Peer-reviewed studyNature
Mouse study shows lung alveolar cells can migrate and help repair airways
This peer-reviewed study in Nature used lineage tracing in mice to show that alveolar type 2 (AT2) cells migrate into injured bronchioles and turn into club cells and ciliated cells. The authors report that immune cells release a signal molecule called SPP1 that guides these cells, and that Notch signalling drives the change into club cells. They say the findings may inform therapeutic strategies for airway injury.
- Published
- Oct 7, 2026
DOI 10.1038/s41586-026-11127-w
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Preprint links personality traits to completing COVID-19 vaccination in Japan
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of a cross-sectional web survey of 7,210 Japanese adults. Higher extraversion and lower openness were linked to completing the primary COVID-19 vaccination series, and agreeableness was linked to vaccination among men but not women. The authors describe these as modest but meaningful associations and recommend personality-tailored, gender-responsive messages in campaigns.
- Published
- Oct 7, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.04.26363389
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Routine clinical data could help target frailty screening, a preprint suggests
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, that analyzes UK Biobank data on adults with chronic diseases. A model using 12 routinely collected clinical measures found that screening the 20% of people at highest predicted risk would identify 55.6% of frailty cases, a 2.78-fold improvement over random screening. The authors suggest this could support scalable frailty screening without adding testing burden or clinical workload.
- Published
- Oct 7, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.05.26364730
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Drebrin protein appears to help respiratory syncytial virus particles leave cells
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of laboratory experiments on cells infected with respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). The researchers found that the cell protein drebrin interacts with a viral protein, and that reducing drebrin lowered virus particle release while increasing it raised release. A second cell protein, TM9SF2, is linked to drebrin during infection and also affects release, which suggests both help RSV particles leave infected cells.
- Published
- Oct 7, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.05.756730
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Blocking ceramide synthesis slowed aortic valve disease in mice, a preprint reports
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, combining human aortic valve samples, human valve cells and mouse experiments on calcific aortic valve disease. The authors found higher long-chain ceramides in calcified human valves, and that inhibiting serine palmitoyltransferase (SPT) with Myriocin lowered valve ceramides and slowed disease in mice, even when treatment began after disease was established. They say SPT inhibition may be a tractable strategy for medical therapy, though the work so far has been done in mice and cells.
- Published
- Oct 7, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.07.757226
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Targeting microglial P2Y12 receptors reduced neuron loss in experimental Parkinson's
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, reporting experiments in experimental Parkinsonism in which the microglial P2Y12 receptor was deleted or blocked by new antagonists. Deleting it reduced dopaminergic neuron loss, preserved dopamine synthesis, dampened inflammation and improved motor deficits, and it stayed protective when deleted after neurodegeneration had started. One candidate antagonist given centrally reproduced the protective effect, which the authors describe as proof of concept.
- Published
- Oct 8, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.02.756181
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Carbapenem-resistant E. coli clone ST361 is emerging in urinary tract infections
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, analyzing 20,331 Escherichia coli genomes from urinary tract infection and urine samples. It identifies sequence type ST361 as an emerging carbapenem-resistant clone with near pan-drug resistance, driven by the blaNDM-5 gene, and reports that a conserved Klebsiella-like surface polysaccharide contributes to virulence in mouse urinary tract infection models. The authors also describe how plasmids and insertion elements help spread blaNDM-5.
- Published
- Oct 8, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.05.755231
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Gut bacteria linked to emotional lability in a preprint genetic analysis
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of a Mendelian randomization study, which uses genetic variation to test possible causal links between gut microbiota and emotional lability (EL), a symptom that cuts across diagnoses. The strongest effect was RUG013 sp001486445 (odds ratio 1.500), and CAG-485 sp002362485 was linked to a 39.8% higher risk for each standard deviation increase. The authors say reverse analyses ruled out reverse causality, and that CAG-485 is specific to EL and correlated with glycine, serine and threonine metabolites.
