EverythingScience

This Is Why the Same Virus Hits People So Differently The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted just how differently people can respond to the same infection. Some individuals experience mild symptoms, while others become severely ill. This striking contrast raises an important question. Why would two people infected by the same pathogen have such different outcomes? Much of the answer lies in differences in genetics (the genes you inherit) and life experience (your environmental, infection, and vaccination history). These influences shape our cells through subtle molecular modifications known as epigenetic changes. These changes do not alter the DNA sequence itself. Instead, they control whether specific genes are turned “on” or “off,” helping determine how cells behave and function. Researchers at the Salk Institute have introduced a comprehensive epigenetic catalog that separates the effects of inherited genetics from those of life experiences across multiple immune cell types. This new cell type-specific database, published in Nature Genetics on January 27, 2026, provides insight into why immune responses vary from person to person and could help guide the development of more precise, personalized treatments. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

The Benefits Of Intermittent Fasting For Weight Loss Have Been Greatly Exaggerated Intermittent fasting – periods of eating little or nothing interspersed with normal food consumption – isn't an effective way to lose weight, according to a review of 22 randomized controlled trials. It seems that assurances from celebrity weight-loss gurus and appeals to historical precedent aren’t enough make a practice work. Religions have encouraged or directed their adherents to refrain from eating, and in some cases even drinking water, to mark holy days or show penitence for thousands of years. In recent times, social media has been filled with those who advocate engaging in fasts for weight loss instead. The fact the practice has been so widespread for so long has been touted as evidence of its effectiveness. Until recently, however, most fasts were conducted in a world where calories were harder to come by the rest of the time, and whatever people's reasons for fasting, shedding fat wasn't high among them. Source:IFLScience @EverythingScience

Scientists Discover How To “Switch Off” [Certain] Cancer Genes for Good Scientists at Monash University, working with Harvard University, report they have found a way to permanently ‘switch off’ genes that help cancers survive. If the approach holds up in further testing, it could point to a new style of treatment that works with shorter courses and fewer of the harsh side effects that often come with long, continuous cancer therapy. The team described the work in Nature Cell Biology. Their focus is epigenetic therapy, which aims to change how genes behave rather than rewriting the genes themselves. You can think of epigenetics as the cell’s operating instructions for when to read a gene and when to keep it quiet. Cancer mutations can corrupt those instructions, locking dangerous growth programs in the “on” position. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

EverythingScience pinned «New 'Mars GPS' lets Perseverance pinpoint its location within 25 centimeters A new technology developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California enables Perseverance to figure out its whereabouts without calling humans for help. Dubbed Mars…»

Did Life Begin in the Cold? New Experiments Point to an Icy Origin Most origin-of-life scenarios focus on environments such as drying and rewetting surfaces on land or hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor. This study suggests that icy regions could also have been significant. On the early Earth, freeze/thaw cycles likely occurred repeatedly over long timescales. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

There are estimated to be between one and six million species of fungi. Take a moment to appreciate a few. 🍄 Source: @NatGeo @EverythingScience

Nanodevice produces continuous electricity from evaporation A nanodevice developed at EPFL produces an autonomous, stable current from evaporating saltwater by using heat and light to control the movement of ions and electrons. Previously, researchers in the Laboratory of Nanoscience for Energy Technology (LNET) in EPFL's School of Engineering reported a platform for studying the hydrovoltaic (HV) effect—a phenomenon that allows electricity to be harvested when fluid is passed over the charged surface of a nanodevice. Their platform consisted of a hexagonal network of silicon nanopillars, the space between which created channels for evaporating fluid samples. Now the LNET team, led by Giulia Tagliabue, has developed this platform into a hydrovoltaic system with a power output that matches or exceeds similar technologies—with a major advantage. Instead of relying on heat and light to simply boost evaporation, the EPFL system generates current by harnessing heat and light to control the movement of ions in evaporating saltwater, and the flow of electrons in the silicon nanodevice. "Heat and light imbalances will always affect a hydrovoltaic device, but we have discovered how these can be leveraged to our advantage," explains LNET researcher Tarique Anwar. With three distinct layers dedicated to evaporation, ion transport, and electrical charge collection, the nanodevice's decoupled design allows the scientists to observe and finely tune each step in the process. The researchers believe their innovation will accelerate the development of hydrovoltaic devices, which have great potential to power battery-free small sensor networks wherever water, heat, and sunlight are available. Examples include self-powered environmental monitoring systems, wearable devices, and internet-of-things applications. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

A bacterium's built-in compass, explained: Single-cell magnetometry confirms Earth-field alignment Some bacterial species possess an astonishing ability: They use Earth's magnetic field to orient themselves. To better understand this mechanism, the team led by Argovia-Professor Martino Poggio from the Swiss Nanoscience Institute and the Department of Physics at the University of Basel took a closer look at the "magnetotactic" bacterium Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense. Inside this bacterium is a chain of magnetic nanoparticles known as magnetosomes. These act like a biological compass and allow the bacterium to align with Earth's magnetic field. In their natural habitat, bodies of water or moist sediments, this compass helps the bacteria to advance in a systematic manner when searching for the optimal living conditions. Without this orientation, their movements would be more random, requiring greater time and energy to locate optimal oxygen levels, for example. The potential applications of these bacteria are considerable. For instance, they could be used in medicine as magnetically controllable "microrobots" for the targeted delivery of drugs. They could also be applied in wastewater treatment, with bacteria absorbing heavy metals and then being easily removed from the water using a magnet. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, made history 64 years ago on Feb 20, 1962, with his 5-hour spaceflight. Despite a few problems with the Friendship 7 spacecraft, Glenn made 3 orbits (2 of them manually controlled), and splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean. Source: @NASAhistory @EverythingScience

Scientists Finally Solved the High Altitude Diabetes Mystery People who live high in the mountains have long been observed to develop diabetes less often than those at sea level. Scientists have known about this pattern for years, but the biological reason behind it has remained unclear. Researchers at Gladstone Institutes now believe they have uncovered the answer. Their findings show that in low oxygen environments, red blood cells begin absorbing large amounts of glucose from the bloodstream, effectively acting like sugar sponges. In a study published today (February 19) in the journal Cell Metabolism, the team demonstrated that red blood cells can reprogram their metabolism under low oxygen conditions. At high altitude, this shift helps the cells deliver oxygen more effectively throughout the body. At the same time, it reduces the amount of sugar circulating in the blood. Source:SciTechDaily @EverythingScience

World's smallest QR code, read via electron microscope, earns Guinness recognition Just how small can a QR code be? Small enough that it can only be recognized with an electron microscope. A research team at TU Wien, working together with the data storage technology company Cerabyte, has now demonstrated exactly that. The QR code covers an area of just 1.98 square micrometers—smaller than most bacteria. The record has now been verified and officially entered into the Guinness World Records. The technology has enormous potential for long-term data storage: Conventional magnetic or electronic data storage systems often have lifespans of only a few years. But if information is written bit by bit into ceramic materials, it can endure for centuries or even millennia. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience

Hubble identifies a near-invisible galaxy that may be 99% dark matter Preliminary analysis suggests CDG-2 has the luminosity of roughly 6 million sun-like stars, with the globular clusters accounting for 16% of its visible content. Remarkably, 99% of its mass, which includes both visible matter and dark matter, appears to be dark matter. Much of its normal matter to enable star formation—primarily hydrogen gas—was likely stripped away by gravitational interactions with other galaxies inside the Perseus cluster. Source:Phys.org @EverythingScience