Health and Medicine
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Dr. Xiaolei Zhu – Dr. Barbara Slusher | A New Approach to Depression Treatment Targets Brain Immune Cells
Depression affects nearly one in five Americans at some point in their lives. Sadly, for roughly a third of patients, standard antidepressants simply don’t work. Now, researchers at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine believe they may have found a promising new path forward – one that targets the brain’s own immune cells. Dr. Xiaolei Zhu, Dr. Barbara Slusher, and their colleagues have been investigating why the brain’s resident immune cells, called microglia, appear to go into overdrive in people with major depressive disorder.
Dr Vedrana Bali – Dr Vladimir Grubišić | How Enteric Glia Shape Health and Disease
The human gut is more than a long tube for digesting food – it is one of our body’s largest and busiest borders, constantly deciding what may enter and what must stay out. Most of these decisions are made by a nervous system embedded within the gut wall, often called ‘the brain in the gut’, and supported by the local immune system. When this border becomes too permeable, often described as a ‘leaky gut’, problems can arise throughout the body. Researchers Vedrana Bali and Vladimir Grubišić, at the New York Institute of Technology College of Osteopathic Medicine, argue that this leaky-gut phenomenon may cause far more than stomach troubles.
Professor Stefan Pierzynowski – Professor Kateryna Pierzynowska | Cracking the Code on How Our Bodies Absorb Protein
When you eat a steak or a protein shake, what actually ends up in your bloodstream? It turns out the answer is surprisingly little-understood – until now. Professors Stefan Pierzynowski and Kateryna Pierzynowska of Lund University, also affiliated with the Institute of Rural Medicine, Lublin, and The Kielanowski Institute of Animal Physiology and Nutrition, have developed a clever new approach to answer this question. Their work has important implications for how doctors treat digestive diseases and how to evaluate dietary proteins’ quality and bioavailability.
Hope Walks: Early Clubfoot Treatment Transforms Children’s Lives
In many low- and middle-income countries, children born with physical disabilities face lifelong barriers that limit their ability to learn, play, and participate in their communities. One such condition is clubfoot, a congenital deformity that twists a baby’s feet downward and inward. While it is routinely corrected in wealthier nations, lack of access to treatment in poorer regions often leaves children disabled for life. In research funded by the University of Notre Dame, Bruce Wydick, Gianna Camacho, and Patrizio Piraino reveal how early, affordable treatment for clubfoot can transform not only a child’s mobility but nearly every aspect of their well-being.
Dr Sriram Iyengar | Resilience Informatics
Pandemics! Heatwaves! Floods! Droughts! We live in an age of overlapping crises. Climate change is intensifying. Acute, short-term stressors and chronic, long-term stressors damage physical and mental health. Such stressors are not going away. We need to develop resilience to these stressors. But what IS resilience?
Marc de la Roche – Maike de la Roche | A New Route to Precision Cancer Immunotherapy
Cancer treatments are increasingly moving beyond one-size-fits-all approaches, and new research led by Marc de la Roche and Maike de la Roche shows how a single biological target could open the door to multiple, more precise immunotherapies. The work focuses on LGR5, a protein found at unusually high levels on the surface of certain cancer cells, including colorectal cancer, liver cancer, and a form of leukaemia.
Dr Fatema Alali | How Ring-Shaped Gold Nanoparticles Could Revolutionise Cancer Treatment
Nanoparticles may be tiny, but their potential impact on medicine is enormous. In a new study, researcher Fatema Alali explores how carefully designed gold nanoparticles could make light-based cancer treatments safer, more precise, and more reliable. Her research focuses on how the shape of these particles controls the way they absorb light and turn it into heat – a key process in photothermal therapy.
Dr. Mark Greenwald | The NET Device™: A New Tool to Help People Recover from Opioid Addiction
For people trying to stop using opioids, the most dangerous point in recovery often comes right at the start. Withdrawal can arrive quickly and fiercely, bringing physical pain, severe anxiety, sleeplessness, and intense cravings. Even when someone is deeply motivated to quit, these symptoms can overwhelm their resolve and lead them back to use. New research led by Dr. Mark Greenwald at Wayne State University is investigating a novel way to ease this early hurdle.
Dr. Bruce Lahn | Cracking the Code of How Cells Choose Their Fates
How does a single fertilized egg produce the hundreds of cell types that make up the body – from neurons and skin cells to muscle and blood? This question has long been one of biology’s great mysteries. Dr. Bruce Lahn and his team at the University of Chicago believe they have uncovered a fundamental mechanism behind this process, which could reshape how scientists think about development and cellular identity.
Dr. Angelo Hooker | Understanding Intrauterine Scarring to Improve Fertility and Pregnancy Outcomes
Intrauterine adhesion is a common gynecological condition – one of the main diseases of the reproductive system. This uterine disorder is characterized by a partial or complete adhesion between the anterior and posterior walls of the uterine cavity and/or the cervical canal. It has a debilitating impact on the quality of life for women of childbearing age. Intrauterine adhesion can form when the lining of the uterus becomes damaged, leading to scarring or even obliteration of the uterine cavity. It can result from intrauterine infections and from operations such as dilatation and curettage after miscarriage or termination of pregnancy.
Memory, Aging, and the IQity® NeuroTimeLine™ Advantage
Most people assume memory loss is a natural and unavoidable part of getting older. But modern neuroscience tells a very different story. Your brain can regain clarity, restore memory, and even reverse age-related decline – when we understand what is actually changing beneath the surface. As we age, most memory difficulties do not come from brain damage or neuron loss. They come from declining neural efficiency. Brain rhythms slow and lose precision. Communication between key networks becomes less coordinated. Emotional and stress load adds internal “noise”. Together, these shifts make it harder to encode new information and retrieve what we already know – even when the memories are still there.
Reducing Racial Disparities in Anemia in Pregnancy
Pregnancy is often an exciting time as families welcome a new baby (or babies) into their homes. But sometimes, new mothers face serious health problems that can become life-threatening. Doctors call these life-threatening situations “severe maternal morbidity,” or a “near-miss” pregnancy event. One important issue that affects these outcomes is anemia during pregnancy (also referenced as antepartum anemia in our study). Anemia happens when the body doesn’t have enough healthy red blood cells to carry oxygen. The most common type is iron-deficiency anemia, which simply means the body doesn’t have enough iron.
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