TL;DR: A 2026 exploratory study in Nature Communications found that a first 25 mg psilocybin dose in 28 psychedelic-naive adults increased electroencephalography (EEG), a scalp recording of brain electrical activity, entropy during the acute session and that entropy predicted one-month well-being change. Key Findings 28 psychedelic-naive adults: Participants received 1 mg psilocybin as a low-dose …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in Brain, Behavior, & Immunity – Health found that depression symptoms, alcohol use, and alcohol use disorder (AUD) symptoms were not associated with C-reactive protein (CRP), a blood inflammation marker, or a pro-inflammatory cytokine index in 972 community adults, and twin analyses suggested familial confounding explained several cytokine-AUD links. Key Findings …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in JAMA Network Open tracked 1,338 older adults from the Rush Memory and Aging Project for up to 19 years using objective wrist-actigraphy and found that each additional hour of daytime napping per day was linked to ~13% higher mortality, each extra nap per day to ~7% higher mortality, and morning …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in Nature Neuroscience from Baylor College of Medicine showed that boosting Sox9, a transcription factor that regulates aging astrocytes, improved astrocytes’ ability to clear amyloid plaques in Alzheimer’s mouse models and preserved cognitive function — pointing to a treatment strategy that targets the brain’s own support cells rather than directly attacking …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in The Journals of Gerontology, Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences measured a monocyte-specific DNA methylation clock (MonoDNAmAge) in 440 women with and without HIV, and found that accelerated monocyte epigenetic aging was specifically linked to non-somatic depressive symptoms (anhedonia, hopelessness, cognitive impacts) but not to broader depression severity, supporting …
TL;DR: A 2026 longitudinal study in Appetite following 491 Quebec children found that infants breastfed for at least three to six months showed better inhibitory control — the ability to suppress an automatic response — at age three and a half than infants who were never breastfed, with the largest behavioral benefits in those breastfed …
Connexin 36 Loss Disrupted Thalamocortical Synchrony TL;DR: Deleting connexin 36 left broad sleep architecture mostly intact but disrupted fast brain electrical rhythms measured by electroencephalography (EEG), along with sensory-response markers often discussed in neuropsychiatric disease. Key Findings Sleep architecture mostly held: Cx36 knockout mice did not show a broad collapse of sleep-wake organization. Fast rhythms …
Connectome-seq Turned Synapses Into Barcodes TL;DR: Connectome-seq is a 2026 Nature Methods platform that maps brain wiring by combining engineered synaptic proteins, RNA barcodes, single-nucleus sequencing, and single-synaptosome sequencing. In a mouse pontocerebellar circuit, the method linked synaptic connections to the molecular identities of connected neurons, turning a wiring map into something sequencing can read. …
Gabapentin Plus Hegu Embedding Improved Post-Herpetic Neuralgia TL;DR: Adding weekly Hegu-point catgut embedding to gabapentin cut post-herpetic neuralgia pain and sleep disruption more sharply, raising response from 80.0% to 92.4%. Key Findings 210 randomized PHN patients: Adults aged 40 to 70 with pain lasting at least 3 months were randomized 1:1 to gabapentin alone or …
How Five-Animal Play Matched Probiotics in Prediabetes TL;DR: 4 weeks of Huatuo Five-Animal Play improved glucose control and insulin resistance about as much as bifidobacterium capsules, outperforming low-intensity cycling on several metabolic markers, including Wnt5a. Key Findings Exercise shifted glucose and GLP-1: Researchers randomized 90 people with impaired glucose tolerance to bifidobacterium triple viable capsules, …
