Tuesday, April 1, 2025

Headlines From the Front Lines


It may be April Fool's, but the headlines are real.

Iberian nailed head ritual was more complex than expected, isotope analysis reveals
Feb 2025, phys.org

Not trying to be anti-literacy here, it's just that sometimes the headline is all you need. (Although this particular headline below requires the accompanying image.)

via Autonomous University of Barcelona: Rubén de la Fuente-Seoane et al, Territorialisation and human mobility during the Iron Age in NE Iberia: An approach through Isotope Analyses of the Severed Heads from Puig Castellar (Barcelona, Spain) and Ullastret (Girona, Spain), Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.jasrep.2025.105035



Antioxidant carbon dot nanozymes alleviate depression in rats by restoring the gut microbiome
Sep 2024, phys.org

Some headlines just make me feel like how a cracked windshield can become the the quintessential heavy metal band name font, but for like a mad scientist type of science thing. 

via Henan Joint International Research Laboratory of Nanomaterials for Energy and Catalysis at Xuchang University: Huimin Jia et al, Antioxidant Carbon Dots Nanozymes Alleviate Stress-induced Depression by Modulating Gut Microbiota, Langmuir (2024). DOI: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.4c02481


Google reacts angrily to report it will have to sell Chrome
Nov 2024, BBC News


'Alzheimer's in dish' model shows promise for accelerating drug discovery
Nov 2024, phys.org

(Alzheimer's isn't funny but Alzheimer's-in-a-dish is funny.)

via Massachusetts General Hospital: Yeganeah, PN et al. Integrative Pathway Analysis across Humans and 3D Cellular Models Identifies the p38 MAPK-MK2 Axis as a Therapeutic Target for Alzheimer's Disease, Neuron (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2024.10.029.


Topological quantum processor uses Majorana zero modes for fault-tolerant computing
Feb 2025, phys.org

It's got all the words - majorana fermion, topological things, and quantum computers - but I still don't buy it because it's Microsoft and they lie about shit all the time. In fact, I'm going to assume that specifically because it's a Microsoft press release, that it was engineered to have all these words on purpose. Shall we say, a kind of artificial headline generator trained on hype words more than the actual work that was done. 

(Actual scientists working in academia are not convinced, by the way.)

via UC Santa Barbara and Microsoft Station Q: David Aasen et al, Roadmap to fault tolerant quantum computation using topological qubit arrays, arXiv (2025). DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2502.12252


Biohybrid hand uses sushi-like rolls of lab-grown human muscle to move objects
Feb 2025, phys.org

via University of Tokyo: XINZHU REN et al, Biohybrid hand actuated by multiple human muscle tissues, Science Robotics (2025). DOI: 10.1126/scirobotics.adr5512.


Engineers develop a fully 3D-printed electrospray engine that can power tiny satellites
Feb 2025, phys.org

via MIT: Hyeonseok Kim et al, High‐Impulse, Modular, 3D‐Printed CubeSat Electrospray Thrusters Throttleable via Pressure and Voltage Control, Advanced Science (2025). DOI: 10.1002/advs.202413706

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