- Published
- Oct 8, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.06.26364911
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Bisphenol mixtures altered heart and brain function in zebrafish larvae
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of experiments on zebrafish larvae exposed to mixtures of BPS, BPF and BPAF, with or without BPA, at ng/L concentrations. The mixtures caused 4.16% and 6.54% mortality, slower heartbeats and reduced swimming, along with altered brain oscillations and shorter, less branched brain blood vessels. The authors say these effects were not predicted by a concentration-addition model, which predicted no toxicity.
- Published
- Oct 8, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.06.752046
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Lung PET scan may detect influenza treatment response before CT changes in mice
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of experiments in mice infected with H1N1 influenza and treated with favipiravir, baloxavir marboxil or ribavirin. The researchers report that lung [18F]-fluorodeoxyglucose PET uptake and metabolic lung volume fell as early as 3 days after infection, before improvements showed on CT and respiratory function. They say the scan may provide an early, quantitative measure of antiviral response that could be evaluated further as a pharmacodynamic endpoint.
- Published
- Oct 8, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.06.756978
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Herpes simplex virus 1 appears to reduce gp130 cytokine receptors on infected cells
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of laboratory experiments on herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1), which establishes lifelong latency in sensory neurons. The researchers found that infection downmodulates several gp130 family cytokine receptors, partly through the viral RNase VHS, which they suggest is an immune-evasion strategy. They also report that CNTF can reactivate latent HSV-1 in an in vitro model, a effect the authors say is similar to one reported for IL-6.
- Published
- Oct 8, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.06.757054
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Tumor niche cells shape how gene interactions drive metastasis, a preprint suggests
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of experiments in mice on lung metastasis, combining CRISPR perturbations of tumor genes with depletion of host myeloid populations. The authors report that the metastatic niche first selects cells by gene-by-gene epistatic fitness and then makes their transcriptomes converge, and that removing myeloid populations changed the epistasis landscape even with identical tumor genotypes. They suggest the tissue niche sets how genetic interactions become different phenotypes.
- Published
- Oct 9, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.02.756296
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Replication stress from chemotherapy may block red cell maturation in lab cells
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of in vitro erythroid differentiation of human cord-blood CD34+ progenitor cells treated with chemotherapy agents. The researchers found that treated cells differentiated faster than controls but failed to mature, with fewer enucleated cells, and that inhibiting ATR reproduced this effect. They propose defective maturation as an additional mechanism of chemotherapy-induced anemia, alongside depletion of progenitors.
- Published
- Oct 9, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.07.754672
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Compressive stress slows protein production in cells through a calcium checkpoint
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of laboratory experiments showing that compressive stress activates Piezo1, releasing calcium from the endoplasmic reticulum, which slows protein production through several mechanisms. The authors say these mechanisms help tumour cells adapt to mechanical constraint, and in a public pancreatic cancer patient dataset, eEF2K expression correlated with poor overall survival.
- Published
- Oct 9, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.07.757237
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Protein design framework CheMoDesign uses chemistry beyond the canonical twenty
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, describing CheMoDesign, a generative framework for designing proteins from scratch around user-specified chemistry such as modified or noncanonical residues. The authors report single-round experimental campaigns in which designs recognized thrombin and HER2 in a modification-dependent way, and a light-activated covalent PD-L1 binder. They also report an isoform-selective CA IX inhibitor with a KD of 45 nM.
