Today's Science Pulse
Hidden Star Clusters Discovered Deep Inside Nearby Galaxies
A UK‑led study using VLA and ALMA data uncovered previously hidden giant star clusters deep within nearby galaxies, describing them as “ring factories.” The findings highlight how young stellar activity shapes galactic evolution across the universe.
Also developing:
By the numbers: Foundation Alloy raises $22M Series A
Engaging with the Arts Linked to Slower Aging at the Biological Level
University College London researchers found that regular engagement in arts—reading, music, museum visits—correlates with a slower biological aging pace. Analyzing data from 3,556 UK adults using seven epigenetic clocks, participants who engaged in arts at least weekly aged about 4% more slowly, a benefit comparable to weekly exercise. The effect was strongest among those aged 40 and older and persisted after controlling for BMI, smoking, education, and income. Diverse and frequent arts activities were linked to lower scores on the DunedinPACE and PhenoAge clocks, indicating younger biological age.
New Research May Lead to Hearing Aids with the Ability to Select One Voice Among Many
Researchers at Columbia University have demonstrated a brain‑controlled hearing‑aid prototype that uses auditory‑cortex signals to isolate a single speaker in a noisy environment. By monitoring neural activity, the system automatically amplifies the desired voice while suppressing others, improving comprehension and...
Arts and Cultural Engagement ‘Linked to Slower Pace of Biological Ageing’
University College London researchers have found that regular engagement with the arts—whether creating music or visual art, or simply visiting galleries and museums—slows the biological aging process. The study, which examined epigenetic markers in a large UK cohort, showed that...
Testosterone Treatment Found to Improve Sexual and Physical Function for Men After Prostate Cancer Surgery
A randomized SPIRIT trial led by Shalender Bhasin showed that three months of testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) markedly improved sexual activity, desire, physical function, and aerobic performance in men who had undergone radical prostatectomy. The study enrolled 136 men with...
How Underwater Speakers Are Helping Revive Coral Reefs Devastated by Climate Change
Scientists in Jamaica are deploying underwater speakers that emit recordings of thriving reefs for 14 hours daily, powered by solar‑float buoys. The initiative, led by Italian artist Marco Barotti, pairs the soundscape with 3‑D‑printed coral sculptures that serve as settlement...
The BioPharm Brief: Precision Medicine Expansion Accelerates Autoimmune and Targeted Oncology Development
The FDA broadened Vyvgart’s label to cover all adult patients with generalized myasthenia gravis, removing the previous antibody‑status restriction. Zai Lab received fast‑track designation for its DLL3‑targeting antibody‑drug conjugate aimed at extrapulmonary neuroendocrine carcinomas, a disease with limited options. The...
These Small Ants Act Like Cleaner Fish
Biologist Mark Moffett documented the first known cleaning mutualism between desert harvester ants (Pogonomyrmex barbatus) and much smaller cone ants. The larger ants pause at their nest entrance while the cone ants crawl over them, licking and nipping for 15...
What We Know About Hypoxic Conditioning for High-Altitude Climbing
Uphill Athlete has shifted from skepticism to offering a coached hypoxic conditioning program that tailors altitude exposure, timing, and monitoring to each climber. The new approach combines normobaric sleeping tents and intermittent hypoxic training, with daily SpO2, heart‑rate and recovery...
Measure Biology, Not Trends, to Extend Longevity
Most people are trying to optimize their health without ever measuring what actually matters. The reality is: aging is a biological process you can track (and in many cases, influence) when you know what to look for. Longevity isn’t built on trends....
NCSA and CAPS Highlight HPC’s Role in Processing Next-Gen Astronomy Data
National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) and the Center for AstroPhysical Surveys (CAPS) are spearheading a computational revolution in astronomy by processing petabyte‑scale datasets from flagship surveys such as the Dark Energy Survey, Rubin Observatory’s LSST, and the new SkAI...
