Yang, S.J., Jeon, YR., Kim, D. et al. npj 2D Mater Appl 9, 9 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41699-025-00533-9
UMD researchers have discovered key mechanisms in gene regulation that could improve the design of RNA-based medicines.
RNA-based medicines are among the most promising approaches to combating human disease, as evidenced by the recent successes of RNA
Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a polymeric molecule similar to DNA that is essential in various biological roles in coding, decoding, regulation and expression of genes. Both are nucleic acids, but unlike DNA, RNA is single-stranded. An RNA strand has a backbone made of alternating sugar (ribose) and phosphate groups. Attached to each sugar is one of four bases—adenine (A), uracil (U), cytosine ©, or guanine (G). Different types of RNA exist in the cell: messenger RNA (mRNA), ribosomal RNA (rRNA), and transfer RNA (tRNA).
In the 1951 science fiction film, “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” powerful ray guns are shown vaporizing rifles and even tanks. In the Star Wars movies, a wide variety of directed energy weapons are depicted, from handheld lightsabers to massive, spaceship-mounted laser cannons.
What exactly is a directed energy weapon? Are these weapons still science fiction, lab experiments, or are they real? How can they be used and how disruptive can they be? What are the challenges and next steps? This article will examine answers to these questions.
According to DOD’s Joint Publication 3–13 Electronic Warfare, directed energy (DE) is described as an:
An international team of researchers has detected a series of significant X-ray oscillations near the innermost orbit of a supermassive black hole – an unprecedented discovery that could indicate the presence of a nearby stellar-mass orbiter such as a white dwarf.
Optical outburst
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)-led team began studying the extreme supermassive black hole 1ES 1927+654 – located around 270 million light years away and about a million times more massive than the Sun – in 2018, when it brightened by a factor of around 100 at optical wavelengths. Shortly after this optical outburst, X-ray monitoring revealed a period of dramatic variability as X-rays dropped rapidly – at first becoming undetectable for about a month, before returning with a vengeance and transforming into the brightest supermassive black hole in the X-ray sky.
Researchers from Nagoya University in Japan and the Slovak Academy of Sciences have unveiled new insights into the interplay between quantum theory and thermodynamics. The team demonstrated that while quantum theory does not inherently forbid violations of the second law of thermodynamics, quantum processes may be implemented without actually breaching the law.
This discovery, published in npj Quantum Information, highlights a harmonious coexistence between the two fields, despite their logical independence. Their findings open up new avenues for understanding the thermodynamic boundaries of quantum technologies, such as quantum computing and nanoscale engines.
This breakthrough contributes to the long-standing exploration of the second law of thermodynamics, a principle often regarded as one of the most profound and enigmatic in physics.
Crowdsourcing treatments that work — yael elish — CEO & founder, stuffthatworks.
Yael Elish is CEO and Founder of StuffThatWorks (https://www.stuffthatworks.health/), a company that offers an online platform where people suffering from chronic diseases can share information to learn which treatments work best for their specific condition, based on the experience of their peers combined with a smart, AI-based crowdsourcing system.
A passionate entrepreneur with expertise in crowdsourcing and consumer-facing products, Yael was on the Waze founding team, where she drove the overall product strategy that led the company from User One to one of the world’s most notable crowdsourcing endeavours. She also co-founded eSnips and NetSnippet, and was part of the senior management team that took Commtouch to its successful NASDAQ IPO in 2000.
Weill Cornell Medicine investigators have identified in a preclinical model a specific brain circuit whose inhibition appears to reduce anxiety without side effects. Their work suggests a new target for treating anxiety disorders and related conditions and demonstrates a general strategy, based on a method called photopharmacology, for mapping drug effects on the brain.
In their study, published Jan. 28 in Neuron, the researchers examined the effects of experimental drug compounds that activate a type of brain-cell receptor called the metabotropic glutamate receptor 2 (mGluR2). While these receptors are found on neurons within many brain circuits, the team showed that activating them in a specific circuit terminating in an emotion-related brain region called the amygdala reduces signs of anxiety without apparent adverse side effects. Current treatments for anxiety disorders, panic disorder and associated conditions can have unwanted side effects including cognitive impairments.
“Our findings indicate a new and important target for the treatment of anxiety-related disorders and show that our photopharmacology-based approach holds promise more broadly as a way to precisely reverse-engineer how therapeutics work in the brain,” said study senior author Dr. Joshua Levitz, an associate professor of biochemistry at Weill Cornell Medicine.
NASA’s internship programs provide training, mentoring, and career development opportunities while working with the best science, engineering, financial, information technology and business minds in the world.
The aim of the following paper was to overview the body-composition-related changes and molecular effects of different chemotherapy agents used in cancer treatment on skeletal-muscle remodeling.
— Pedrosa, et al.
Full text is available
Paraneoplastic conditions such as cancer cachexia are often exacerbated by chemotherapy, which affects the patient’s quality of life as well as the response to therapy. The aim of this narrative review was to overview the body-composition-related changes and molecular effects of different chemotherapy agents used in cancer treatment on skeletal-muscle remodeling. A literature search was performed using the Web of Science, Scopus, and Science Direct databases and a total of 77 papers was retrieved. In general, the literature survey showed that the molecular changes induced by chemotherapy in skeletal muscle have been studied mainly in animal models and mostly in non-tumor-bearing rodents, whereas clinical studies have essentially assessed changes in body composition by computerized tomography.
The X-shaped building in southwestern China could help China pull ahead in the race to master a futuristic clean energy source and amp up weapons research.