A study led by a team from the University of the Basque Country (Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea, EHU) has identified hundreds of molecular markers in saliva that could indicate the risk of serious diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and neurodegenerative diseases. Their findings lay the groundwork for the development of a powerful, non-invasive tool for early diagnosis and precision medicine. "Saliva is one of the most accessible biological fluids, yet it is still underutilized in clinical practice," said José Ramón Bilbao, Professor of Medical Genetics at the EHU and one of the study's lead authors. "Our findings show that molecular markers present in saliva can reflect systemic pathological processes outside the oral cavity." It is widely known that saliva samples are used for genetic testing, for example, to determine...

"Sleeping on it," particularly falling into a deeper sleep than a nap, may help people gain insights into certain types of problems. This is according to a study published on June 26 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Anika Löwe, Marit Petzka, Maria Tzegka, and Nicolas Schuck from the University of Hamburg and colleagues. Sometimes, when solving a problem they are working on, people experience a sudden "eureka moment," leading to sudden insights or breakthroughs. Scientists have not yet had their own "aha!" moment of insight into how this might work, although sleep appears to play a role. To better understand how sleep can lead to insights in problem-solving, the authors of this pre-registered study asked 90 people to follow a series of dots on a screen. Participants were given instructions for a seemingly simple task where they just had to follow the dots...

Four discrete cross-sectional studies among adults in the United States from 2020 to 2024 show that the proportion of U.S. adults who have high confidence in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has fallen from 82 percent in February 2020 to a low of 56 percent in June 2022. This is according to a study published on June 26, 2025, in the open-access journal PLOS Global Public Health by Amyn A. Malik and colleagues from UT Southwestern Medical Center, USA. Surveys have shown that the U.S. population's confidence in public health institutions has declined since the COVID-19 pandemic reached the United States in 2020. This study is one of the first scientific works to examine the perceptions of U.S. adults toward health institutions longitudinally from 2020 to 2024. From February 2020 to October 2024, the authors conducted four surveys with a sample of...

The discovery of an unknown organelle in our cells could open the door to new treatments for devastating inherited diseases. The organelle, a type of specialized structure, has been named "hemifusome" by its discoverers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health. This small organelle has the important job of helping our cells sort, recycle, and excrete important cargo within themselves, according to the scientists. The new discovery could help scientists better understand what goes wrong in genetic diseases that disrupt these vital functions. "It's like discovering a new recycling center in the cell," said researcher Dr. Seham Ebrahim of UVA's Department of Molecular Physiology and Biophysics. "We believe the hemifusome helps control the packaging and processing of material in cells. When this goes wrong, it can contribute to diseases,...