Good news, everyone!

Johns Hopkins scientists say they have used 3D imaging, special microscopes and artificial intelligence (AI) programs to construct new maps of mouse brains showing a precise location of more than 10 million cells called oligodendrocytes. These cells form myelin, a protective sleeve around nerve cell axons, which speeds transmission of electrical signals and support brain health.

When we hear certain sounds, our brains often pair them with specific shapes. For example, most people will associate a sharp-sounding word with a jagged, pointed shape, while a soft, rolling word is linked to something smooth and curved. This fascinating phenomenon is known as the bouba-kiki effect.

Should we do couples counseling? Are we happy? Are we both pulling in the same direction? How can we get our spark back?

As countries strive to achieve the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, a new international study published in Nature Communications brings together 19 researchers in 13 institutions—including Jianguo "Jack" Liu, Rachel Carson Chair in Sustainability and director of Michigan State University's Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability (CSIS), former CSIS Ph.D student Zhenci Xu and two former CSIS visiting students Zhimeng Jiang and Xutong Wu—to present a comprehensive framework for understanding and managing cross-scale socioeconomic and environmental interconnections and feedback.

Just like each person has unique fingerprints, every CMOS chip has a distinctive "fingerprint" caused by tiny, random manufacturing variations. Engineers can leverage this unforgeable ID for authentication, to safeguard a device from attackers trying to steal private data.

Since the third Gaia data release in 2022, wide binary stars with separation greater than several thousand astronomical units have been intensely investigated across the world, to probe the nature of gravity in the low acceleration regime, weaker than about 1 nanometer per second squared.

Picture a star-shaped cell in the brain, stretching its spindly arms out to cradle the neurons around it. That's an astrocyte, and for a long time, scientists thought its job was caretaking the brain, gluing together neurons, and maintaining neural circuits. But now, a new study reveals that these supposed support cells that are spread all over the brain are as important as neurons in fear memory.

Researchers at the Ribeirao Preto Blood Center and the Center for Cell-Based Therapy (CTC) conducted a study using the NK-92 cell line to test new models of chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) with specific costimulatory domains, such as 2B4 and DAP12. The tests showed that these components helped make the cells "ready to attack," thereby increasing their ability to destroy tumors. The results were published in the journal Frontiers in Immunology.

An international team of scientists led by the Institute of Cosmos Sciences at the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) and the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia (IEEC) has presented REGALADE, an unprecedented catalog covering the entire sky and bringing together nearly 80 million galaxies. The work, published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, marks a turning point for astronomy and opens up a new scenario that allows researchers to explore cosmic events with a degree of precision never before achieved.

During their first six months of life, many infants get some or all of their calories from formula, but federal rules governing what goes into those bottles haven't been updated in decades.

A small but mighty piece of lab equipment, about the size of a cellphone, has arrived at the International Space Station after launching with NASA's SpaceX Crew-12 mission. NASA aims to use the off-the-shelf device, called a microplate reader, to conduct vital biological research in space and get real-time access to data.

Ribonucleotide reductases (RNR) are indispensable enzymes that convert ribonucleotides to deoxyribonucleotides (dNTPs), the precursors to make up DNA. Because DNA synthesis is fundamental to cell survival, RNR activity must be tightly controlled. In bacteria, this control is exerted by a specialized transcriptional regulator, NrdR, which has no equivalent in eukaryotic organisms and therefore represents a potential selective target for antimicrobial development. Despite its central role, the structural basis of NrdR's function and the mechanisms by which it senses cellular nucleotide levels and modulates RNR expression have remained only partially understood.

Attending a historically Black college or university (HBCU) can be linked to better cognitive performance decades later among Black adults, according to a study coauthored by Min Hee Kim, an assistant professor at Rutgers School of Nursing. The findings, published in JAMA Network Open, examine how institutional and social conditions shape cognitive aging and Alzheimer's disease and related dementias. Researchers believe this is the first national cohort study with a large sample of Black adults to examine how attendance at HBCUs versus predominantly white institutions relates to cognition later in life. The study sample included 1,978 Black older adults, of whom 699 (35%) attended an HBCU.

