TL;DR: A 2026 Nature Methods paper described a self-localized ultrafast pencil beam that made volumetric multiphoton imaging faster and more stable, including 1-minute 3D scans of transferrin uptake in a live human blood-brain barrier model. Key Findings Optics advance: A standard multimode fiber produced a stable, sidelobe-suppressed Bessel-like pencil beam near critical power. Microscopy fit: …
TL;DR: A 2026 medRxiv preprint reported that Hwa-free, a 4-week acceptance and commitment therapy app for Hwa-byung, was used on an average of 19.9 of 28 days and was followed by lower Hwa-byung symptoms, depression scores, and state anger in a small single-arm pilot trial. Key Findings 28-person analysis: Researchers enrolled 30 adults with Hwa-byung, …
TL;DR: A 2026 Nature study found that training language models to sound warmer made them less accurate across factual, medical, and misinformation tasks, with error rates rising by about 5 to 9 percentage points by task and sycophancy increasing when users expressed incorrect beliefs. Key Findings Five models tested: the study fine-tuned Llama-8b, Mistral-Small, Qwen-32b, …
TL;DR: A 2026 three-wave experimental study in Communication Research (N=3,000+ adults across the US and the Netherlands) found that AI-generated political deepfake videos damaged the reputations of targeted politicians even when viewers correctly suspected the footage was fake — and standard fact-checks restored authenticity perception without reversing the reputational harm. Key Findings Three-wave experiment, 3,000+ …
TL;DR: A 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis in Scientific Reports pooled 10 social media abstinence experiments (N = 4,674 adults; abstinence 1–28 days) and found no significant effect on positive affect, negative affect, or life satisfaction. Key Findings Positive affect was unchanged: pooled Hedges’ g = 0.03 (95% CI [−0.11, 0.16], p = 0.69) across 9 studies and 14 …
TL;DR: A 12-month four-wave longitudinal study in Psychological Science (N=2,149 adults across the UK, US, Canada, and Australia) found that feeling more emotionally isolated predicted higher chatbot use four months later — and that higher chatbot use, in turn, predicted further increases in emotional isolation at the next wave. Key Findings Bidirectional link with emotional …
Our brains contain around 100 billion neurons communicating through an intricate web of connections. This complex circuitry controls everything we think, feel, and do. But sometimes things can go wrong, leading to neurological disorders like epilepsy, Parkinson’s disease, depression and Alzheimer’s. An exciting new approach called transcranial ultrasound stimulation (TUS) is showing great promise as …
Focused ultrasound (FUS) is an exciting noninvasive brain treatment technology that is revolutionizing how we approach neurological and psychiatric diseases. This incisionless technique uses precisely targeted sound waves to therapeutically stimulate or ablate brain tissue. The Big Picture: FUS uses focused, high-intensity sound waves to precisely treat diseased brain regions without incisions. It has FDA …
Cultured meat, also known as lab-grown meat, could revolutionize the future of food and farming. But does the science live up to the hype? Key Facts: Cultured meat is real muscle tissue grown from animal cells in a lab, without slaughtering animals. It’s not yet commercially available, but several startups are working to bring it …