NASA Retaining Six-Month ISS Missions
NASA will keep a roughly six‑month crew rotation on the International Space Station, moving the SpaceX Crew‑13 launch to mid‑September and shortening Crew‑12’s stay to about seven months. The change is intended to maximize ISS utilization before its scheduled retirement...
City Birds Are More Afraid of Women than Men and Scientists Have No Idea Why
A study published in the journal People and Nature measured flight‑initiation distances of 37 urban bird species across parks in the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Poland and Spain. Researchers found that men could approach roughly three feet closer before birds...
Should You Be Worried About Hantavirus?
The Washington Post’s "Make It Make Sense" podcast examined a recent hantavirus outbreak on the Hondius cruise ship, where several cases were confirmed. Hosts Adam O'Neal, James Hohmann, Carine Hajjar and Kate Andrews debated whether the situation warrants heightened concern...
China's EAST Reactor Extends High‑Temp Plasma Run, Boosting Fusion Prospects
Chinese scientists reported that the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) sustained extremely high plasma temperatures for longer periods during recent tests, marking a critical advance toward practical fusion energy. The achievement strengthens China's standing in the global race for clean,...
Study Links Five Eggs a Week to 27% Lower Alzheimer’s Risk
Researchers from Loma Linda University analyzed data from the Adventist Health Study‑2 and found that adults who ate five or more eggs per week had a 27% lower risk of being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. The finding, published in The...
Eli Lilly’s Orforglipron Cuts Weight up to 13% and HbA1c 1.7% in Seniors, Study Shows
At the European Congress on Obesity, Eli Lilly presented a post‑hoc analysis of its oral GLP‑1 agonist orforglipron showing seniors lost up to 13% of body weight and cut HbA1c by 1.7% over 72 weeks. The findings, drawn from 616 participants...
SpaceX Will Reuse Cargo Dragon a Sixth Time on Upcoming Launch to ISS
SpaceX’s Cargo Dragon will launch its sixth mission, CRS‑34, carrying roughly 3,000 kg of scientific cargo to the International Space Station. The launch is slated for 7:16 p.m. ET Tuesday from Cape Canaveral, with a Wednesday backup if the window is scrubbed....
Taiwan Unveils 6G R&D Initiative Targeting Networks, NTN and All‑Photonics
Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs announced on May 11, 2026 a new 6G research program under its A+ Industrial Innovative R&D scheme. The initiative directs corporate R&D toward three priority areas—6G networks, non‑terrestrial networks and all‑photonics—signaling a coordinated push to...
Windward Bio Secures $165 Million to Accelerate Late‑Stage Asthma and COPD Trials
Windward Bio announced a $165 million crossover financing round led by OrbiMed, giving the Basel‑based biotech the runway to push its WIN378 antibody into Phase 3 trials for asthma and COPD. The capital injection underscores strong investor confidence in long‑acting respiratory...
Proteins Can Directly Template Sequence‑Specific DNA Synthesis
For 50+ years, molecular biology followed one golden rule: DNA ➜ RNA ➜ Protein 🧬 This new Science paper just added a shocking new twist: 🧪 Proteins can DIRECT sequence-specific DNA synthesis — without a nucleic acid template. 🤯⚡ Yes, you read that right. A...
NASA and OPM Unveil "NASA Force" To Pull Top Engineers Into Federal Space Missions
NASA and the U.S. Office of Personnel Management have launched the NASA Force website, opening applications for aerospace engineers and technologists. The initiative, part of OPM's broader US Tech Force program, aims to funnel elite technical talent into mission‑critical federal...
Jackie and Shadow’s Eaglets Can Now See Like Their Parents
Jackie and Shadow’s 2026 eaglets, Sandy and Luna, have reached the 35‑day milestone when their eyesight sharpens to near‑adult levels, allowing them to track moving objects like squirrels and airplanes. The birds use a characteristic head‑bobbing motion to calculate distance...
Virgin Galactic Starts Production Acceptance Tests on Delta‑Class Spaceplane
Virgin Galactic has begun static and fatigue trials on Delta 1, the first of its new Delta‑Class spaceplanes, after completing structural assembly in April at its Mesa, Arizona facility. The tests mark a critical phase toward the company’s long‑term commercial launch...
