First Surrogate Endpoint in Osteoporosis Clinical Trials with FNIH’s Dr. Tania Kamphaus — Episode 247
On December 2025 the FDA officially qualified dual‑energy X‑ray absorptiometry (DXA) bone density scans as the first surrogate endpoint for fracture outcomes in osteoporosis trials involving post‑menopausal women. The qualification, achieved through a request from the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health’s Biomarkers Consortium, allows sponsors to demonstrate efficacy by measuring changes in bone mineral density rather than waiting for fracture events. Dr. Tania Kamphaus, associate VP of Science Partnerships at FNIH, discussed the science and regulatory pathway on the Xtalks Life Science Podcast. The move is expected to accelerate drug development and lower costs for new anti‑osteoporosis therapies.
![Why Early Detection Matters: Transforming Lung Cancer Care [PODCAST]](/cdn-cgi/image/width=1200,quality=75,format=auto,fit=cover/https://kevinmd.com/wp-content/uploads/unnamed-2-7.jpg)
Why Early Detection Matters: Transforming Lung Cancer Care [PODCAST]
Early detection of lung cancer, especially through low‑dose CT screening, can cut mortality by 20% and prevent one death per 320 screened. Yet only 18% of eligible U.S. patients undergo screening, due to awareness and access barriers. Eli Lilly’s senior oncology...
The Most Important Unanswered Question of the Pandemic
The author invites a high‑stakes debate on whether COVID‑19 vaccines produced a net mortality benefit, demanding analysis of all‑cause mortality data from mid‑2021 to the end of 2022. Participants must rely on up to three official government datasets and five...
A Common Habit May Give Babies an Early Developmental Edge
A large Japanese birth cohort of 38,219 mother‑child pairs found that mothers who were physically active before and during pregnancy had infants who scored higher on early developmental screenings, especially in gross motor, fine motor, and problem‑solving domains between six...
Space Dolphins, Virginia Woolf, and More
Robert Trivers, a leading evolutionary psychologist, died this week, prompting reflections on his provocative personality and scholarly impact. The post also raises a speculative astrobiology question about the existence of “space dolphins” beyond Alpha Centauri. It revisits Virginia Woolf’s early‑century feminist...
Fauna Bio Announces Target Designation Milestone in Obesity Discovery Collaboration
Fauna Bio announced that its Convergence™ AI platform has achieved a target designation milestone in its obesity discovery partnership with Eli Lilly, triggering a contractual payment. The designated target stems from comparative genomics of over 450 mammal species, especially hibernators,...
The Disease That Looks Different Every Time
Multiple sclerosis (MS) impacts roughly 2.9 million people worldwide, with about one‑million cases in the United States. The disease presents in three clinical patterns—relapsing‑remitting, primary progressive, and secondary progressive—making each patient’s experience unique. Updated 2024 McDonald diagnostic criteria now allow earlier...
Modern Medicine Has Dementia and Is Impotent Against Neurological Diseases
The essay argues that modern medicine, despite advanced technology, remains largely ineffective against neurodegenerative diseases such as dementia, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. It highlights a soaring prevalence—Alzheimer’s projected to affect over 150 million people worldwide by mid‑century—and a 55 percent rise in U.S....
The Memory Circuit: How Your Brain Stores Your Entire Life
Human memory operates through distributed neural networks rather than a single storage file. Neuroscientists define memory traces as engrams—strengthened synaptic patterns that enable reconstruction of experiences. The hippocampus plays a central role by binding visual, auditory, spatial, and emotional inputs...
Neutrophils Exhibit Senescence-Like Behavior in Older Individuals
Researchers discovered that neutrophils from older individuals adopt a senescence‑like phenotype, marked by elevated SASP factors and reduced antimicrobial metabolism. RNA‑seq of lung neutrophils after Streptococcus pneumoniae infection revealed diminished glycolysis and ROS production, impairing bacterial clearance. Aged neutrophils also...
A Model of the Evolution of Aging that Accounts for Immortal Species
Researchers propose a new evolutionary model of aging that incorporates continuous gene effects on mortality, allowing for a runaway feedback loop that can produce immortal or negligibly senescent species. The model expands Hamilton’s classic framework by integrating external mortality, internal...
CANCER RESEARCH - TOCOTRIENOLS - 2025 Review - Therapeutic Potential of Tocotrienols as Chemosensitizers in Cancer Therapy (Why They Are...
