Disruption of the circadian clocks that keep the body and its cells entrained to the 24-hour day-night cycle plays a critical role in weight gain, according to a pair of studies by Weill Cornell Medicine investigators.

One study, published June 27, in Cell Reports revealed that stress caused by chronically administering glucocorticoid stress hormones and disturbing the normal daily cycle of release triggers a temporary protective mechanism in mice. This mechanism boosts fat cell growth and insulin production while reducing excess blood sugar and fat levels in the bloodstream and liver. The second study, published Aug...

Computers that think more like human brains are inching closer to mainstream adoption. What types of materials can serve as the best building blocks to unlock the potential of this new style of computing? For most traditional computing devices, silicon remains the gold standard. However, there is a movement to use more flexible, efficient and environmentally friendly materials for these brain-like devices.

In a new paper, researchers from The University of Texas at Austin developed synaptic transistors for brain-like computers using the thin, flexible material graphene. These transistors are similar to synapses in the brain, that connect neurons to each other.

“Computers that think like brains can do so much more than today’s devices,” said J...

Atomic clocks, combined with precise astronomical measurements, have revealed that the length of a day is suddenly getting longer, and scientists don’t know why. This has critical impacts not just on our timekeeping, but also things like GPS and other technologies that govern our modern life.

Over the past few decades, Earth’s rotation around its axis—which determines how long a day is—has been speeding up. This trend has been making our days shorter; in fact, in June 2022 we set a record for the shortest day over the past half-century or so.

But despite this record, since 2020 that steady speedup has curiously switched to a slowdown—days are getting longer again, and the reason is so far a mystery.

While the clocks in our phones indicate there are e...

Sequence modeling algorithms could eventually lead to new ways to fight diseases caused by genetic mutations. Newly developed artificial intelligence (AI) programs accurately predicted the role of DNA’s regulatory elements and three-dimensional (3D) structure based solely on its raw sequence, according to two recent studies in Nature Genetics. These tools could eventually shed new light on how genetic mutations lead to disease and could lead to new understanding of how genetic sequence influences the spatial organization and function of chromosomal DNA in the nucleus, said study author Jian Zhou, Ph.D., Assistant Professor in the Lyda Hill Department of Bioinformatics at UTSW.

“Taken together, these two programs provide a mor...