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‘Chameleon’ chip adapts to changing data speeds, cutting prediction errors by up to 40-fold

A research team led by Chair Professor Shinhyun Choi from the School of Electrical Engineering and the Graduate School of Semiconductor Technology has developed a programmable dynamic memtransistor (PDM), a semiconductor device whose time-response characteristics can be set to and retain multiple states, as well as an integrated array based on the device.

The research is published in the journal Nature Communications.

A memtransistor is a next-generation semiconductor device that combines the information storage function of memory with the computing function of a transistor. In the PDM, the ability to process data while retaining previous information allows its response characteristics to be adjusted and retained for incoming data.

Brain test could predict dementia before doctors can see it, study suggests

Early symptoms include forgetting things or recent events, getting lost or confused even in familiar places, problems following or making conversation, and feeling anxious or angry and exhibiting inappropriate behavior.

There is no cure for dementia, and as the condition progresses, the patient may not be able to recognize loved ones, move around, eat, drink, or control their bladder or bowels.

Now, researchers have suggested that a measure of how old a person’s brain appears on brain scans, compared with their actual age, may be a predictor for developing dementia at a later age, and may predict the risk years before doctors can see it.

What the Microbiome Reveals About the Future of Cancer Research

Yet funding is only part of the equation. Microbiome science does not fit neatly within a single discipline or institution, and no single lab or cancer center can answer these questions alone. Advancing discoveries into clinical trials — and ultimately into standard care — requires coordination among research institutions, healthcare systems, government and philanthropy.

This effort also means untangling years of siloed work: sharing standards, building interoperable data systems and committing to long-term evidence generation. The infrastructure required will need to extend far beyond individual institutional priorities. Patients, too, must be willing to participate in clinical trials, and all stakeholders must share a commitment to understanding the biology within us.

The challenge is not a lack of scientific talent. It is the willingness to invest — and to bring great minds and communities together.

Alternative mRNA modification lets ribosomes move nearly twice as fast

In a new study, scientists from Johns Hopkins Medicine report that an experimental mRNA-based platform has the potential to help deliver next-generation mRNA therapeutics, including vaccines to fight infectious diseases, cancer and autoimmune conditions, faster and more efficiently than the industry standard.

In experiments with cells from people and mice, researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) compared an experimental mRNA platform, N4-acetylcytidine (ac4C), with the industry-standard mRNA platform, N1-Methylpseudouridine (m1Ψ). The chemical modification used in COVID-19 mRNA vaccines is being widely studied for delivering potential cancer and autoimmune disease vaccines.

The study was published July 1 in Nature.

A little Big Bang: Bowling-pin-shaped nuclei shed new light on the universe’s first moments

What happened in the first moments of the universe—before the building blocks of life and the world we know today came into existence? Physicists at the CERN research facility in Switzerland are trying to answer this question by recreating some of the extreme conditions that prevailed in the universe during its earliest history. Now, researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute, together with colleagues from the international ALICE collaboration, have come one step closer to understanding those conditions.

At CERN, researchers can make atomic nuclei collide at almost the speed of light, creating tiny droplets of the primordial matter that filled the universe during its first millionth of a second. This matter is known as quark-gluon plasma and is thought to have been the earliest form of matter in the universe.

For many years, scientists have assumed that creating this plasma required collisions between very heavy atomic nuclei such as lead. But physicists from the Niels Bohr Institute have now succeeded in creating the primordial matter by smashing the much smaller nuclei of oxygen-16 and neon-20 together.

Dark energy and quantum gravity may be deeply intertwined

For close to a century, physicists have pursued a way to unite gravity with quantum mechanics. Known as quantum gravity, this goal has remained frustratingly out of reach so far. Similarly elusive is the force of dark energy, which is believed to be driving the universe’s accelerating expansion.

But through new research published in Physical Review D, physicist Savvas Koushiappas of Brown University has proposed a new explanation suggesting that these two phenomena might not be separate at all. Instead, dark energy could be a natural side effect of quantum gravity, acting on the geometry of space itself.

RNA droplets may have helped start life on Earth

It’s one of the origins-of-life chicken-or-egg problems: How could RNA have helped give rise to the first cells before there were cells to contain it?

Without the compartmentalization of a cell, it would have been extremely difficult for these vulnerable molecules to have found enough of each other in the proverbial primordial soup, let alone survive the harsh conditions of the early Earth.

The answer could lie in RNA’s ability to assemble into liquid-like droplets, or condensates. These membraneless compartments could have concentrated RNA molecules, increasing opportunities for them to interact and potentially sheltering them from a hot and acidic environment.

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