With a new mathematical model, a team of biophysicists has revealed fresh insights into how biological tissues are shaped by the active motion of structural imperfections known as "topological defects." Published in Physical Review Letters, the results build on our latest understanding of tissue formation and could even help resolve long-standing experimental mysteries surrounding our own organs.

For the first time, researchers show that tirzepatide—the active ingredient in the diabetes and weight-loss drug Mounjaro—reduces alcohol intake as well as relapse-like behaviors in rats and mice. The findings are considered relevant in the search for new treatments for alcohol use disorder. Researchers at the University of Gothenburg have previously demonstrated that semaglutide, found in the diabetes and weight-loss drugs Ozempic and Wegovy, reduces alcohol consumption in rats. In the current study, published in the journal eBioMedicine, the focus shifts to tirzepatide and Mounjaro.

Origami, the traditional Japanese art of paper folding, has received considerable attention in engineering. By applying paper-folding principles, researchers have created compact structures that are flexible, lightweight, and reconfigurable across aerospace, medicine, and robotics.

An analysis of approximately 1,604 studies from over three decades proves that delirium is a clinically highly relevant but scientifically often neglected complication in cardiology, and prevention can reduce the incidence of delirium by up to 40%. The review, led by the University Hospital Bonn (UKB), has now been published in the European Heart Journal and provides systematic prevention strategies and innovative treatment recommendations.

A new study provides hope that smarter timing of cancer treatments could improve cure rates. The study's Principal Investigator, Dr. Robert Noble, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Mathematics, City, St George's, University of London, sought to tackle a major problem in cancer care. The work is published in the journal Genetics.

When 200 natural accessions of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana grown in a nitrate-enriched medium were compared, one observation stood out: some accessions formed significantly longer lateral roots than others. Genetic analysis revealed a difference in a gene called MEKK14.

Human beings are social animals; they need places to relax, connect with others, and feel a sense of belonging beyond the demands of home and work. Traditionally, these "third places" are thought to be limited to cafes, clubs, gardens, and other neighborhood community spots. However, with an increase in digitally shaped life schedules, a new question arises: Do online spaces offer the same social values as offline ones?

Life doesn't arrive in neat chapters. It flows, one conversation bleeding into the next, one thought quietly reshaping the one that follows. Yet our brains do something remarkable: they preserve a sense of continuity while also breaking experience into meaningful events. How this balance works has long puzzled cognitive scientists.

Green hydrogen production technology, which utilizes renewable energy to produce eco-friendly hydrogen without carbon emissions, is gaining attention as a core technology for addressing global warming. Green hydrogen is produced through electrolysis, a process that separates hydrogen and oxygen by applying electrical energy to water, requiring low-cost, high-efficiency, high-performance catalysts.

Preschool-age children are most engaged in pretend play 10–15 minutes after playing begins. In addition, girls exhibit higher organizational skills, according to a study conducted by researchers from SWPS University and Istanbul University. The paper "The Dynamics of Pretend Play: Exploring Organization, Elaboration, and Imagination in Early Childhood" was published in the journal Early Education and Development by psychologists Natalia Józefacka, Ph.D., from the Institute of Psychology at SWPS University and Beyza Hamamcı, Ph.D., from Istanbul University. The publication is part of a larger study on how self-regulation develops in children and how young children, depending on their age and gender, are able to adapt to the demands of their environment.

A team of EPFL researchers has developed an AI algorithm that can model complex dynamical processes while taking into account the laws of physics—using Newton's third law. Their research is published in the journal Nature Communications.

A research team led by scientists at Queen Mary University of London and University College London (UCL) has found new clues about how the brains of people with Down syndrome develop differently from a very early age. The study, published in Nature Communications, shows that brain cells with an extra copy of a chromosome (trisomy 21)—the genetic cause of Down syndrome—have difficulty forming strong, well-coordinated connections with one another.

Every year, billions of birds undertake extraordinary migrations, crossing vast deserts and open seas with no place to stop, feed, or rest. A new international study published in iScience by a consortium of researchers from Tour du Valat, CEFE/CNRS, Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle and Swiss Ornithological Institute reveals that small migratory birds adjust how high they fly over these ecological barriers, and that their strategies depend on wing morphology and plumage color.

Scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) have identified the true source of a magnetic effect seen in the material ruthenium dioxide (RuO₂), helping resolve an active debate in the rapidly growing field of altermagnetism. The study is published in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

Northwestern Medicine scientists have discovered a potent immunotherapy approach for treating meningiomas, the most common type of primary brain tumor, according to a study published in Nature Communications.

Researchers have long been puzzled by the observed cooling of the eastern tropical Pacific and the Southern Ocean accompanying global warming. Existing climate models have failed to capture this pattern. At the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, researchers have come a significant step closer to the answer: Using a new generation of more physical climate models, they have demonstrated the first successful representation of the observed trend in a climate simulation and have delivered an explanation of the underlying mechanisms.

A protein called neurofilament light chain (NfL)—studied in humans in the context of neurodegenerative diseases and aging—is also detectable in the blood of numerous animals, and NfL levels increase with age in mice, cats, dogs and horses. Experts from the DZNE and the Hertie Institute for Clinical Brain Research (HIH) at the University of Tübingen report these findings in PLOS Biology. In their view, this biomarker could help to assess the biological age of animals and estimate their life expectancy.

New kinds of aircraft taking to the skies could mean unfamiliar sounds overhead—and where you're hearing them might matter, according to new NASA research. NASA aeronautics has worked for years to enable new air transportation options for people and goods, and to find ways to make sure they can be safely and effectively integrated into U.S. communities. That's why the agency continues to study how people respond to aircraft noise.

Acinetobacter baumannii is a bacteria which can become a virulent killer in health-care settings among severely ill patients. The germ has rapidly developed drug resistance to even last-line carbapenem drugs. Now a group of Hackensack Meridian Center for Discovery and Innovation (CDI) scientists have found a way to understand how the germ is evolving—and how best to strategize a fight against it.

When household batteries die, it's hard to know what to do with them. So they get shoved into a junk drawer or sheepishly thrown into the trash.

NASA aims to send astronauts to the moon in March after acing the latest rocket fueling test.

For many people diagnosed with cancer, treatment with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) has dramatically extended lives. Some of these treatments, such as Keytruda and Opdivo, have become familiar brand names. However, for some patients, ICI cancer treatment can also prompt the immune system to attack heart tissue—a potentially lethal side effect.

Many insects rely on heritable bacterial endosymbionts for essential nutrients that they cannot get through their diet. A new study, published in Nature Communications, indicates that the genomes of these symbiotic bacteria often shrink over time. Some of these bacteria, which live inside certain insect cells, have lost so many genes that they have broken the record for the tiniest genome ever found—almost blurring the lines between organelle and bacteria.

Lunar dust remains one of the biggest challenges for a long-term human presence on the moon. Its jagged, clingy nature makes it naturally stick to everything from solar panels to the inside of human lungs. And while we have some methods of dealing with it, there is still plenty of experimentation to do here on Earth before we use any such system in the lunar environment. A new paper published in Acta Astronautica from Francesco Pacelli and Alvaro Romero-Calvo of Georgia Tech and their co-authors describes two types of flexible Electrodynamic Dust Shields (EDSs) that could one day be used in such an environment.

Researchers at the University of Maryland and Tilburg University in the Netherlands have produced an AI-driven innovation to reshape how marketers place digital ads. AdGazer, a predictive tool, evaluates both an advertisement and the media environment around it to forecast how much attention viewers will give. The result, they say, is smarter, more effective ad placement.

When the economy grows or shrinks, we often focus on how long the phase lasts or how deep it goes. A new paper asks a sharper question: How does actual growth compare with steady, quarter-by-quarter growth over the same period? The authors, Viv Hall (Victoria University of Wellington), John McDermott (Motu Research) and Peter Thomson (Statistics Research Associates), develop three new measures that track the shape of each business cycle phase.

EU researchers are developing AI-guided robot fleets to take over the dangerous, dirty work of finding and removing marine litter from the sea floor. A ship with a crane floats in the Mediterranean sun at a marina in Marseille, France. The crane whirs as it hauls waste from the seabed and, when the wire breaks the surface, the gripper at the end is clutching a rubber tire covered in algae.

Like many scientists, theoretical physicist Andrew Strominger was unimpressed with early attempts at probing ChatGPT, receiving clever-sounding answers that didn't stand up to scrutiny. So he was skeptical when a talented former graduate student paused a promising academic career to take a job with OpenAI. Strominger told him physics needed him more than Silicon Valley.

