Life is full of choices. For instance, I chose to take on the responsibility of one Good News Roundup a month. That’s a huge choice in my life because I’m not a natural optimist. Many people (including me) wallow in indifference and even despair for their entire lives. However, even in the darkest of times, there is hope.
I’ve thought about the Greek myth of Pandora’s Box a lot recently. Here’s a recap of the myth if you’ve forgotten or aren’t familiar with it.
Pandora, whose name means “all-gifted,” was blessed by the gods with numerous talents and charms. She was beautiful, clever, and alluring. However, she was also given less desirable traits – most notably, an insatiable curiosity.
Before sending Pandora to earth, Zeus gave her a jar (in later versions, a box) which he warned her never to open. Epimetheus, in his shortsightedness, failed to heed his brother’s warnings about accepting gifts from the gods. He allowed Pandora into his home, and inevitably, her curiosity got the better of her.
When Pandora opened the jar, she unleashed all manner of evils and miseries into the world – sickness, death, sorrow, strife, and many others. She closed the jar quickly, but it was too late. The damage had been done. Only one thing remained in the jar – hope.
America chose to open their own Pandora’s Box on November 5th, 2024. It unleashed all of the nastiness found inherent within our society that was always bubbling beneath the surface. But it also unleashed the seeds of its own redemption: hope and solidarity.
We at the Good News Roundup choose hope instead of fear, good news instead of doomscrolling, and love instead of hate. We’re not naïve — we know that the forces of evil are strong and currently have power in the halls of Washington, D.C. However, we also know that the forces for good are strong too!
Thus begins my first effort at writing a Good News Roundup...
😡 We’re Not Gonna Take It Anymore! 😡
Swasticars taking a hit in Europe.
Trump Policies Draw Outrage at May Day Protests Across the US
Annual May Day rallies proclaim the cause of workers in the United States and across the globe. But this year, demonstrations in the United States were supercharged with the breadth of the anti-Trump movement, as outcry continued to grow over the president’s agenda and expansion of executive power.
Protesters denounced the administration’s effort to roll back workers’ rights — a particular sore spot on a day dedicated to celebrating organized labor — as well as plans to cut education funding and carry out mass deportations.
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Similar scenes unfolded across the country, as the police closed streets for the crowds in major cities including New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and Washington.
But protesters also rallied in small communities that voted overwhelmingly for President Trump, including Norman, Okla.; Sauk City, Wis.; and Hendersonville, N.C. Groups held signs in front of municipal buildings and public schools, and some demonstrators wore red to indicate their support for public education.
The protests continued in Chicago into the weekend after May Day passed.
Let’s do it all again in June 14th!
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“If you are watching this right now and you’re thinking I don’t want a king in this county, good news: Neither do we. And you can be part of this.” - @ezralevin.bsky.social
We’re mobilizing nationwide on June 14 to say No Kings. Find an event near you or start one: www.nokings.org?SQF_SOURCE=i...
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— Indivisible (@indivisible.org) May 5, 2025 at 10:02 PM
💪 Not Afraid To Take a Stand 💪
Looks like another town hall went off the rails. This time, Rep. Mike Lawler (NY-17) was the member of the GOP targeted.
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🧵
NY-17 Rep. Mike Lawler had a local social worker physically dragged out of his town hall Sunday night.
Emily Feiner was singled out by private security, lifted out of her seat, as the crowd chanted “let her stay” and “shame, shame.”
She’s a constituent.
Not a threat.
Fascism again.
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— Jennifer ✨Get In Good Trouble (@thejenniwren.teamlh.social) May 4, 2025 at 9:23 PM
We’re holding town halls in every corner of the country.
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In DEEP RED Adams County, Pennsylvania, I held a town hall with hundreds of people — led by local organizers — because GOP Rep. Joyce and Sen. McCormick refuse to show up.
But if we keep showing up for and with each other, we will meet this moment.
@democrats.org
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— Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (@malcolmkenyatta.bsky.social) May 4, 2025 at 6:42 PM
Go Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon! Making Pennsylvania’s 5th district proud!
