Scientists at the University of Cambridge tested 39 sweeteners against 25 species of gut bacteria and found that about three-quarters altered the growth of at least one species. Some slowed or stopped microbes associated with a healthy digestive system. The strongest effect came when the sweetener isosteviol was combined with the antidepressant duloxetine, which suppressed two bacteria involved in digestion and blood sugar regulation and disturbed a simulated microbiome. The study, published in Molecular Systems Biology, was done in the laboratory rather than in people, and the authors say more work is needed before drawing conclusions about human health.
NASA says its Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is producing images nearly 30% sharper than predicted after engineers moved a mirror by about one-sixteenth the width of a human hair. The Wide Field Instrument, activated in September, was tested detector by detector, then calibrated with its own internal LEDs. The instrument is central to Roman's surveys of dark matter and dark energy. Engineers say the extra sharpness will make measurements of distant galaxy shapes more accurate.
A RIKEN-led team reported single-qubit gate fidelities above 99.99 percent across a five-qubit silicon spin array, with some measurements near 99.999 percent, in a study published in Nature Physics. Crucially, the fidelities held while up to three qubits ran simultaneously on one shared microwave control line. The researchers traced crosstalk in the array and used tailored Kaiser-window pulses plus pairwise phase calibrations to suppress it. When all five qubits operated in parallel, fidelity stayed at the 99.9 percent fault-tolerant threshold or above. Silicon spin qubits can be made with standard CMOS chip tools.
A new radiocarbon dating campaign along the Qhapaq Nan, the Inca road system, is rewriting a timeline that rested on Spanish colonial records. Researchers used accelerator mass spectrometry to date material from sites across the Andes and found the empire lasted longer than the written accounts suggest, and that it met more resistance as it expanded. The work appears in this week's issue of Science. Earlier dating of Machu Picchu already showed the site was in use decades before the colonial record said.
Thousands of Adelie penguins found dead at Antarctica's Danger Islands in March 2024 were victims of avian cholera, not the H5N1 bird flu that scientists first suspected, according to a new study. Researchers swabbed and collected tissue from 49 carcasses and found the bacterial disease was the most likely cause of death for most adults examined. Genetic analysis showed the strain has circulated in Antarctica for more than two decades. The authors say avian cholera should be included in future wildlife surveillance alongside bird flu. The work was published by the Royal Society and involved researchers from the University of California, Davis.
Researchers at EPFL in Switzerland have built the first three-dimensional atlas of the brain based on fats rather than genes, published in the journal Nature. The map revealed 539 chemically distinct regions, which the team calls lipizones. Some line up with structures scientists already knew, while others mark boundaries no gene-based map had shown. Regions far apart but linked by nerve fibres often share similar lipid patterns, and white matter turned out to be a patchwork of different chemical territories. The atlas gives researchers a reference for comparing healthy and diseased tissue in Alzheimer's research.
The 2026 Nobel Prize in Physics went to Francis Halzen of the University of Wisconsin-Madison for decisive contributions to the IceCube Neutrino Observatory and the discovery of high-energy neutrinos of astrophysical origin. IceCube is buried in the clear ice beneath the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, with more than 5,000 optical sensors spread through a cubic kilometre of ice. Construction finished in 2011 and the discovery of cosmic neutrinos was announced two years later. Nobel week also honoured optogenetics, asymmetric organic synthesis and, on 12 October, the economics prize for work on macroeconomic stabilisation.
Researchers in China have used tiny structures taken from spinach leaves to feed struggling heart muscle. The team, led by Union Hospital of Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, extracted thylakoid membranes from spinach and packaged them into nanoparticles coated with membranes from heart muscle cells. Injected into the hearts of rats with induced heart failure and combined with red light, the particles improved pumping function and reduced tissue damage. The findings appear in the journal Small. The work is early: the treatment was delivered by direct heart injection, and no one has shown that enough light can reach a human heart.
Hexagon Robotics' AEON humanoid is now training inside Schaeffler's Humanoid Gym in Germany, part of an agreement to deploy at least 1,000 units across Schaeffler's global production network by 2032. Most industrial humanoid deployments are still counted in single digits, so the target marks a shift from demonstration to production planning. AEON is built for multi-purpose work: pick and place, moving boxes, inspecting parts and capturing 3D scans of plant floors. It relies on sensor fusion, spatial intelligence and physical AI, and Schaeffler supplies high-precision strain wave and planetary gear actuators for the platform, drawing on its bearing and power-transmission engineering.
Physicists at the University of Innsbruck created and observed Bethe strings, quantum bound states that Hans Bethe predicted in 1931. The team cooled caesium atoms to a few billionths of a degree above absolute zero and split the cloud into thousands of narrow one-dimensional tubes. By tuning the interactions from repulsive to attractive, the atoms bound together into clusters of several sizes, some holding six or more particles. The strings survived collisions with one another but fell apart when released into three dimensions, which freed extra energy and confirmed their presence. The results appeared in Nature Communications.