Actinides are a group of heavy, radioactive elements that include uranium, plutonium, americium, curium, berkelium and californium. Understanding how these elements bond with other atoms (known as coordination chemistry), how they behave in water and how they can be separated from one another is crucial for safer nuclear waste management, new reactor technologies and advanced materials.

A University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa student-led team has developed a new algorithm to help scientists determine direction in complex two-dimensional (2D) data, with potential applications ranging from particle physics to machine learning. The research was published in AIP Advances.

A large, long-term study following nearly 1 million adults across the United States and Europe has found that dietary patterns associated with lower inflammation and steadier insulin levels are linked to a reduced risk of colorectal cancer. The findings, published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, add to growing evidence that what people eat, and how they eat, can meaningfully influence colon and rectal cancer risk.

While the statement, "Humanoid robots are coming," might cause anxiety for some, for one Georgia Tech research team, working with humanlike robots couldn't be more exciting. The researchers have developed a new "thinking" technology for two-legged robots, increasing their balance and agility.

People often remark that allergies run in their family, but the genetic causes have remained unclear. Previous food allergy genetic research has relied upon broad but surface-level methods called genome-wide association studies.

Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are among the most common bacterial infections, with catheter-associated UTIs accounting for more than half of infections contracted in hospitals. When detected early and accurately, UTIs are treatable. Current diagnostic methods can be slow or inaccurate, creating a need for improved methods.

One night in 2010, Mohit Gupta decided to try something before leaving the lab. Then a Ph.D. student at Carnegie Mellon University, Gupta was in the final days of an internship at a manufacturing company in Boston. He'd spent months developing a system that used cameras and light sources to create 3D images of small objects. "I wanted to stress test it, just for fun," said Gupta, who would begin his postdoctoral research at Columbia Engineering a few months later.

Nvidia is on the cusp of investing $30 billion in OpenAI, scaling back a plan to pump $100 billion into the ChatGPT maker, the Financial Times reported Thursday.

Fledgling Indian artificial intelligence companies showcased homegrown technologies this week at a major summit in New Delhi, underpinning big dreams of becoming a global AI power.

A UN panel on artificial intelligence will work towards "science-led governance," the global body's chief said on Friday as leaders at a New Delhi summit weighed their message on the future of the booming technology.

Stanford d.school's Jeremy Utley wants people to stop using AI. Instead, he wants them to work with it. "If you're 'using' AI, I know you're misusing it," said Utley, an adjunct professor at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (aka the "d.school"). Utley argues that people fall into two categories when it comes to AI: underperformers who treat it like a tool and outperformers who treat it like a teammate.

Alphabet Inc.'s Google and Apple Inc. are adding music-focused generative artificial intelligence features to their core consumer apps, underscoring how advanced AI tools are moving into mainstream use.

RMIT University researchers have developed a flexible nylon-film device that generates electricity from compression and keeps working even after being run over by a car multiple times, opening the door to self-powered sensors on our roads and other electronic devices. The paper is published in the journal Nature Communications.

An international research team has demonstrated how conventional radiative cooling coatings can be optimized to further reduce building surface temperatures, cutting energy consumption, while also improving fire safety.

Flexible electronics are often sold on a simple promise: bendable screens, lightweight solar cells or wearable devices that can bend and flex without breaking. But what does that "flexibility" actually look like at the molecular scale, and how does it affect performance? Researchers led by the University of Cambridge say they have taken a first step towards answering this question. Using ultra-sensitive atomic force microscopy—which analyzes materials by "feeling" them—the researchers were able to measure how stiff flexible semiconductor molecules are when packed together, down to the scale of just a few molecules.

Researchers at Columbia Engineering have developed a new gel electrolyte that both improves the lifetime and safety of anode-free lithium batteries, an emerging battery architecture that could dramatically boost energy density while simplifying manufacturing. Although such a design promises higher energy density and lower cost, the approach has long been plagued by short battery life and safety concerns caused by unstable lithium plating and parasitic reactions at the electrode-electrolyte interface.

It happens every day—a motorist heading across town checks a navigation app to see how long the trip will take, but they find no parking spots available when they reach their destination. By the time they finally park and walk to their destination, they're significantly later than they expected to be.