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Scanlon: The Gulf of Mexico was so named over 500 years ago. If we want to update that name to reflect our current culture, maybe we should call it the Sea of Emoluments—you know, the place where we can board the Ship of Fools and navigate from a State of Ignorance to the Confederacy of Dunces…
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— Acyn (@acyn.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 2:36 PM
Love me some Rep. Jasmine Crockett. Expect to see her in almost every GNR I write!
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Crockett: Instead of the President cosplaying as the next pope, he may want to cosplay as an actual President of these United States. That means he may have to do a little bit of research and understand that he swore a an oath to defend and protect the constitution.
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— Acyn (@acyn.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 5:06 PM
A rare time a member of the GOP is making the good news. I’ll take it, especially since Ed Martin is a crooked nutjob.
🐈🐕Pootie/Woozle Video Break 🐈🐕
⚖ Trump Fought the Law and the Law WON! ⚖
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🚨BREAKING: Federal District Court REJECTS Republican effort to overturn North Carolina Supreme Court election result. Orders the state to certify the results of the election and not proceed with the cure process. Congratulations to our clients, the ELG team, Justice Riggs and the voters of NC!
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— Marc Elias (@marcelias.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 6:54 PM
US Appeals Court Rejects Attempt to Strip Status from Thousands of Immigrants
A federal appeals court rejected on Monday a request by U.S. President
Donald Trump's administration to allow it to revoke the temporary legal status of hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans living in the United States.
The Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
declined, opens new tab to put on hold a judge's order halting the Department of Homeland Security's move to cut short a two-year "parole" granted to the migrants under Trump's Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden.
Jumpstart your morning with the latest legal news delivered straight to your inbox from The Daily Docket newsletter. Sign up here.
The administration's action marked an expansion of the Republican president's
hardline crackdown on immigration and push to ramp up deportations, including of noncitizens previously granted a legal right to live and work in the United States.
The administration argued Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had discretion to categorically end the migrants' status and that the judge's order was forcing the U.S. government to "retain hundreds of thousands of aliens in the country against its will."
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Pressure works. RFK Jr. is reportedly restoring FDA's FOIA office following our lawsuit challenging the firing of records staff.
That's good news, but CDC's FOIA office is still illegally shuttered. We'll keep fighting for transparency until all of HHS complies with the law.
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— CREW (@citizensforethics.org) May 5, 2025 at 4:33 PM
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COURT ODDS AND ENDS: A federal judge has temporarily blocked the CIA from firing Dr. Terry Adirim, who claims the agency targeted her for termination after criticism by Laura Loomer and Ivan Raiklin.
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 5:11 PM
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MORE: Another judge has sounded the alarm on the Trump administration's alleged violations of due process in immigration proceedings. Judge Larence Valardo said the administration view of due process was "downright frightening." storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
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— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 5:11 PM
Judge Orders Dept of Education to Restore Pandemic Relief Funds
The U.S. Department of Education must abide by earlier promises to give states more time to spend COVID relief money, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.
U.S. District Court Judge Edgardo Ramos issued the preliminary injunction in response to a lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James, 15 other Democratic attorneys general, and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro.
The injunction only applies in the states that sued and not nationwide. California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, and New Jersey are among the states that joined New York and Pennsylvania in the lawsuit.
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NEWS: Second federal judge continues blocking AEA removals or transfers today, this time in the Colorado case.
Judge Sweeney, who previously issued a TRO, grants a preliminary injunction blocking all AEA proclamation-based removals, regardless of notice. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
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— Chris Geidner (@chrisgeidner.bsky.social) May 6, 2025 at 6:49 PM
Don’t know what the Trump regime’s angle is with this…
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Court filings revealed the Department of Justice will not appeal a judge’s order blocking part of President Trump’s election order that imposed a documentary proof of citizenship requirement when registering to vote — a major win for voters.
