovered how a mutated gene kicks off a dangerous chain of events during blood cell production. The study, published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveals how a mutated gene called ASXL1 is involved in a disease called clonal hematopoiesis, a precursor to malignant diseases such as myeloid malignancies and chronic monomyelocytic leukemia. "We know that many diseases—and all cancers—are driven by mutations in the genome," says LJI Instructor Zhen Dong, ...

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER (FL), January 7, 2025 – The International Space Station (ISSInternational Space Station) National Laboratory is soliciting flight concepts for technology advancement that utilizes the space-based environment of the orbiting laboratory. This solicitation, “Technology Advancement and Applied Research Leveraging the ISS National Lab,” is open to a broad range of technology areas, including chemical and material synthesis in space, translational medicine, in-space edge computing, and in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing. It also encompasses the application of space station remote sensing data to improve geospatial analytics ...

A new study has shown that sleep deprivation can inhibit the brain’s ability to suppress unwanted memories and intrusive thoughts. Scientists at the University of York, in collaboration with the University of East Anglia, have shown that sleep deprivation interferes with the ability of the prefrontal area of the brain to restrict the retrieval of memories that would have otherwise been suppressed. Dr Scott Cairney from the University of York said: “Memories of unpleasant experiences often intrude into our conscious ...

Irvine, Calif., Jan. 8, 2025 — A University of California, Irvine-led research team has discovered intricate molecular mechanisms driving the RNA processing defects that lead to Huntington’s disease and link HD with other neurodegenerative disorders such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, frontotemporal lobar dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.   The findings may pave the way for neurodegenerative disorder researchers to collaborate and share therapeutic strategies across diseases, opening additional avenues for treatment.   While it’s known that HD is caused by an abnormal ...

HOUSTON, January 8, 2025 — Eight active college football coaches make up the American Heart Association’s 2024 Paul “Bear” Bryant Coach of the Year Award finalist list. The award is given each January to a college football coach for contributions that make the sport better for athletes and fans alike by demonstrating grit, integrity and a winning approach to coaching and life – both on and off the field. The Paul “Bear” Bryant Coach of the Year Award is the only college football coaching honor ...

In a recent essay, pediatrician-scientist Peter Hotez proposes a focus on local data, improved benefit-risk communications, actively countering health disinformation, and state-level action to address antivaccine sentiment in the U.S. Anti-vaccine sentiment isn’t going away any time soon. In a new opinion article published January 8 in the open-access journal PLOS Global Public Health, Prof. Peter Hotez from Baylor College of Medicine, outlines key actions to stem the momentum of anti-vaccine advocates in the U.S. over the next five years. Anti-vaccine activities in the U.S. transformed to become a politically charged movement ...

Electrical stimulation of the spinal cord is a promising strategy for reestablishing walking after spinal cord injury, recent studies show. But for patients suffering from muscle spasms, the stimulation protocols have a limited effect due to the unpredictable behaviour of involuntary muscle stiffness related to spasticity. Muscle spasticity affects almost 70% of spinal cord injured patients Now, scientists at EPFL, Università San Raffaele and Scuola Sant’Anna have found a promising way to address and reduce muscle spasticity in patients with incomplete spinal cord injury. ...

A new study published in Science Advances reveals evidence of electrical signaling and coordinated behavior in choanoflagellates, the closest living relatives of animals. This elaborate example of cell communication offers key insights into the early evolution of animal multicellularity and nervous systems. Researchers from the Burkhardt group at the Michael Sars Centre, University of Bergen, uncovered a remarkable diversity of behaviors within the rosette-shaped colonies of the choanoflagellate Salpingoeca rosetta - and the small organisms held even more surprises. “We found communication among the cells of the colonies, which regulates shape and ciliary beating across the rosette,” ...

Ion-adsorption rare earth deposits (IADs) are primary sources of heavy rare earth elements (HREE), supplying over 90% of the global demand for HREE. However, the current ammonium-salt-based in-situ mining technique has led to severe environmental impacts. To facilitate sustainable REE mining, Professors ZHU Jianxi and HE Hongping’s team from the Guangzhou Institute of Geochemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) has developed a green and efficient electrokinetic mining (EKM) technology. Their work was published in Nature Sustainability on Jan. 6, 2025. To address the challenges of sustainable and efficient REE extraction, ...

In an unprecedented new study in the journal Cell Reports, researchers have shown neurotransmitters in the human brain are released during the processing of the emotional content of language, providing new insights into how people interpret the significance of words. The work, conducted by an international team led by Virginia Tech scientists, offers deeper understanding into how language influences human choices and mental health. Spearheaded by computational neuroscientist Read Montague, a professor of the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC and ...

A recent study published in Health Data Science, led by Dr. Fengyu Wen from the Institute of Medical Technology at Peking University Health Science Center and Professor Luxia Zhang from the National Institute of Health Data Science at Peking University, reveals significant survival disparities among cancer patients depending on their mobility patterns for medical care.   The study analyzed data from over 20,000 cancer patients in Shandong Province, China, to assess the impact of intra-city, local center, and national center mobility patterns on survival rates. Patients who traveled to local or national healthcare centers had higher five-year survival ...

Getting a good night’s sleep is a critical part of our daily biological cycle and is associated with improved brain function, a stronger immune system, and a healthier heart. Conversely, sleep disorders like insomnia and sleep apnea can significantly impact health and quality of life. Poor sleep often precedes the onset of neurodegenerative diseases and is a predictor of early dementia. New research appearing in the journal Cell describes for the first time the tightly synchronized oscillations in the neurotransmitter norepinephrine, ...

LA JOLLA (January 8, 2025)—Human bodies defend themselves using a diverse population of immune cells that circulate from one organ to another, responding to everything from cuts to colds to cancer. But plants don’t have this luxury. Because plant cells are immobile, each individual cell is forced to manage its own immunity in addition to its many other responsibilities, like turning sunlight into energy or using that energy to grow. How these multitasking cells accomplish it all—detecting threats, communicating those threats, and ...

January 8, 2025—Marked variation in the prevalence of depression was found in a multisite sample of community-dwelling older adults in the United States reports a study by Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Until now, few studies, have examined the frequency of depression in community-dwelling older adults in the U.S. The study is published in the Journal of American Geriatrics Society. Of the 2,900 participants studied, 6.2 percent had depression. Older adults who had a negative history of depression or had annual household incomes of $50,000 or greater were at significantly decreased ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Amid the many mysteries of quantum physics, subatomic particles don’t always follow the rules of the physical world. They can exist in two places at once, pass through solid barriers and even communicate across vast distances instantaneously. These behaviors may seem impossible, but in the quantum realm, scientists are exploring an array properties once thought impossible. In a new study, physicists at Brown University have now observed a novel class of quantum particles called fractional excitons, which behave in unexpected ways and could significantly ...