An AI tool has made a step forward in translating the language proteins use to dictate whether they form sticky clumps similar to those linked to Alzheimer’s Disease and around fifty other types of human disease. In a departure from typical “black-box” AI models, the new tool, CANYA, was designed to be able to explain its decisions, revealing the specific chemical patterns that drive or prevent harmful protein folding.  The discovery, published today in the journal Science Advances, was possible thanks to the largest-ever dataset on protein aggregation created to date. The study gives new insights about the molecular mechanisms underpinning sticky proteins, which are ...

Mounting evidence supports ayahuasca’s potential to improve mental health, but its long-term effects are shaped by both individual mental health history and the context in which the psychedelic is used, according to a study published on April 30, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS Mental Health by Óscar Andión from Research Sherpas, Spain; José Carlos Bouso from the International Centre for Ethnobotanical Education, Research, and Services (ICEERS) and the University of Rovira i Virgili, Spain; Daniel Perkins from the University of Melbourne and Swinburne University; and colleagues. Ayahuasca, a psychedelic medicine traditionally ...

National-level policies can reduce the impact of antibiotic resistance across diverse countries, according to a study published April 30, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS Global Public Health by Peter Søgaard Jørgensen from Stockholm University and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Sweden, and colleagues. Antibiotic resistance is a major public health concern, contributing to 1.27 million deaths per year. In 2016, countries around the world committed to developing and implementing national action plans to combat antibiotic resistance. These plans have been criticized ...

Object recognition software is used by law enforcement to help identify suspects, by self-driving cars to navigate roadways and by many consumers to unlock their cell phones or pay for their morning coffee. Now, researchers led by the University of Cincinnati’s Anna Kruyer and the University of Houston’s Demetrio Labate have applied object recognition technology to track changes in brain cell structure and provide new insights into how the brain responds to heroin use, withdrawal and relapse. The research was published April 30 in the journal Science Advances. Study ...

  A new “atlas” developed by researchers at Duke University School of Medicine, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, and the University of Pittsburgh will increase precision in measuring changes in brain structure and make it easier to share results for scientists working to understand neurological diseases such as Alzheimer's disease.   The tool, the Duke Mouse Brain Atlas, combines microscopic resolution, three-dimensional images from three different techniques to create a detailed map of the entire mouse brain, from large structures down to individual cells and circuits.  “This ...

Fish are masters of coordinated motion. Schools of fish have no leader, yet individuals manage to stay in formation, avoid collisions, and respond with liquid flexibility to changes in their environment. Reproducing this combination of robustness and flexibility has been a long-standing challenge for human engineered systems like robots. Now, using virtual reality for freely-moving fish, a research team based in Konstanz has taken an important step towards that goal. “Our work illustrates that solutions evolved by nature over millennia can inspire robust and efficient control laws in engineered systems,” said first author Liang Li from the University of Konstanz. Co-author ...

A new study, led by Peter Søgaard Jørgensen from the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University, reveals that while global cooperation remains essential, countries have more power than previously believed to reduce antibiotic resistance through effective domestic interventions. Currently only a handful of countries are taking sufficient action. The study is the first to assess the level of government intervention needed to improve the worsening situation on antibiotic resistance across 73 countries. The researchers find strong associations between the level of action a country reports and whether antibiotic use and antibiotic resistance increased during a ...

A type of virus thought to be a ‘mere curiosity’ is plentiful in one common bacteria, and possibly others, a Monash University-led research team has found.  The discovery improves understanding of how viruses work and could mean this particular virus is also common in other types of bacteria. Published in Science Advances, the study looked at bacteriophages (phages), which are viruses that infect bacteria and come in many forms. In particular, researchers investigated telomere phages, a ...

In a landmark achievement for fusion energy, ITER has completed all components for the world’s largest, most powerful pulsed superconducting electromagnet system. ITER is an international collaboration of more than 30 countries to demonstrate the viability of fusion—the power of the sun and stars—as an abundant, safe, carbon-free energy source for the planet.  The final component was the sixth module of the Central Solenoid, built and tested in the United States. When it is assembled at the ITER site in Southern France, the Central Solenoid will be ...

Scientists have discovered, for the first time how root cells respond to their complex soil environment revealing that roots actively sense their microenvironment and mount precise, cell-specific molecular responses. The findings could help the development crops that are resistant to climate stress. In a study published in Nature, an international team of plant scientists and engineers from the University of Nottingham have worked with teams in the USA and Belgium. The team used cutting-edge spatial and single-cell transcriptomics to compare rice roots grown in conventional gel-based media with those grown in heterogeneous natural ...

Seattle, WASH.—April 30, 2025—An experiment seven years in the making has uncovered new insights into the nature of consciousness and challenges two prominent, competing scientific theories: Integrated Information Theory (IIT) and Global Neuronal Workspace Theory (GNWT). The findings were published today in Nature and mark a pivotal moment in the goal to understand the elusive origins consciousness.  IIT suggests that consciousness emerges when information inside a system (like the brain) is highly connected and unified, for as long as the information is consciously perceived, acting as a single whole. On the other ...

About The Study: In this cross-sectional study, commercial nontobacco nicotine use in U.S. 10th and 12th graders shifted from 2023 to 2024, marked by a doubling in nicotine pouch past-30-day use, an increase in pouch plus e-cigarette dual use, and a decrease in exclusive e-cigarette use. Prioritizing surveillance, regulation, and prevention addressing pediatric nicotine pouch use warrants consideration. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Adam M. Leventhal, PhD, email adam.leventhal@usc.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit ...

