This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope Picture of the Week features a cloudy starscape from an impressive star cluster. This scene is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy situated about 160,000 light-years away in the constellations Dorado and Mensa. With a mass equal to 10-20% of the mass of the Milky Way,…
People with operable diffuse pleural mesothelioma may benefit from immunotherapy before and after surgery, based on results of a clinical trial exploring the sequence of treatment and the role of surgery for this difficult to treat cancer. Mesothelioma is a rare cancer that affects the tissue that lines many organs of the body. Approximately 30,000…
An international team of astronomers has discovered a cosmic rarity: an ultra-massive white dwarf star resulting from a white dwarf merging with another star, rather than through the evolution of a single star. This discovery, made by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope’s sensitive ultraviolet observations, suggests these rare white dwarfs may be more common than previously…
A team of Canadian scientists has discovered a surprising new way to improve blood sugar levels and reduce liver damage: by trapping a little-known fuel made by gut bacteria before they wreak havoc on the body. The findings, published in Cell Metabolism on July 29, 2025, could open the door to new therapies to treat…
Glioblastoma is a devastatingly effective brain cancer. Doctors can cut it out or blast it with radiation, but that only buys time. The cancer has an insidious ability to hide enough tumor cells in tissue around the tumor to allow it to return as deadly as ever. Patients diagnosed with glioblastoma survive for an average…
Analytical chemists from Stellenbosch University (SU) have provided the first evidence of a rare class of phenolics, called flavoalkaloids, in Cannabis leaves. Phenolic compounds, especially flavonoids, are well-known and sought after in the pharmaceutical industry because of their antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-carcinogenic properties. The researchers identified 79 phenolic compounds in three strains of Cannabis grown…
Although metformin has been the go-to medication to manage type 2 diabetes for more than 60 years, researchers still do not have a complete picture of how it works. Scientists at Baylor College of Medicine and international collaborators have discovered a previously unrecognized new player mediating clinically relevant effects of metformin: the brain. By uncovering…
A joint team from the University of Stuttgart in Germany and the University of Melbourne in Australia has developed a new method for the straightforward analysis of tiny nanoplastic particles in environmental samples. One needs only an ordinary optical microscope and a newly developed test strip — the optical sieve. The research results have now…