— Laurence H. Tribe (@tribelaw.bsky.social) May 6, 2025 at 8:06 PM
❎The Times They Are a Changing ❎
Quality Candidates are Lining Up to Take on Republicans
An important difference between this cycle compared to this same point eight years ago is that far more high-quality candidates have announced for Congress in swingy seats currently held by the GOP, despite the fact that Democrats go into this election already holding more House seats than eight years ago.
In 2017, through the end of April, 24 seats held by Republicans had at least one declared Democratic candidate, but only five of these seats featured a candidate who had previously won elective office. This year, there are 17 seats held by Republicans with an announced Democratic candidate, but 10 of these races have at least one challenger with elective office experience.
Meanwhile, prominent electable GOP candidates are shying away from running.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp NOT Running for Senate in 2026
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp will not run for Senate in 2026, according to three people familiar with his decision. The popular Republican would have been a prime recruit against first-term Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff.
“I have decided that being on the ballot next year is not the right decision for me and my family,” Kemp said in a statement posted on X. “I spoke with President Trump and Senate leadership earlier today and expressed my commitment to work alongside them to ensure we have a strong Republican nominee who can win next November.”
The Senate math is tough. Democrats have a plan to expand the map.
Trump is causing a backlash in the western world against far-right politics.
The far-right (mostly) lost big in the suburbs of Texas for school board races last Saturday.
It was a tough night for MAGA-aligned candidates in Texas. In the May 3, 2025, local elections, voters across the state decisively rejected far-right candidates, particularly in school board and city council races. From Tarrant County to Collin County, and from San Antonio to Dallas, communities chose leaders who prioritize public education, inclusivity, and pragmatic governance over culture wars and partisan agendas. This widespread shift signals a growing resistance to extremist politics at the local level.
Voters across Texas sent a message loud enough to rattle the far-right out of their echo chambers: we’re done with your culture wars, your book bans, and your crusade against public schools. Voters chose community over chaos, educators over agitators, and progress over extremism.
The local elections weren’t just a series of wins but a sweep. MAGA-backed candidates got absolutely trounced across the state. This was the result of deep organizing, years of work by local Democrats, and voters who are fed up with the far-right hijacking of school boards and city councils to push their agenda.
Texas isn’t turning blue overnight, but make no mistake: the MAGA movement had a very bad night, and the momentum is shifting.
The people who ultimately chose Trump (low engagement voters) are the ones souring on him the fastest and deepest.
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New piece: Trump’s approval rating among low-engagement voters has fallen 30 points since Jan, the worst decline for any group. The GOP’s big advantage with hard-to-reach voters has evaporated as economic turmoil & toxic politics turns them away from Trump
www.gelliottmorris.com/p/what-do-di...
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— G Elliott Morris (@gelliottmorris.com) May 6, 2025 at 8:09 AM
None of the articles shared below constitute an endorsement by bilboteach or the GNR. We respect the primary process and will allow it to play out.
We have our first notable candidate for CO-03 against Rep. Jeff Hurd in Alex Kelloff
Old Snowmass’ Alex Kelloff announced on Wednesday he will run for U.S. Congress.
The fourth-generation Coloradan and co-founder of Armada Skis formally entered on Tuesday into the race for Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District. He will run as a Democrat in the November 2026 election.
“Everything that holds this country together — honor, integrity, common sense, the rule of law, mutual respect — is under attack,” Kelloff said in a press release. “Donald Trump and his followers, including Lauren Boebert and her successor, Jeff Hurd, are tearing at the fabric of our democracy and undermining the very institutions that protect our freedoms. I can’t sit back and watch it happen.”
We have our first notable candidate for NE-02 against Rep. Don Bacon in Denise Powell.
Denise Powell, known for her role boosting new candidates with Women Who Run, is running for Congress in 2026 in Nebraska’s 2nd District.
Powell told the Nebraska Examiner on Wednesday that she is running because many people in the Omaha area have lost a “voice in D.C.,” and the district needs more of an “everyday working” person to represent them.
She said she would prioritize protecting Medicaid and Social Security, vote to ensure the federal government does its part to boost quality K-12 education and push back against the Trump administration.
We have our second notable candidate for PA-07 against Rep. Ryan Mackenzie in Carol Orbando-Derstine.