About The Study: Exposure to high levels of smoke pollution was associated with an increase in hospitalizations for respiratory diseases in this cohort study. These findings underscore the need for interventions to mitigate the health impacts of wildfire smoke exposure. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Rachel C. Nethery, PhD, email rnethery@hsph.harvard.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.7956) Editor’s Note: Please ...

Mount Sinai researchers have identified for the first time the neural mechanisms in the brain that regulate both positive and negative impressions of a social encounter, as well as how an imbalance between the two could lead to common neuropsychiatric disorders like autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and schizophrenia. The study, published April 30 in Nature, also describes how activating a serotonin receptor in the brain of a mouse model ofASD restored positive emotional value (also known as “valence”), with encouraging implications for the development of future therapies. “The ability to recognize and distinguish unpleasant from pleasant interactions ...

The use of nicotine pouches — small, easily concealed sachets of nicotine and additives that are placed between the gum and lip — nearly doubled among U.S. high school students between 2023 and 2024, according to a new USC study. The research, involving surveys of more than 10,000 teens from around the country, appears in JAMA Network Open. “This growing public health issue needs more attention. Like flavored e-cigarettes when they first emerged, use of this new oral nicotine product is becoming more widespread, particularly among adolescents,” said ...

Increasing urban vegetation by 30% could save over one-third of all heat related deaths, saving up to 1.16 million lives globally from 2000 to 2019 according to a 20-year modelling study of the impact of increasing greenness in more than 11,000 urban areas. The study, led by Monash University Professor Yuming Guo and published in The Lancet Planetary Health, showed that increasing vegetation levels by 10%, 20%, and 30% would: decrease the global population-weighted warm-season mean temperature by 0.08°C, 0.14°C, ...

Researchers from the University of California San Diego have found that Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE) can help rewire the brain’s response to natural healthy pleasure, leading to improved mood, greater attention to positive experiences and reduced opioid cravings. The findings, published on April 30, 2025 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), suggest that this evidence-based therapy may be a promising tool in the fight against opioid use disorder (OUD). Opioid ...

Aluminium alloys are well-known for their low weight and corrosion resistance, making them ideal candidates for applications in a low-carbon economy - from lightweight automobiles to tanks for storing green hydrogen. However, their widespread application is limited by a key challenge: they suffer from embrittlement leading to cracking and failure when exposed to hydrogen. Till now, alloys resistant to hydrogen embrittlement were rather soft, limiting their application in hydrogen-related technologies that require high strength. Now, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials (MPI-SusMat) ...

Geologists led by the University of Maryland and the University of Hawaiʻi finally connected the dots between one of the largest volcanic eruptions in Earth’s history and its source deep beneath the Pacific Ocean.  In a paper published in the journal Nature on March XX, 2025, the team revealed that the same underwater hotspot created both a chain of underwater volcanoes in the southern Pacific region and the massive Ontong-Java Plateau, the largest volcanic platform on Earth. “Up until now, we’ve had this extremely disconnected picture of the Pacific and its volcanoes,” said the study’s corresponding author ...

A new study led by researchers at Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) suggests that currently available therapies may help control chronic muscle inflammation in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), a severe condition that leads to muscle weakness and premature death. The study, published in PNAS, identifies new mechanisms that drive chronic muscle inflammation in a disease model of a DMD. Researchers believe that targeting these mechanisms with existing therapies could help reduce inflammation and support muscle function. DMD is caused by a mutation in the dystrophin gene, which produces a large protein essential for stabilizing muscle cell membranes ...

SAN DIEGO (April 30, 2025) — Many are aware of the dire challenges with plastic waste polluting the ocean, but new research shows it may harm wildlife in ways not previously understood. In a new study just published in the journal Environmental Pollution, researchers from the University of California, Santa Cruz and San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance found that plastic swallowed by northern fulmars— seabirds found in the North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans—can leak chemicals that interfere with the birds’ hormone systems. This ...

As the global population ages, supporting older adults in maintaining their cognitive and memory functions has become a pressing concern. The United Nations estimates that by the 2070s, there will be over 2.2 billion people aged 65 or older, surpassing the global number of children under 18. This demographic shift is especially pronounced in Japan, the fastest-aging country, where 28.7% of the population is 65 or older. One promising strategy to counter cognitive decline is through olfactory stimulation—engaging the sense of smell. Smell signals travel directly to brain regions involved ...

Editorial To Improve Screenings With Technology, Focus on People First Background: This issue of Annals of Family Medicine includes four original studies that illustrate valuable concepts to consider when incorporating technology in screening to improve early detection and management of disease.   Editorial Stance: These studies highlight the importance of centering any digital health intervention on the patient’s specific clinical needs. The authors emphasize that digital tools work best when they work with, rather than replace, ...

Original Research Implementing a Digital Cognitive Screening Tool and Flexible Workflow Helps Primary Care Clinics Integrate Dementia Screening Background and Goal: A previous study across seven primary care clinics found that many older adults who completed a digital cognitive assessment showed possible signs of cognitive impairment. In this companion study, researchers assessed how agile implementation, an approach based on iterative improvements and tailored clinic workflows, could support the integration of digital cognitive assessment screening ...

Original Research Digital Cognitive Assessment in Primary Care May Enable Early Dementia Detection and Next Step Care Background and Goal: Many adults aged 65 and older never receive a cognitive check during regular primary care visits. This study assessed the feasibility and acceptability of implementing a digital cognitive assessment for Alzheimer disease and related dementias (ADRD) screening into primary care.  Study Approach: From June 2022 to May 2023, seven Indiana University Health clinics offered the five-minute Digital Clock & Recall test on an iPad to every patient 65 and older. Each ...