UNIST Unveils MXene Sensor with 3‑4× Sensitivity Boost for Swallowing Detection
Scientists at South Korea's UNIST announced a titanium carbonitride MXene sensor that delivers more than three‑fold temperature and four‑fold pressure sensitivity over prior MXene devices. The hyper‑sensory platform can distinguish swallowing, coughing and blinking, marking a major step for wearable...
USTC Unveils First 14.5‑km Bell‑Verified Quantum Repeater in Hefei
University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) researchers demonstrated a 14.5‑kilometer quantum repeater in Hefei that satisfies Bell‑nonlocality criteria, the first of its kind at city scale. The experiment, named XingHan 2.0, linked three nodes using commercial fiber and rare‑earth‑ion...
Atsena Advances XLRS and LCA1 Gene Therapies to Pivotal Phase 3 Trials
Atsena announced that its XLRS (ATSN-201) and LCA1 (ATSN-101) gene‑therapy programs are entering pivotal Phase 3 studies. The move follows 12‑month foveal schisis closure in 7 of 9 treated eyes and a sustained 20‑decibel improvement in dark‑adapted vision across 15 LCA1...
QuEra Paper Simulates Only Two Physical Qubits Are Needed Per Logical Qubit
QuEra, together with Harvard and MIT, simulated quantum error‑correcting codes that use roughly two physical qubits for each logical qubit and achieve an encoding rate above 50%. The simulations produced 580 logical qubits from 1,152 physical qubits and 1,156 logical...
First Real-Time Brain-Controlled Hearing Device
Columbia University researchers have built the first real‑time brain‑controlled hearing prototype that can isolate a single voice in a noisy setting. By decoding intracranial EEG signals, the system identifies which speaker a listener is attending to and automatically amplifies that...
Behind the Scenes of NASA's Artemis II
NASA public‑affairs specialist Madison Tuttle witnessed the Artemis II splashdown aboard the USS John P. Murtha, coordinating broadcast and relaying real‑time data to the public‑affairs team. She described the re‑entry dynamics—25,000 mph, 5,000 °F heat shield, six‑minute communications blackout—and the flawless parachute deployment that led...
AI's Cure‑finding Will Be Slow without Real‑world Data
1. Sounds like an urban legend. 2. I hope so, because AI progress in curing diseases is going to be a slow process, slowed by layers of experimentation and trials; and bottlenecked by real world data. We just don't have...
NZ Moves to Block Private Climate Lawsuits, Citing Investment Concerns
New Zealand’s government plans a law change to prevent private legal action against greenhouse gas emitters, arguing cases have created business uncertainty and deterred investment https://t.co/Bhd92C3bJ5
Decoding the Metabolic Roots of Bipolar Disorder
A new study in Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging shows that metabolic dysfunction—particularly insulin resistance and leptin dysregulation—is linked to reduced gray‑matter volume and cognitive deficits in bipolar disorder but not in major depressive disorder. Researchers evaluated 81 bipolar...
One‑point Mediterranean Diet Boost Cuts Mortality by 4%
Adherence to the Mediterranean diet and all-cause mortality: A systematic review and meta-analysis within the Italian National Guidelines “La Dieta Mediterranea” "Each 1-point MD score increase reduced mortality risk by about 4%." https://t.co/l1VEnyEb29 https://t.co/RU5hAnNG1n
Observed Warming Aligns with Climate Model Expectations
"Heating Up to Expectations" | Press release on our new @PNASNews article (via #MichaelMannBlog): https://t.co/ZCGzybvPYs
Behavioral Science Suggests that Responding Well to Education and Opportunity May Itself Be a Partly Inherited Trait — Not Just...
A new Lund University study of 880 German twins finds that the relationship between IQ at age 23 and socioeconomic status at age 27 is largely genetic. The analysis attributes 69‑98% of that link to inherited factors, while IQ itself...
