Category: 4. Health

In the wake of broadly available AI tools, most technical and natural sciences fields are advancing rapidly. This is particularly true in biotechnology, where AI models power breakthroughs in drug discovery, precision…

That’s the takeaway from new research from a team of scientists, including researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder. The findings suggests that long-term exposure to Martian dust could create a host of health problems for future astronauts — leading to chronic respiratory problems, thyroid disease and more.

The study, published in the journal GeoHealth, is the first to take a comprehensive look at the chemical ingredients that make up Martian…

As warehouses go, nuclei are more like libraries than bank vaults. Too many cellular components need access to the genome to lock it down like Fort Knox. Instead, large groupings of more than 1,000 individual protein molecules called nuclear pore complexes (NPCs) pepper the dividing membrane, serving as gateways for materials and messages entering and exiting the…

“The idea has traditionally been that severe trauma causes stress to patients’ bodies, and we want to deliver as much oxygen as possible to the brain and to vital organs because they are losing blood,” says…

Results show that individuals with lower proportions of time spent in slow wave sleep and rapid eye movement sleep had smaller volumes in critical brain regions, particularly the inferior parietal region, which is known to undergo early structural changes in Alzheimer’s disease. The results were adjusted for…

Created by Washington State University researchers, the machine learning model analyzes host characteristics and virus genetics to identify potential animal reservoirs and geographic areas where new outbreaks are more likely to occur. The model focuses on orthopoxviruses — which includes the viruses that cause…

Mutations in the PTEN gene usually result in the overactivation of PI3K and the imbalance of the…

In an ironic twist, the agency charged with fighting the kind of medical misdiagnosis that had Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on the brink of unnecessary brain surgery is set to be eliminated in the reorganization plan Kennedy announced for the department he heads.

The Agency for…

Americans are increasingly waiting weeks or even months to get an appointment to see a health care specialist.

This delay comes at a time when the population of aging adults is rising dramatically. By 2050, the number of adults over 85 is expected to triple, which will intensify the strain on an already stretched health care system. We wrote about this worsening challenge and its implications for the health care workforce in a January 2025 report in the New England Journal of…

On March 27, 2025, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. announced plans to dramatically transform the department. HHS is the umbrella agency responsible for pandemic preparedness, biomedical research, food safety and many other health-related activities.

In a video posted that afternoon, Kennedy said the cuts and reorganization to HHS aim to “streamline our agency” and “radically improve our quality of service” by eliminating rampant waste…