The 2025 review examines tocotrienols, a subset of vitamin E, as chemosensitizers that boost the effectiveness of conventional cancer drugs. Pre‑clinical studies show that combining tocotrienols with antiparasitic agents such as fenbendazole or mebendazole markedly increases tumor cell death. The analysis...
Xanadu Introduces Quantum Algorithm for Battery Materials Simulation and Analysis
Xanadu Quantum Technologies, together with the University of Toronto and the National Research Council of Canada, unveiled a fault‑tolerant quantum algorithm that simulates resonant inelastic X‑ray scattering (RIXS) for lithium‑rich cathode materials. The pre‑print demonstrates that the method can model...
Formalization of QFT?
A new arXiv paper claims to formalize a free scalar quantum field theory in Lean/Mathlib by constructing a Euclidean measure that satisfies the Glimm‑Jaffe Osterwalder‑Schrader axioms. The work reproduces the classic proof that the two‑point Schwinger function yields a measure...
SEEQC Reports 1st Quantum Computer with Integrated Qubit Control on a Chip at Millikelvin Temperatures
SEEQC announced the first full‑stack quantum computer that integrates superconducting digital control circuitry directly on a chip operating at 10 millikelvin. The five‑qubit processor, paired with a separate SFQ control chip, achieved single‑qubit gate fidelities above 99.5% and demonstrated nanowatt‑scale power...
Challenging a 300-Year-Old Law of Friction
Researchers at the University of Konstanz demonstrated a new type of sliding friction that arises without mechanical contact, driven solely by collective magnetic dynamics. By varying the separation between two magnetic layers, they showed friction peaks at intermediate distances where...
How Young Galaxies Grew Magnetic Fields Faster than Expected
A study in Physical Review Letters proposes that turbulence generated by the gravitational collapse of plasma clouds can dramatically speed up the growth of large‑scale magnetic fields in nascent galaxies. The authors show that the collapse raises eddy turnover rates,...
Sound Waves Could Be Used to Remotely Reprogram Material Stiffness
Researchers at UC San Diego, University of Michigan and CNRS have demonstrated that targeted acoustic frequencies can deterministically shift mechanical kinks in a topological metamaterial, instantly reconfiguring its stiffness profile. In a life‑sized chain of rotating disks, short sound pulses...
Machine Learning Maps Nanodiamond Nanofluid Performance on Wavy Surfaces
Researchers at Harbin Institute of Technology used a hybrid numerical‑simulation and neural‑network framework to map how nanodiamond aggregation, magnetic field strength, and surface waviness affect convective heat transfer. Aggregated nanodiamond particles lifted the Nusselt number by up to 30 % but...
AI in Science
The paper by Agrawal, McHale and Oettl frames artificial intelligence as an augmentation tool that expands scientists' ability to search combinatorial spaces, rather than fully automating research. By dissecting the knowledge‑production process into stages, the authors reveal a “jagged frontier”...
Laser Process Creates Silicon-Graphene Battery Anodes that Barely Lose Charge
Researchers at Tel Aviv University have unveiled a single‑step laser technique that fabricates prelithiated silicon‑graphene anodes under ambient conditions. The process embeds lithium directly into silicon nanoparticles within a graphene matrix, eliminating binders, conductive additives, and multi‑step chemistries. Resulting electrodes...
Emails Find Virologists Plotting Against Me for BMJ Investigation, That’s Fine
In summer 2021 the author published a BMJ investigation alleging that leading science journalists had embraced a virologist‑led narrative dismissing a lab‑origin theory for COVID‑19. New email disclosures from the nonprofit U.S. Right to Know reveal NIH officials and the...
Autophagy as a Double Edged Sword in Aging
Recent research frames autophagy as a double‑edged sword in aging, proposing a threshold model where modest autophagic flux preserves mitochondrial health and blocks senescence, while excessive autophagy sustains the metabolic needs of established senescent cells. Above the damage threshold, autophagy...
The Polyvagal Theory Is Dead - and HRV Isn't a Simple Indicator of Arousal
The polyvagal theory, once a cornerstone of trauma‑informed therapy, has been declared untenable by a 38‑author neurophysiological review published in Clinical Neuropsychiatry. The paper dismantles the theory's core claims about vagal anatomy, respiratory sinus arrhythmia, and evolutionary hierarchy, arguing they...
APS March Meeting 2026, Day 2
Day two of the APS March Meeting showcased cutting‑edge research across condensed‑matter physics and quantum technologies. Edoardo Baldini reported a Berezinskii–Kosterlitz–Thouless transition in monolayer NiPS3, confirming 2D XY magnetism via second‑harmonic generation microscopy. Barry Zink demonstrated how a chromium spin...
