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Medicine

Focused Ultrasound Trial Targets Schizophrenia Hallucinations at UCSF

Psychiatrists at the University of California San Francisco have started a first-in-human trial using low-intensity focused ultrasound to suppress auditory hallucinations in patients with schizophrenia. The study tests whether acoustic pulses delivered through the skull can alter deep brain activity without surgery. More than 70 percent of people with schizophrenia hear voices, and about 40 percent do not find relief through antipsychotic drugs.

Chemistry

Recycling Neodymium Magnets from Computer Drives with Ammonium Chloride

German researchers are developing two chemical processes to extract neodymium, iron and boron from scrap computer hard drives. The work, carried out under the European Union NEO-CYCLE project, aims to recover rare earth elements locally to supply motors for each new electric vehicle and wind turbine without relying on overseas refining.

Operations & Transport

NASA unveils X-70 Fractal experimental aircraft for flight control research

NASA presented its newest crewed experimental aircraft, the X-70 Fractal, on November 4, 2026, during the UP.Summit at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The agency designed the platform to accelerate aerospace innovation by flight-testing reconfigurable control systems and modular experimental hardware. Agency officials expect the aircraft to complete its first flight under the NASA banner within two years.

Robotics

FlexiQuad: the collision-resistant ring drone from ETH Zurich

Robotics researchers at ETH Zurich have designed a quadcopter without a rigid central body that absorbs collisions without crashing. Invented by Luca Girardi and Stefano Mintchev, the ring-shaped FlexiQuad drone uses an elastic frame that flexes laterally on impact while retaining the vertical stiffness required for flight. The inventors have filed a patent application for the device, which has also earned a nomination for the university's Spark Award.

Mobile

AT&T and AST SpaceMobile complete first cellular to satellite network handoff

Engineers in Washington state have completed what they describe as the first successful live handoff between a terrestrial cellular network and a direct-to-device satellite link. The demonstration by AT&T and AST SpaceMobile allowed standard mobile devices to maintain connectivity as they moved beyond the reach of ground towers. If deployed commercially, the architecture could eliminate dead zones on highways and remote regions without requiring specialized hardware.

Tech

Fraunhofer FKIE Connects Seafloor Sensors to Shore With Gateway Buoys

Underwater sensors and uncrewed vessels cannot rely on conventional Wi-Fi or cellular networks because water absorbs electromagnetic waves. Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Communication, Information Processing and Ergonomics FKIE have built an acoustic network to bridge this gap, using floating gateway buoys to pass critical seafloor data to command stations on land.

Norms & Regulation

Federal Circuit overturns 9.1 million dollar fee award in vitamin patent case

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a district court order requiring ChromaDex to pay 9.1 million dollars in legal fees to rival Elysium Health. The decision settles an exceptional-case dispute over dietary supplement intellectual property licensed from Dartmouth College. Judges ruled that while ChromaDex lost on patent eligibility, its arguments were neither frivolous nor foreclosed by Supreme Court precedent.

Giovanni Sapere

Biology

Ancestral Enzyme Variant Generates ATP with Fewer Amino Acids

Biochemists at Waseda University and the RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences have engineered a simplified ancestral enzyme that generates cellular energy without the amino acid traditionally required for the reaction. The biological invention, an engineered variant designated Arc1-12KR, produces adenosine triphosphate by combining two precursor molecules at a rate 7,500 times faster than earlier synthetic models. Described in research released in October 2026, the work provides a structural framework for designing stripped-down catalytic proteins.

Letizia Giugliano

Medicine

Activating p53 Protein Boosts Engineered T Cells Against Cancer

Scientists at the UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center have found that temporarily activating the tumor-suppressor protein p53 improves the stamina and killing power of engineered immune cells. The study, published in Frontiers in Immunology, demonstrates that dosing human T cells with the investigational drug navtemadlin during laboratory preparation keeps them from exhausting quickly and enhances their ability to destroy melanoma cells.

Letizia Giugliano

Environment

Fruit and vegetable scraps pack more fiber than flesh, King's study shows

Researchers at King's College London found that discarded skins, seeds, and cores from twelve common fruits and vegetables contain higher fiber concentrations than the flesh itself. The team explored root-to-tip consumption as a dietary innovation to combat both household food waste and nutrient deficiencies. Their laboratory analysis showed that common kitchen refuse represents between 25% and 48% of total produce weight.

Letizia Giugliano

Biology

Yale Study Finds Taurine Acts as an Internal Brake on Inflammaging

Scientists at the Yale School of Medicine have discovered how taurine regulates immune reactions during aging, revealing that the amino acid prevents damaging inflammatory cascades. The biological innovation, published in the journal Cell, demonstrates that immune cells leak taurine when triggered by pathogens, removing a critical constraint on cellular inflammation.

Letizia Giugliano

Biology

How Crowded Molecules Assemble Synthetic DNA Droplets

Biochemists at the Institute of Science Tokyo have found a way to assemble and organize artificial cell structures by mimicking the crowded interior of living cells. Using synthetic DNA nanostars and polymer crowding agents, the team stabilized liquid droplets at higher temperatures without allowing distinct droplets to fuse. The biological innovation provides a physical blueprint for building programmable microscopic networks.

Letizia Giugliano

Inventions

Engineers Solve Key Physical Hurdle in Exhaled Breath Diagnostics

Engineers at the University of Notre Dame have pinpointed why exhaled breath tests often produce inconsistent results, solving a problem that has stalled the diagnostic method for decades. The discovery provides the physical basis for a new invention in sample collectors, ensuring that noninvasive breath monitors can reliably detect pulmonary diseases without invasive procedures.

Robotics

Humanoid Robot Learns Complex Sequences Without Unified Training Data

Teaching a bipedal machine to walk across a room and manipulate objects usually requires unbroken demonstration sequences that are difficult to record reliably. A research team at Seoul National University has built a vision-language-action architecture called RISE, which connects independently gathered walking and handling data to perform sequential tasks. The system advances practical robotics by cutting the burden of training physical machines.

Science

Unlocking Spider Silk to Turn Liquid Protein into Solid Fibers

Natural dragline silk can withstand a pulling force of 150 newtons per square millimeter before tearing, matching high-grade steel at a fraction of the weight. Replicating that performance through an artificial manufacturing process remains an elusive technical frontier in materials science. Today, laboratory teams are decoding how arachnids transform liquid gland proteins into tough, solid threads for textiles and medical use.

Letizia Giugliano

Space

NASA Map Identifies 13 Possible Martian Origins for Teghaza 001 Meteorite

Scientists studying Mars have pinpointed 13 candidate source locations for Teghaza 001, one of the oldest Martian meteorites discovered on Earth. Using spectroscopic and topographical observations from orbital missions in space, researchers traced the unique chemical composition of the rock back to specific highland regions in the Martian southern hemisphere.

Giovanni Sapere

Chemistry

Soil Bacterium from Iran Yields Two New Chemical Compounds

Biochemists in Germany have isolated two previously unknown natural molecules, lavasamycin A and B, from a bacterial strain collected in Iran. The study shows that lavasamycin A stops the growth of Bacillus subtilis, pointing to chemical structures that could aid the invention of new antimicrobial agents.

Giovanni Sapere