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A new study by researchers from the Dexeus Women’s Health research network in Barcelona found that frozen sperm samples survived when exposed to microgravity.

That could mean that sperm banks in space are possible, providing future space travelers with the ability to reproduce in space with sperm samples brought up from Earth.

“Some studies suggest a significant decrease in the motility of a human, fresh sperm sample,” Montserrat Boada who presented the research yesterday at an annual meeting in Vienna, Austria, said, as quoted by The Guardian. “But nothing has been reported on the possible effects of gravitational differences on frozen human gametes, in which state they could be transported from Earth to space.”

Exercise really does influence how we age, and a new study shows how regular exercise in later life can help offset the decline of NAD+ and NAMPT, two important molecules that facilitate cellular energy production, in skeletal muscle.

NAD+ and mitochondria

The mitochondria are the power stations of the cell and provide the energy that our cells need in order to function. As we age, our mitochondria become increasingly dysfunctional and inefficient, and they produce excessive waste in the form of free radicals, which bounce around the interior of the cell, striking and damaging the cellular machinery within.

According to a first-of-its-kind study, cities with a higher incidence of a certain kind of racist tweets reported more actual hate crimes related to race, ethnicity, and national origin.

A New York University research team analyzed the location and linguistic features of 532 million tweets published between 2011 and 2016. They trained a machine learning model—one form of artificial intelligence—to identify and analyze two types of tweets: those that are targeted—directly espousing discriminatory views—and those that are self-narrative—describing or commenting upon discriminatory remarks or acts. The team compared the prevalence of each type of discriminatory to the number of actual hate crimes reported during that same time period in those same cities.

The research was led by Rumi Chunara, an assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the NYU Tandon School of Engineering and biostatistics at the NYU College of Global Public Health, and Stephanie Cook, an assistant professor of biostatistics and social and behavioral sciences at the NYU College of Global Public Health.

In a groundbreaking treatment, cancer patients’ immune systems are being genetically reprogrammed to fight their terminal cancer for them, with promising results.

In the UK, a number of National Health Service (NHS) patients with lymphoma at King’s College Hospital have been given CAR-T, a “living drug” that is unique to each patient as it contains some of their own cells.

The future of medicine is not fixing what is broken, it’s preventing things from getting broken in the first place.


The leading cause of death in Texas is heart disease, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, accounting for more than 45,000 deaths statewide in 2017. A new wearable technology made from stretchy, lightweight material could make heart health monitoring easier and more accurate than existing electrocardiograph machines—a technology that has changed little in almost a century.

Developed by engineers at The University of Texas at Austin and led by Nanshu Lu in the Cockrell School of Engineering, this is the latest incarnation of Lu’s electronic tattoo technology, a graphene-based that can be placed on the skin to measure a variety of body responses, from electrical to biomechanical signals.

The research team reported on their newest e-tattoo in a recent issue of Advanced Science.