Democrat Carol Obando-Derstine, a onetime staffer for former U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, launched a campaign Thursday to oust Republican U.S. Rep. Ryan Mackenzie from his seat in Lehigh Valley’s 7th Congressional District — a race that could have significant implications for the balance of the U.S. House in the 2026 election.
Former Democratic U.S. Rep. Susan Wild, who held the seat for three terms before Mackenzie bested her last November by a single percentage point, endorsed Obando-Derstine, ending speculation about whether Wild would seek a rematch.
Obando-Derstine, 48, who escaped civil war in her native Colombia with her family when she was 3, has lived in the Lehigh Valley for 22 years.
She is running for Congress, she said, because “too many families are being squeezed by a system that puts billionaires and special interests first.” She added, “I know the struggles our families are facing because I’ve lived them.”
We have our first notable candidate for IA-03 against Rep. Zach Nunn in Sarah Trone Garriott.
State Sen. Sarah Trone Garriott is launching her campaign for the Democratic nomination in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District as she seeks to challenge Republican U.S. Rep. Zach Nunn in 2026.
Trone Garriott, 46, is the first candidate to jump into the race in what is expected to be one of the country's most competitive congressional contests next year. She shared her plans in an exclusive interview with the Des Moines Register.
"I see public service as a calling," she said. "And what I’m hearing from the people in my district, from the people in Iowa, is that life is getting really challenging. Folks are struggling with rising costs. They’re not able to make ends meet for their families. And they need someone who is speaking out on behalf of their interests and their concerns and making sure that their priorities are being heard in Washington. And that’s what I do."
It’s a stretch seat, but we have our first notable candidate for NC-11 against Rep. Chuck Edwards in Moe Davis.
Retired Air Force Col. Moe Davis is stepping back into familiar turf — running for Congress in North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District.
“I just keep looking at what Chuck Edwards is not doing for the district,” Davis told The Smoky Mountain News May 5. “People here are hurting, particularly after Helene, and they deserve somebody that's going to work for them, rather than for the billionaire out-of-state donors that own Chuck Edwards.”
A Shelby native, Davis graduated from Appalachian State University with a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice before earning his J.D. from North Carolina Central University School of Law. Davis went on to serve as a lawyer in the U.S. Air Force for 25 years, working as chief prosecutor for the Guantanamo Bay military commissions in 2005. In 2007, he resigned in protest over political interference and the use of evidence obtained through torture and became a prominent critic of detainee policies. Davis also worked for the Congressional Research Service and as a professor at Howard University School of Law. Recently, he’s served as co-host of American Muckrakers podcast “Muck You” alongside David Wheeler.
🌍We are the World🌎
33 West Africans Freed from Human Trafficking Ring
Police raids have rescued 33 West Africans from a human trafficking ring in Ivory Coast that lured people into paying fees and providing coerced labor by promising them jobs in Canada, the international police agency Interpol said Tuesday.
Victims paid as much as $9,000 to supposed recruiters who instead trafficked them to the city of Abidjan in the Ivory Coast, where they were held under physical and psychological coercion, the agency said in a statement.
They also were forced to help scam others with the same promise of finding a job abroad by taking photos of themselves in upscale restaurants and hotels and posting them online as though they were in Canada. The traffickers allowed them limited contact with their families to maintain the illusion of living overseas.
Germany might know a thing or two about far-right politics and the consequences thereof…
Less-Thirsty Rice Offers Hope During Chilean Drought
A cold, dry part of Chile might not sound like the best place to grow rice, a famously thirsty grain that thrives in tropical conditions. But a new strain of the world's favorite cereal developed by scientists in the drought-plagued South American country has generated hope that rice can be grown in seemingly inhospitable conditions.
Using an innovative planting technique, Javier Munoz has been trialling the "Jaspe" strain created by experts at the Agricultural Research Institute's (INIA) Rice Breeding Program.
It is one of several research efforts worldwide to come up with less resource-hungry crops at a time of increased water scarcity in parts of the world due to global warming.