When Rocks & Water Give Birth to Life: The Science of Continuous Emergence
The blog revisits Morley Martin’s 1934 microscope experiments that appeared to coax vertebrate‑like forms from Precambrian, azoic rock, linking them with Trevor James Constable’s aether‑engineering to argue that life’s origin is a continuous Earth‑driven process. By emphasizing mineral‑water interactions, it...
The Luminous Migrants: The Blond, Blue-Eyed Peoples Who Transformed the Chalcolithic Levant
Archaeologists uncovered over 600 skeletons in Israel’s Peki’in Cave, the largest Chalcolithic burial complex in the Levant. Ancient DNA analysis of 22 individuals revealed that nearly half carried genetic markers for blue eyes, blond hair, and fair skin—traits rare in...
Clean Wastewater of Stubborn Antibiotics with Hybrid Nanocomposite
Researchers at National Taiwan University have unveiled a hybrid nanocomposite that merges graphene oxide, biochar, and titanium dioxide to tackle antibiotic residues in wastewater. The material leverages both adsorption and UV‑activated photocatalysis, achieving over 95% removal of veterinary antibiotics such...
Hybrid Quantum Computing Boosts Atom Simulations
Jihyeon Park and colleagues introduced CANOE, a Classically Assisted Non‑Orthogonal Eigensolver that distributes the computational load between quantum and classical hardware. By combining a few highly entangled quantum basis states with a large pool of classical determinants, the method reaches...
Quantum Design Oxford Collaborates to Improve Access to 20-30 Tesla Magnetic Fields
Quantum Design Oxford and the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory have announced a strategic partnership to co‑develop superconducting magnets that reach 20‑30 Tesla. The collaboration leverages MagLab’s Bi‑2212 high‑temperature superconductor wire and a high‑pressure reaction technique with Quantum Design Oxford’s commercial...
Aging Salty Ice
When ice forms in salty water it initially creates a mushy, porous matrix as brine becomes trapped between crystal lattices. Over roughly sixteen days, the denser brine convects downward, expelling itself and leaving a thinner yet more solid ice layer...
Luana’s Revealing Class Survey of the Biological Definition of Sex
Evolution professor Luana Maroja surveyed her undergraduate class on how many biological sexes exist in animals and plants. The majority (44%) chose four sexes—males, females, intersexes, and hermaphrodites—while only 21% correctly identified the binary gamete‑based definition. The results highlight persistent...
Planned Cities Optimise Quantum Algorithms More Reliably Than Organic Layouts
Researchers led by Abdul Sami Rao examined street networks from Islamabad and Lyari, showing that planned grid topologies dramatically improve the Approximate Optimisation Algorithm (QAOA) at shallow depth p=1. Islamabad’s layout achieved 95% reliable convergence on the minimum vertex cover...
Blood Test Detects Brain Tumours with 90% Accuracy
Scientists at the University of Manchester have developed a blood test that detects brain tumours with 90% accuracy by measuring a pair of proteins. The test, validated in glioblastoma patients, is being evaluated in a multi‑site clinical trial across six...
The DOE’s “Climate Working Group”
The Department of Energy’s Climate Working Group, created to review climate risk, secretly crafted a strategy to downplay carbon‑dioxide impacts and undermine mainstream climate science. Internal memos show the group planned to amplify uncertainties and shape a denial narrative. After...
Evidence for Microglia to Actively Promote Amyloid Aggregation in the Aging Brain
Researchers have discovered that microglia, the brain’s innate immune cells, can actively remodel soluble amyloid‑β (Aβ42) into extracellular fibrils with strong seeding activity, contrary to the prevailing view that they only clear plaques. Cell‑based assays showed that microglia‑generated amyloid closely...
Exercise Modifies the Gut Microbiome and Tryptophan Metabolism to Improve Mood and Memory
Regular exercise reshapes the gut microbiome in adult male rats, notably reducing the abundance of Alistipes and Clostridium species. These microbial shifts enhance systemic tryptophan metabolism, increasing the serotonin catabolite 5‑hydroxytryptol and altering indole derivatives. Concurrently, hippocampal expression of the...
SLS Prints Programmable Bonded Magnets
Researchers at Auckland University of Technology have demonstrated a field‑assisted selective laser sintering (SLS) process that prints polymer‑bonded magnets with locally programmable pole patterns. By integrating under‑bed electromagnets and a powder‑handling bar, they can deposit different magnetic powders point‑wise and...
