Early-life to endocrine-disrupting chemicals may fuel food preferences

sweets
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals in early life, including during gestation and infancy, results in a higher preference for sugary and fatty foods later in life, according to an animal study being presented Sunday at ENDO 2025, the Endocrine Society’s annual meeting in San Francisco, Calif.

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals are substances in the environment (air, soil or water supply), food sources, personal care products and manufactured products that interfere with the normal function of the body’s endocrine system...

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Multisynapse optical network outperforms digital AI models

Photonic multisynapse neural networks for AI computation
Photonic multisynapse neural networks for AI computation. Credit: Ting Mei (Northwestern Polytechnical University).

For decades, scientists have looked to light as a way to speed up computing. Photonic neural networks—systems that use light instead of electricity to process information—promise faster speeds and lower energy use than traditional electronics.

But despite their potential, these systems have struggled to match the accuracy of digital neural networks. A key reason: most photonic systems still mimic the structure and training methods of digital models, introducing errors when translating from software to hardware.

Now, a research team from Northwestern Polytechnical University and Southeast University in China has developed a new kind of photonic neural network tha...

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3I/ATLAS: Interstellar object ‘may be oldest comet ever seen’

Newly discovered interstellar object 'may be oldest comet ever seen'
Top view of the Milky Way galaxy showing the estimated orbits of both our sun and the 3I/ATLAS comet. 3I/ATLAS is shown in red dashed lines, and the sun is shown in yellow dotted lines. The large extent of 3I’s orbit into the outer thick disk is clear, while the sun stays nearer the core of the galaxy. Credit: M. Hopkins/Ōtautahi-Oxford team. Base map: ESA/Gaia/DPAC, Stefan Payne-Wardenaar, CC-BY-SA 4.0

A mystery interstellar object discovered last week is likely to be the oldest comet ever seen—possibly predating our solar system by more than 3 billion years, researchers say.

The “water ice-rich” visitor, named 3I/ATLAS, is only the third known object from beyond our solar system ever spotted in our cosmic neighborhood and the first to reach us from a completely different regi...

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From 0 to 100 in 12 minutes—roadmap for lithium–sulfur batteries

From 0 to 100 in 12 minutes—roadmap for lithium-sulfur batteries
Key challenges (red background) and potential solutions (green background) for fast-charging LSBs. Credit: Advanced Energy Materials (2025). DOI: 10.1002/aenm.202404383

Grab a coffee and your car is fully charged—this is how many people envision the future of mobility. But today’s batteries still fall short of this ideal. While modern lithium–ion batteries can charge from 20% to 80% in about 20 to 30 minutes, a full charge takes considerably longer—and fast charging puts significant stress on the cells.

A new international review study published in the journal Advanced Energy Materials now shows how lithium–sulfur batteries (LSBs) could overcome these limitations.

Researchers from Germany, India, and Taiwan—coordinated by Dr...

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