A Cup of ruby red hibiscus tea not only warms the body in winter but also is known to boost the immune system, control blood pressure, and reduce body weight. And here is yet another reason to enjoy this tea – It may defeat Alzheimer’s disease.

Professor Kyong-Tai Kim and PhD candidate Kyung Won Jo (Department of Life Sciences) at POSTECH has verified that the gossypetin found in hibiscus activates microglia, the resident immune cell in the brain. The research team also demonstrated that microglia scavenge amyloid-beta (Aβ) in the brain to ameliorate cognitive impairments brought on by Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

AD begins as Aβ and Tau protein aggregates form deposits in the brain tissue. Microglia internalize such aggregates (phagocytosis) to protect the brain...

Femtosecond pulsed lasers—which emit light in ultrafast bursts lasting a millionth of a billionth of a second—are powerful tools used in a range of applications from medicine and manufacturing, to sensing and precision measurements of space and time. Today, these lasers are typically expensive table-top systems, which limits their use in applications that have size and power consumption restrictions.

An on-chip femtosecond pulse source would unlock new applications in quantum and optical computing, astronomy, optical communications and beyond...

The Winchcombe meteorite, a rare carbonaceous meteorite which crashed onto a driveway in Gloucestershire in 2021, has been found to contain extra-terrestrial water and organic compounds that reveal insights into the origin of Earth’s oceans.

A new study, published today by Science Advances, led by experts from the Natural History Museum and the University of Glasgow reports the orbital history and first laboratory analyses of the Winchcombe meteorite, which was recovered only hours after its spectacular fireball lit up the skies over the U.K. in February 2021.

Denis Vida, a Western physics and astronomy postdoctoral associate, was a key contributor to the study...

E-cigarettes and marijuana have harmful effects on the heart similar to those caused by tobacco cigarettes, opening the door to abnormal heart rhythms, reports a team of researchers at UC San Francisco.

The study is published November 15, 2022 in the journal Heart Rhythm.

“We found that cigarettes, e-cigarettes, and marijuana greatly interfere with the electrical activity, structure, and neural regulation of the heart,” said lead author Huiliang Qiu, MD, Ph.D., a postdoctoral scholar in the UCSF Division of Cardiology. “Often, any single change can lead to arrhythmia disease. Unfortunately, these adverse effects on the heart are quite comprehensive.”

For the heart to work well, it must pump blood efficiently and with correct timing...