2024 Temperature Record Validates Climate Model Forecasts
"2024 global temperature record is consistent with model-predicted warming" | Our new article in @PNASNews (open access): https://t.co/wozp1qu3xa
Two Decades, Twenty Papers: ETH Quantum Device Lab Milestone
20 Papers from 20 Years of the Quantum Device Lab (@qudev ) at @ETH_en #Zurich. https://t.co/HbtxwXWtcF
Jay Bhattacharya Called Test-Negative Study Design ‘Crap.’ Here’s How We Know Whether Vaccines Measured With It Are Effective
Jay Bhattacharya, acting CDC director, denounced the test‑negative design as “crap” during a Senate hearing. The method, a case‑control variant used for influenza and COVID‑19 vaccine effectiveness, compares vaccination rates among patients who test positive versus negative for the pathogen....
Testing for ‘Bad Cholesterol’ Doesn’t Tell the Whole Story
The 2026 American Heart Association and American College of Cardiology guidelines recognized apolipoprotein B (apoB) as a more precise marker of atherogenic particles than traditional LDL‑C, but they stopped short of replacing LDL testing. A JAMA modeling study of about 250,000...
Florida Beach Nourishment May Threaten Local Shark Populations ... And Us
Florida Atlantic University researchers found that beach‑nourishment projects in Palm Beach generate massive turbidity plumes, stretching nearly 10 miles offshore and persisting for weeks. Analysis of 10,000 aerial photos shows these murky conditions coincide with the winter migration of blacktip...
Unplanned Cesarean Delivery Increases Peritraumatic Stress Risk
A recent study presented at the ACOG Annual Meeting found that unscheduled cesarean deliveries raise the risk of acute peritraumatic stress more than fourfold compared with vaginal births. In a cohort of 1,146 patients, 26.6% of those undergoing an unscheduled...
Castomize Rethinks the Orthopedic Cast as a Breathable ‘4D-Printed’ Lattice Shell
Castomize, a Singapore‑based med‑tech startup, has introduced a 4D‑printed orthopedic cast that softens with heat, conforms to a patient’s limb, and hardens as it cools. The lattice shell is breathable, waterproof and can be reshaped for swelling, eliminating the need...
Gene Therapy Is Giving Blind People Their Sight Back
Gene‑editing pioneers Katherine High, Jean Bennett and Albert Maguire won a Breakthrough Prize for Luxturna, the first FDA‑approved gene therapy that restores vision to people born with Leber congenital amaurosis. More than 100 blind Americans have already received the one‑time...
Cowboy Space, Darkhive Detail Their Series B Rounds
Cowboy Space Corp., founded by Robinhood co‑founder Baiju Bhatt, closed a $275 million Series B that values the company at about $2 billion. The round, led by Index Ventures, will fund its first power‑beaming satellite and an AI‑focused data‑center module in partnership with...
Questioning CDC's Current Primer Design Standards and Tools
Jokes aside, what's the current CDC protocol for primer design? Are they using Primer3? Are they using a modern thermodynamic model? Still with that GC clamp juju? I keep hearing primer issues being brought up but thats practically solved...
How the Brain Dampens Losses to Support Mental Toughness
A new Journal of Neuroscience study reveals that psychologically resilient people tend to downplay minor losses rather than overvalue rewards. Using functional MRI, researchers observed that participants who discounted small losses showed heightened prefrontal activity when confronting those losses and...
Dame Bridget Ogilvie Obituary
Dame Bridget Ogilvie, the Australian‑born parasitologist who led the Wellcome Trust from 1991‑1998, died at 88. She transformed the charity’s modest £12 m grant budget into a £200 m portfolio and built an endowment of roughly £13‑15 bn (about $17.5 bn). Her decisive investment...
Our New Initiative to Apply Quantum Science and AI to the Life Sciences
Google Quantum AI and Google.org have launched REPLIQA, a research program that merges quantum science with artificial intelligence to tackle life‑science challenges. The initiative includes a $10 million grant to support projects at Harvard, MIT, UCSD, UCSB and the University of...