APS March Meeting 2026, Day 1
The APS March Meeting Day 1 showcased cutting‑edge research on quantum excitations and emergent materials. Highlights included Hanyu Zhu’s demonstration of chiral phonons producing intense local magnetic fields, and talks on cavity‑magnon control using surface acoustic waves for nonreciprocal devices. Longji...
Study Links High Fat Intake to Elevated Stress Hormones, Leaky Gut, and Systemic Inflammation
Recent research links chronic high‑fat consumption to elevated cortisol and gut‑derived serotonin, which together compromise the intestinal barrier and spark systemic inflammation. The studies show that excess dietary fat disrupts gut microbiota, increasing pro‑inflammatory Firmicutes and endotoxin‑producing Gram‑negative bacteria while...
Gut Bacteria May Influence Brain Circuits Involved in Bipolar Depression
Recent research published in Molecular Psychiatry and related journals shows that gut dysbiosis can weaken dopamine‑reward circuits and reduce synaptic connectivity in the medial prefrontal cortex of mice receiving microbiota from bipolar‑depressed patients. The same studies report distinct microbial signatures...
New Planet Category Identified
Astronomers have identified a planet 35 light‑years away that does not fit existing small‑planet categories. The world, L 98‑59 d, was first discovered in 2019 and observed by JWST in 2024 and ground facilities in 2025. Researchers used computer models to simulate...
ION717 Trial Re-Opens with 3rd Dosing Regimen
Ionis Pharmaceuticals announced that its Phase 1/2a PrProfile trial of ION717, the first PrP‑lowering antisense oligonucleotide for symptomatic prion disease, has reopened with a third dosing regimen. The study, which enrolled 56 patients in 2024, will now recruit at three...
When Prevention Fails Twice a Year: The Twin Peaks of Japan’s COVID‑19 Epidemic
A recent study of Japan’s national COVID‑19 surveillance data from 2020 to 2025 reveals a consistent pattern of two annual epidemic peaks—one in summer and another in winter—beginning in 2022. The analysis shows that these surges occurred despite the country’s...
Meditators’ Brains Showed Thicker Cortexes and Slower Aging in Study
A recent MRI study found that long‑term Buddhist insight meditators exhibit a thicker cerebral cortex and a slower rate of cortical thinning compared with non‑meditating controls. The research suggests that sustained attention to breath and present‑moment awareness may counteract typical...
Interfering in Induction of Bystander Senescence as an Approach to Senotherapy
Researchers have mapped how senescence spreads between human brain cell types via the senescence‑associated secretory phenotype (SASP). Using DNA‑damage‑induced cultures and conditioned‑media assays, they identified cell‑type‑specific SASP signatures that drive secondary senescence in neighboring astrocytes, endothelial cells, microglia, oligodendrocytes and...
![World’s First Pollen-Based Sunscreen (Derived From Camellia Flower) Is as Effective as Sunscreens with Minerals (Titanium Dioxide [TiO₂] and Zinc...](https://hixhlmpcokxhartfkpyi.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/images/thumbnails/468efafa539139c1fc8535c78ad080e7.webp)
World’s First Pollen-Based Sunscreen (Derived From Camellia Flower) Is as Effective as Sunscreens with Minerals (Titanium Dioxide [TiO₂] and Zinc...
Materials scientists at Nanyang Technological University have created the world’s first sunscreen made from Camellia flower pollen. Laboratory tests show the pollen microgel blocks UV rays with SPF 30, comparable to titanium dioxide and zinc oxide formulations, while also keeping skin...
Why the Trump Administration Couldn’t Kill the Nature Record
Early 2025 the Trump administration terminated the National Nature Assessment, labeling it wasteful and ideologically driven. In response, more than 170 scientists produced the independent 868‑page Nature Record, funded privately with $3 million and overseen by the National Academies. The report...
Beauty Encountered During Ice World Exploration
Dale T. Andersen returned from the first of two 2026 astrobiology dives beneath Lake Untersee’s thick ice sheet in Antarctica. The expedition showcased the striking visual beauty and technical rigor of sub‑ice exploration, using a Kirby Morgan Exo‑26 full‑face mask, tethered safety lines,...
How Zinc Protects Injured Arteries From Accelerated Aging
Researchers published in Aging Cell report that vascular injury induces misshapen nuclei in smooth muscle cells, accelerating cellular senescence. Human femoral arteries post‑angioplasty and rat carotid injury models both displayed nuclear dysmorphism linked to prelamin A buildup. The study identifies...