- Published
- Oct 9, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.757794
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Glycemic control kept improving over five years in a remote diabetes program
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of a retrospective cohort study of 56,754 adults with type 2 diabetes (T2D) in the Teladoc Health Remote Diabetes Monitoring Program (RDMP) from 2021 to 2025. Estimated A1c (eA1c) fell by 0.06 percentage points a year, and the authors attribute most of the change in the adjusted trend to cardiorenal-protective medicines, with program engagement pulling in the opposite direction. They say the results show durable improvement but do not establish causal effects.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.26363772
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Metabolic profiling shows childhood obesity is more varied than current labels
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of a cross-sectional study of 267 children and adolescents with obesity, using serum 1H-NMR spectroscopy. The researchers found that the metabolically healthy and unhealthy obesity labels capture part of metabolic variation but not all, and identified two data-driven metabolic profiles that only partly overlapped with them. The authors say metabolomic profiling may refine cardiometabolic risk stratification, but it requires confirmation in independent cohorts.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.26365018
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Gene risk scores by brain cell type show overlap across neurodegenerative diseases
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of UK Biobank analyses using polygenic risk scores restricted to genes expressed in microglia, astrocytes, oligodendrocytes and neurons. The authors report substantial overlap between the cell-type gene sets, with APOE in all of them, and that these scores explained 60-93% of the genetic liability for diseases in which dementia is a major feature. They also report that Alzheimer's disease showed associations across all cell types, while Parkinson's disease with and without dementia and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) had distinct genetic profiles.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.26365054
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Longer obesity linked to higher heart stress and injury markers at age 62
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of 4,901 participants in the 1958 National Child Development Study, a birth cohort study. Longer duration of obesity was associated with higher concentrations of NT-proBNP, hs-cTnI and GDF-15 at age 62, markers of myocardial stress, injury and cellular stress, and among men, ever having been obese was linked to 11.00% higher hs-cTnI. These are associations from a cohort study, so they do not establish that obesity causes the difference.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.26365055
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Bacterial genes add little to predicting death from bloodstream infection
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of 35,746 bloodstream infections in Calgary, Canada, from 2006 to 2022, combining microbial genomes, proteomes and electronic medical records. Machine learning on the medical records predicted 30-day mortality with an area under the curve of 0.83, but adding more than 70,000 microbial genes and proteins did not improve it. The authors conclude that microbial virulence factors have minimal impact on mortality from bloodstream infections.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.26365081
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Daylight saving clock changes cause short-lived sleep disruption, preprint reports
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of preregistered analyses of Fitbit sleep data from the All of Us Research Program. It compares 13 seasonal clock changes in Colorado, New Mexico and Utah with the same dates in Arizona, where clocks do not change, across 1,522 participants. The authors report that sleep changed more from night to night after the spring transition in the Mountain states, and that the typical return to usual sleep took two nights, similarly in Arizona, so the quick return should not be read as the length of recovery from daylight saving time itself.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.08.26365089
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Avian influenza H7N7 infection found in a Taiwan poultry worker, a preprint reports
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, reporting a human infection with low pathogenic avian influenza A(H7N7) virus in a poultry worker in Taiwan in 2026. The authors say the virus was related to viruses circulating in Asian wild birds and carried the PB2 E627K change, which they describe as a mammalian adaptation marker. They say enhanced surveillance of H7 viruses in poultry and rapid characterization of human cases are essential to assess pandemic potential.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.09.26365013
Preprint, not peer-reviewedmedRxiv
Social media signals of depression fall to near chance for unseen users
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, testing models that use 20,000 tweets from 72 users and two synthetic datasets to flag depression and stress. When whole users were held out, a term-weighted model dropped from an area under the curve of 0.835 to 0.595, near chance, because it largely recognized users and their topics. The authors conclude that digital distress signals should be validated across individuals, on real linked data and at realistic prevalence before informing public health surveillance.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.09.26365101
Preprint, not peer-reviewedbioRxiv
Model forecasts next-year changes in antimicrobial resistance genes
This is a preprint, not yet reviewed by other scientists, of a model trained on AMRFinderPlus-annotated genomes of Klebsiella pneumoniae and Acinetobacter baumannii that forecasts, for each resistance gene, whether a new allele will emerge or the most common allele will change the following year. The authors report that the model ranked genes by risk better than simple baselines in both organisms, including genes it had not seen during training. They say models should be built and validated separately for each organism, since performance and what it depends on differ between them.
- Published
- Oct 11, 2026
DOI 10.64898/2026.10.10.758085