Using Jaspe in combination with a growing method that requires only intermittent watering cut the Munoz family's water consumption in half in a country that has for generations cultivated rice in flooded fields, or paddies.
At the same time, yield rocketed, with each seed yielding about thirty plants -- nearly ten times more than a conventional rice field.
🎶Song of the Day🎶
🧪Don’t Stop Believing (in Science) 🧪
In the interests of full disclosure, I will say the one area where I am fatalist is the climate crisis. That won’t stop me from bringing good climate and science news to the Good News Roundup!
Startup Company Turning to Seaweed for Critical Minerals
On farms off the coast of Alaska and in Mexico, a company called Blue Evolution grows seaweed used in food and skincare products. But five years ago, while studying the potential for seaweed to be used in bioenergy, the company discovered something else: The algae also contains critical minerals.
The research, conducted with Pacific Northwest National Labs, identified the presence of scandium, an expensive rare earth element that’s produced in tiny volumes globally. The seaweed also contains other rare earth elements and platinum group metals that can be used to make products ranging from EV batteries to motors for wind turbines. “That generated a lot of excitement,” says Beau Perry, CEO of Blue Evolution. “Everyone was like, ‘Can you mine with seaweed?’”
The company undertook more research into the area, and today it launched a new initiative, Orca Minerals, that’s focused on the new form of mining. Instead of blasting rocks or the seabed, the process makes use of the fact that seaweed naturally absorbs minerals from seawater as it grows.
Mushrooms can help remediate brownfields along with certain other plants!
Scientists Hone in on Alternatives to PFAS
PFAS have been linked to a range of health issues, from high cholesterol to cancer. Some researchers are investigating how to break down PFAS in the environment, while others — like Eastoe — are developing fluorine-free alternatives.
To replace PFAS, scientists need to find a way to keep a material’s surface energy low without invoking fluorine. Eastoe and colleagues report that for PFAS acting as surfactants, chains of mostly carbon and silicon atoms with a bulky, tree branch–like structure can take the place of fluorine-rich fragments.
The researchers determined the surface tension of solutions containing water and the fluorine-free surfactants at different concentrations, usually by measuring the force required to pull a metal plate out of each solution. These tests suggest that the surfactants’ “branches” pack tightly at the surface of a water droplet to reduce the surface tension. Some of the best-performing alternatives reduced the water’s surface tension about as well as PFAS surfactants in use today.
Perhaps Planet Nine exists after all? A LOT of work needed to confirm it still but this is the most solid lead yet.
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Astronomers have identified a potential candidate for the elusive Planet Nine by analyzing infrared sky surveys taken 23 years apart. The object, possibly more massive than Neptune, resides approximately 700 times farther from the Sun than Earth
🧪🔭
#PlanetNine
#Astronomy
#InfraredSurvey
#SolarSystem
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— Kenneth Becker (@geophotographer.org) May 2, 2025 at 6:07 PM
Scientists Can Turn Rain into Electricity
This is what engineer Siowling Soh—from the National University of Singapore—and his research team realized when they tried to generate electricity by catching rainwater in tubes.
“The setup is simple; no equipment is needed,” they said in a study recently published in ACS Central Science. “Hence, it is inexpensive and environmentally friendly to install, operate, and maintain […] scaling up can be achieved readily in three dimensions for large-scale harvesting of energy from nature. It can be used anywhere, including in urbanized areas.”
Previous experiments had tried to use water flowing through nanoscale tubes to capture electric charge. However, not only does the charge from flowing water decay more rapidly, but when tubes that small are used, that charge becomes just about negligible. It is also unnatural for water to flow through nano-tubes, which is why Soh stresses that macroscale tubes on the scale of at least millimeters wide should be used to harvest electricity from natural sources of water.
Solar storms are a HUGE deal. Read up on the Carrington Event of 1859. This telescope studies the sun and could be key to helping us predict these events.
Two Scientific Societies Step into Climate Report Void
Two major scientific societies on Friday said they will try to fill the void from the Trump administration’s dismissal of scientists writing a cornerstone federal report on what climate change is doing to the United States.
