https://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Assessing the toxicity of food contaminants—including carcinogenic potential—is a major challenge in evaluating the risks associated with exposure. In recent years, as part of efforts to reduce animal testing, two-dimensional (2D) analytical methods using human hepatic cell lines (which make up most of the liver) have advanced predictive toxicology for contaminants. However, these approaches have limitations, because they do not sufficiently capture the organ's complexity. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-miniature-human-liver-toxicology-food.html Thu, 29 Jan 2026 16:52:32 EST news688927921 The role that flies play in spreading cholera—a bacterial disease that causes severe diarrhea and dehydration—has been underestimated in Africa, which carries the largest burden of the disease. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-flies-linked-cholera-oral-vaccine.html Wed, 21 Jan 2026 11:59:23 EST news688219021 The neonatal period, which is defined as the first 28 days after birth, is known to be a crucial stage in the development of the human brain. During this stage, the brain is known to grow significantly in size, with billions of new connections forming between neurons and supporting basic physiological functions. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-brain-complexity-newborn.html Wed, 21 Jan 2026 08:10:01 EST news688035828 Obtaining clearer functional MRI data about the brain and its disorders is possible using artificial intelligence, according to Boston College researchers who report in Nature Methods that they have developed an AI-assisted method to remove "noise," or image distortions, caused by movement, heartbeat, and other factors. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-ai-clearer-picture-functional-mri.html Tue, 06 Jan 2026 11:30:04 EST news686921055 Patients experience significant changes in gut bacteria at the onset of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), a new international study has found—offering new hope for earlier diagnosis and future treatments. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-gut-bacteria-shift-early-inflammatory.html Tue, 23 Dec 2025 05:00:02 EST news685369922 Adults who experience a head injury face a substantially higher risk of attempting suicide compared to those without such injuries, according to the findings from a new UK-based study. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-brain-injuries-linked-potential-suicide.html Mon, 22 Dec 2025 16:00:04 EST news685639641 Scientists at Duke-NUS Medical School have developed two powerful computational tools that could transform how researchers study the "conversations" between cells inside the body. The tools, called sCCIgen and QuadST, help scientists understand both where cells are located in tissues and how they communicate through genetic activity and chemical signals. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-scientists-virtual-tissue-tools-cells.html Mon, 22 Dec 2025 05:51:53 EST news685605076 HIV and tuberculosis (TB) treatment programs have always relied on clinical trials to understand whether treatment interventions are actually working, but they're costly and cumbersome. Meanwhile, African biostatisticians have offered a powerful, data-driven alternative that can accurately inform HIV policy, reduce health care costs, and save more lives. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-real-world-africa-smarter-path.html Wed, 17 Dec 2025 21:00:01 EST news685197492 People who have been exposed to both PFAS and PCBs are more likely to be diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS). These new research findings are based on analyses of blood samples from more than 1,800 individuals in Sweden, one of the most comprehensive studies to date on the influence of chemical environmental exposure on the development of MS. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-exposure-pfas-pcbs-linked-higher.html Wed, 17 Dec 2025 12:43:50 EST news685197721 Australian scientists have identified the key genetic drivers behind long COVID, revealing why some people continue to experience debilitating symptoms long after their initial infection. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-covid-uncovers-genetic-drivers-disease.html Tue, 16 Dec 2025 06:41:10 EST news685089634 Every year, millions of newborns—especially those born premature, underweight or sick—are at risk of neonatal hypoglycemia, a dangerous drop in blood sugar that can lead to seizures, brain injury and lifelong developmental challenges if not detected quickly. Early testing and treatment are essential, but many hospitals around the world lack access to reliable devices designed specifically for newborns. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-accurate-tools-blood-sugar-newborns.html Tue, 09 Dec 2025 15:29:13 EST news684516541 Spatial transcriptomics provides a unique perspective on the genes that cells express and where those cells are located. However, the rapid growth of the technology has come at the cost of standardization and consistency. To address this, the multi-institutional Spatial Touchstone project collected publicly available spatial transcriptomics imaging data and combined it with newly generated, curated datasets from six tissue types. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-spatial-transcriptomics-gains-quality-source.html Wed, 03 Dec 2025 14:20:06 EST news683993540 Between 0.7% and 1.5% of people in developed countries are estimated to suffer from intellectual disability (ID). In Spain, this is equivalent to more than 400,000 people. The term intellectual disability refers to a set of significant limitations in intellectual functioning and learning that manifest before the individual's 18th birthday as a result of genetic, acquired (congenital and developmental), environmental and sociocultural factors. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-intervention-aims-young-people-intellectual.html Tue, 02 Dec 2025 15:00:03 EST news683909401 Nerve damage is one of the most common and burdensome complications of diabetes. Millions of patients worldwide suffer from pain, numbness, and restricted movement, largely because damaged nerve fibers do not regenerate sufficiently. The reasons for this are unclear. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-therapeutic-approach-diabetic-nerve.html Wed, 26 Nov 2025 14:00:14 EST news683303161 Studying T cells, the immune cells most responsible for responding to infections and cancers, just received a significant boost in the form of a new technique from St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. While T-cell analysis can reveal much about how the immune system works, it can be prohibitively expensive and logistically impractical. This is due to the necessity of analyzing millions of T cells while accurately detecting the pairings of the two halves of their most critical protein, the T-cell receptor. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-sequencing-method-millions-cells-fraction.html Mon, 24 Nov 2025 16:11:04 EST news683223061 A new software enables brain simulations which both imitate the processes in the brain in detail and can solve challenging cognitive tasks. The program was developed by a research team at the Cluster of Excellence "Machine Learning: New Perspectives for Science" at the University of Tübingen. The software thus forms the basis for a new generation of brain simulations which allow deeper insights into the functioning and performance of the brain. The Tübingen researchers' paper has been published in the journal Nature Methods. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-software-optimizes-brain-simulations-enabling.html Sat, 15 Nov 2025 10:30:02 EST news682270765 Existing evidence does not clearly link paracetamol (acetaminophen) use during pregnancy with autism or ADHD in children, finds an in-depth evidence review published by The BMJ today, in direct response to recent announcements around the safety of using paracetamol in pregnancy. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-tylenol-pregnancy-strong-evidence-autism.html Sun, 09 Nov 2025 19:10:03 EST news681740462 Researchers at National Taiwan University have discovered how light, electricity, and tiny forces can work together to help wounds heal naturally and leave fewer scars, offering new hope for chronic wound care. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-generation-wound-body.html Tue, 04 Nov 2025 14:10:05 EST news681487802 Researchers at Fox Chase Cancer Center, Temple University's College of Engineering, and the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University have developed a new method that enhances the ability of artificial intelligence models to detect and diagnose skin cancer in individuals with darker skin. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-ai-tool-skin-cancer-accurate.html Fri, 31 Oct 2025 05:30:05 EDT news681107402 The number of people living with dementia worldwide was estimated at 57 million in 2021 with nearly 10 million new cases recorded each year. In the U.S., dementia impacts more than 6 million lives, and the number of new cases is expected to double over the next few decades, according to a 2025 study. Despite advancements in the field, a full understanding of disease-causing mechanisms is still lacking. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-algorithm-genetic-alzheimer-specific-neurons.html Wed, 22 Oct 2025 14:14:05 EDT news680361242 Scientists at CSIRO, Australia's national science agency, have identified simpler and less invasive methods to improve Alzheimer's disease diagnosis, potentially making it easier for patients to access emerging treatments. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-blood-alzheimer-diagnosis-treatment-access.html Tue, 21 Oct 2025 07:41:04 EDT news680251261 Grid cells are a class of specialized neurons in a brain region called the entorhinal cortex, which is known to support spatial navigation and some memory processes. Past neuroscience studies have found that as humans and other animals move in their surroundings, these cells fire following a grid-like pattern, creating a sort of internal map of the environment. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-grid-cells-multiple-local-global.html Mon, 20 Oct 2025 07:30:02 EDT news679921944 The doctor suggests opting for a treatment that is better for the environment. How do patients react to this? Doctors and psychologists together discovered that this has little impact on patient confidence in the doctor. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-collaboration-loss-patient-confidence-environmentally.html Thu, 16 Oct 2025 15:26:10 EDT news679847167 AI can be used to detect cervical cancer in women in resource-limited parts of the world. However, for this method to work, investments are needed in health care staff, reliable supply chains and trust in these communities. This has been shown in a new study from Uppsala University, Karolinska Institutet and the University of Helsinki, where researchers tested an AI-supported diagnostic method at rural hospitals in Kenya and Tanzania. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-ai-cervical-cancer-screening-kenya.html Fri, 10 Oct 2025 11:56:04 EDT news679316162 For decades, researchers have worked to unravel the mysteries of post-traumatic epilepsy (PTE), a form of epilepsy that emerges after a traumatic brain injury (TBI). Now, a new study led by Texas A&M University neuroscientist Dr. Samba Reddy offers a sweeping view of how far the science has come and how far it needs to go. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-years-traumatic-epilepsy.html Mon, 06 Oct 2025 14:15:05 EDT news678978901 Fewer than one percent of people who have changed their legal gender choose to revert to the gender they were assigned at birth. This has been shown in a new study from Uppsala University in which the researchers looked at how stable a gender change is over time in Sweden. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-legal-gender-sweden.html Mon, 06 Oct 2025 11:35:10 EDT news678969307 Drug use disorder (DUDs), also called drug addiction, is the chronic and relapsing use of psychoactive substances in spite of considerable harm to the patient. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime has estimated that more than 250 million people around the world used illegal drugs at least occasionally in 2021, while 39.5 million people suffered from DUD. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-death-toll-drugs-worldwide-decades.html Thu, 02 Oct 2025 14:38:04 EDT news678634682 Drinking any amount of alcohol likely increases the risk of dementia, suggests the largest combined observational and genetic study to date, published in BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-amount-alcohol-dementia.html Tue, 23 Sep 2025 18:30:01 EDT news677771701 Researchers at the University of Osaka have developed a minimally invasive method for recording brain activity through blood vessels. Their article, "Microendovascular Neural Recording from Cortical and Deep Vessels with High Precision and Minimal Invasiveness," is published in Advanced Intelligent Systems. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-invasive-brainwave-blood-vessels-access.html Mon, 22 Sep 2025 11:55:07 EDT news677760902 The human brain can concurrently support a wide range of advanced mental functions, including attention, memory and the processing of sensory stimuli. While past neuroscience studies have gathered valuable insight into the neural underpinnings of each of these processes, the mechanisms that ensure that they are performed efficiently and in a timely fashion have not yet been fully elucidated. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-large-scale-cortical-networks-cyclical.html Mon, 22 Sep 2025 07:00:01 EDT news677340333