Improving Health and Medicine

May 2, 2023

Plant Research Reaches a New High

A South African plant called a woolly umbrella is completely unrelated to the cannabis plant, yet it makes a slew of the active compounds found in cannabis – cannabinoids –...

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April 28, 2023

Decades-Old Mystery of Red Blood Cell Production Finally Solved

To get life-giving oxygen into every cell, the human body produces two to three million oxygen-carrying red blood cells, or erythrocytes, each second – about one-quarter of all the new...

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November 20, 2022

Down to the Synapse: Connecting Brain Circuits to Behaviour

When a threat is looming and an escape route is open, one would expect any animal to flee imminent danger. But when microscopic worms faced a threatening signal in a...

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November 18, 2022

Weizmann Institute scientists reveal how viruses outwit cellular immune systems

We are used to thinking of the immune system as a separate entity, almost a distinct organ, but the truth is much more complicated. Breakthroughs in recent years – some...

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August 26, 2022

Neurons Caught Rapidly Switching Gears

Even during routine tasks such as a daily stroll, our brain needs to shift gears, switching from navigating the city to jumping out of the way of a bike or...

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August 20, 2022

Sweetness That Comes at a Price: Sugar Substitutes May Affect the Human Body in Unanticipated Ways

Non-nutritive sweeteners – also known as sugar substitutes or artificial sweeteners – are supposed to deliver all the sweetness of sugar without the calories. But a controlled trial conducted by...

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August 5, 2022

The Viruses That Fight Disease: A Surprising Precision Weapon against Crohn’s and Ulcerative Colitis

The myriads of microbes in our gut, collectively termed the microbiome, are considered important to our health, but they can also harbour bacteria that contribute to inflammatory bowel disease or...

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August 3, 2022

Without Egg, Sperm or Womb: Synthetic Mouse Embryo Models Created Solely from Stem Cells, Outside the Uterus

An egg meets a sperm – that’s a necessary first step in life’s beginnings, and it’s also a common first step in embryonic development research. But in a Weizmann Institute...

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June 28, 2022

Curbing Candida: The Cells That Keep Fungal Infections at Bay

Of all the fungi that live in the human body, the most infamous is probably the yeast Candida. This distant cousin of baker’s yeast is notorious for causing various types...

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June 25, 2022

Scent of a Friend: Similarities in Body Odour May Contribute to Social Bonding

Weizmann Institute of Science researchers have found that people may have a tendency to form friendships with individuals who have a similar body odour.  The researchers were even able to...

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June 1, 2022

Changing the Channel: Study Sheds New Light on a Promising Antidepressant

Ketamine, a well-known anaesthetic used in smaller doses as a party drug, was hailed as a “new hope for depression” in a Time magazine cover story in 2017. Two years...

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May 27, 2022

Settled at Birth: Blood Vessels Remember Their Origins

Our family origins tend to shape our future in many ways. A Weizmann Institute of Science study, published in Nature, found that the same holds true for blood vessels. The...

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April 6, 2022

Getting Under the Skin of an Autoimmune Disorder

Supporting actors sometimes steal the show, and in a new study published this week in Cell, researchers, headed by Professor Ido Amit at the Weizmann Institute of Science, showed that...

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April 1, 2022

Mutations in Noncoding DNA Protect the Brain from ALS

Genetic mutations linked to a disease often spell bad news. Mutations in over 25 genes, for example, are associated with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and they all increase the risk...

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February 1, 2022

Tracking Multiple Genes with Flying Colours

Even fans of black-and-white film cannot deny that colour brought new life to photography and motion pictures – but when it comes to learning what happens inside the body, there’s...

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January 24, 2022

A Noninvasive Test for Gut Inflammation

Today, people suspected of having inflammatory bowel disease are often required to undergo a colonoscopy, an invasive procedure performed under anaesthesia. A new method developed at the Weizmann Institute of...

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December 22, 2021

Muscle Repair Study Could Lead to Better Cultivated Meat

One day the Weizmann Institute of Science’s Professor Eldad Tzahor peered into his lab’s microscope and saw steak. As part of Tzahor’s research into repairing muscle tissue, Dr Tamar Eigler,...

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December 12, 2021

Going Out with a Bang

In the not-so-distant past, the discovery of a supernova – an exploding star – was considered a rare occasion. For example, when Professor Avishay Gal-Yam of the Weizmann Institute’s Particle...

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December 11, 2021

Gut Microbes May Drive Weight Gain after Smoking Cessation

Cigarette smoking, practiced by over a billion people worldwide, is considered a leading cause of disease, accounting for over six million deaths each year. Many people don’t quit smoking, despite...

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December 11, 2021

Insulin-Making Cells Discovered in Foetal Gut

An exclusive ‘licence’ for making insulin in the human body belongs to the beta cells scattered throughout the pancreas. But because beta cells can become scarce or dysfunctional in people...

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