The American Meteorological Society and the American Geophysical Union said they will work together to produce peer-reviewed research documents assessing the current and future national impacts of climate change because a science-based report required by law is suddenly in question under President Donald Trump.
Energy storage of solar, wind, etc. is the ballgame — and it is getting better all the time!
Farmers Making Bank on Newest Crop: Solar Energy
Around the world, farmers are retooling their land to harvest the hottest new commodity: sunlight. As the price of renewable energy technology has plummeted and water has gotten more scarce, growers are fallowing acreage and installing solar panels. Some are even growing crops beneath them, which is great for plants stressed by too many rays. Still others are letting that shaded land go wild, providing habitat for pollinators and fodder for grazing livestock.
According to a new study, this practice of agrisolar has been quite lucrative for farmers in California’s Central Valley over the last 25 years — and for the environment. Researchers looked at producers who had idled land and installed solar, using the electricity to run equipment like water pumps and selling the excess power to utilities.
On average, that energy savings and revenue added up to $124,000 per hectare (about 2.5 acres) each year, 25 times the value of using the land to grow crops. Collectively, the juice generated in the Central Valley could power around 500,000 households while saving enough water to hydrate 27 million people annually. “If a farmer owns 10 acres of land, and they choose to convert 1 or 2 acres to a solar array, that could produce enough income for them to feel security for their whole operation,” said Jake Stid, a renewable energy landscape scientist at Michigan State University and lead author of the paper, published in the journal Nature Sustainability.
😷I Will Survive (Good Medical News)😷
Fungi On Your Skin Could Produce a Potent Antibiotic
A deadly superbug that sometimes claims the lives of more than a million people globally a year may have a nemesis that lives right under your nose.
Quite literally. It dominates your skin microbiome, where it seems to keep staph infections at bay.
The overlooked agent is a species of natural yeast, called Malassezia sympodialis – one of the most prevalent microorganisms on healthy human skin. New research suggests that as it cleans oil and fat from your body's exterior, the fungi can produce a fatty acid that stops the development and growth of a staph infection.
According to lab experiments, led by scientists at the University of Oregon (UO), M. sympodialis can antagonize Staphylococcus aureus bacteria through its acidic byproducts.
Unparalleled Snake Antivenom Made From Man Bitten Over 200 Times
The blood of a US man who deliberately injected himself with snake venom for nearly two decades has led to an "unparalleled" antivenom, say scientists.
Antibodies found in Tim Friede's blood have been shown to protect against fatal doses from a wide range of species in animal tests.
Current therapies have to match the specific species of venomous snake anyone has been bitten by.
But Mr Friede's 18-year mission could be a significant step in finding a universal antivenom against all snakebites - which kill up to 140,000 people a year and leave three times as many needing amputations or facing permanent disability.
In total, Mr Friede has endured more than 200 bites and more than 700 injections of venom he prepared from some of the world's deadliest snakes, including multiple species of mambas, cobras, taipans and kraits.
He initially wanted to build up his immunity to protect himself when handling snakes, documenting his exploits on YouTube.
Learn to like to move it move it to prevent Alzheimer’s disease later in life!
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🏃🧠 Move more, remember more?
A new study shows that increasing physical activity in midlife is linked to less brain amyloid – a hallmark of Alzheimer's – and healthier brain structure.
🔗 doi.org/10.1002/alz....
#Alzheimers #SciComm 🧪
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— Prof Sam Illingworth (@samillingworth.com) May 3, 2025 at 4:19 AM
Semaglutide May Reverse Signs of Liver Disease
The diabetes and weight loss drug semaglutide may also reverse signs of liver disease.
That’s the headline result of a new clinical trial that tested the popular medication in patients with MASH, or metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis.
The disease is marked by fat droplets piling up in liver cells, chronic inflammation and scar tissue in the liver. But a 72-week regimen of semaglutide seemed to turn the disease around. Patients on the drug saw liver scarring improve and fat and inflammation wane, scientists reported April 30 in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Scientists hope “the improvement in scar tissue will translate into less cirrhosis, and less of all of the bad things that can happen if scar tissue continues to progress,” says study coauthor Arun Sanyal, director of the Stravitz-Sanyal Institute for Liver Disease and Metabolic Health at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. “That is the goal of treatment.”
Gut Fungus May Reverse Signs of Liver Disease as Well
A common intestinal fungus produces a molecule that reduces symptoms of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in mice, according to research published in Science today1.
The study marks a step forward in improving treatments for the disease, which affects roughly 30% of adults worldwide. Only one medication for the condition has approval from the US Food and Drug Administration, and it has limited effectiveness.
Before this study, the role of the fungus, called Fusarium foetens, in the human microbiome and its interactions with metabolism were poorly understood. “We had little understanding of how this fungus evolved to colonize the intestines of healthy individuals,” says co-author Jiang Changtao, a microbiologist at Peking University Third Hospital in Beijing. Previous studies have shown that gut yeast — a type of fungus — can aggravate alcoholic fatty liver disease2, but whether filamentous fungi such as F. foetens could affect liver conditions was unclear.
Phages are absolutely part of the future of infectious disease medicine even with AI helping us with antibiotic research. The good news is the western world is finally taking them seriously.
Experimental Drug Led to Restored Vision in Mice
Our eyes could potentially be coaxed into a special repair mode above and beyond our natural self-healing abilities, according to a new study, thanks to the delivery of antibodies that trigger nerve cell regeneration in the retina.
The South Korean research team says the treatment offers hope for restoring lost vision that otherwise can't be brought back. For now though, it's only been tested in mice.
TB is a menace. Anything that can possibly detect an infection earlier/faster is good news!
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Lead author @ssmelyansky.bsky.social spearheaded a strategy to label a single sulfur-containing glycan called ManLAM on the cell envelope of the bacteria that cause #TB. news.mit.edu/2025/new-mol... or here: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... 🧪 #glycotime @mitchemistry.bsky.social
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— Laura Kiessling (@laurakiessling.bsky.social) May 5, 2025 at 5:53 PM
Immunotherapy Drug Could Spare People With Some Forms of Cancer
When a person develops solid tumors in the stomach or esophagus or rectum, oncologists know how to treat them. But the cures often come with severe effects on quality of life. That can include removal of the stomach or bladder, a permanent colostomy bag, radiation that makes patients infertile and lasting damage from chemotherapy.
So a research group at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, using a drug from the pharmaceutical company GSK, tried something different.
The researchers started with a group of 103 people. The trial participants were among the 2 to 3 percent of cancer patients with tumors that should respond to immunotherapy, a drug that overcomes barriers that prevent the immune system from attacking cancers.
But in clinical trials, immunotherapy is not supposed to replace the standard treatments. The researchers, led by Dr. Luis A. Diaz Jr. and Dr. Andrea Cercek, decided to give dostarlimab, an immunotherapy drug, on its own.
The result was stunning, and could bring hope to the limited cohort of patients contending with these cancers.
Brazilian Ritual Root Could Be Used as Anti-Depressant
Long used in Indigenous Brazilian rituals, the jurema preta plant, which contains a potent psychedelic, is gaining ground as a potential treatment for depression.
At street stalls where medicinal herbs are sold, customers can buy the plant's root which contains dimethyltryptamine (DMT), a hallucinogenic substance that researchers say could be used to alleviate symptoms.
Following instructions he found on the internet, Guaracy Carvajal extracted DMT at home in 2016 from roots he bought on the street.
The 31-year-old software programmer, who had tried various treatment for chronic depression he has suffered since adolescence, said the drug makes it "feel like you've solved something in your life."
Physicist Draulio Araujo, who has conducted extensive research on the drug, said "the response is rapid. One day after treatment, (patients) already showed a significant improvement in their depression symptoms."
Yet he also warned that it "is not a magic cure" and that psychedelics "are not for everyone."
😆Wednesday Wheezes 😆
Thank you Denise Oliver-Velez for posting humorous cartoons in the APR every morning. This section is not possible without you!
