Here I am at 3AM... writing the lede for the Good News Roundup. I don’t even know where to begin because there is so much good news to share. Let’s start with a song!
Moving on to the big three:
Abigail Spanberger Easily Wins Virginia Governor Election
Democrat Abigail Spanberger will be Virginia's next governor, according to a race call by the Associated Press.
Spanberger, who previously served three terms in the U.S. House, defeated her Republican opponent, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears. She'll be Virginia's first woman governor.
The contest received national attention as one of the first major tests of voter sentiment in response to the Trump administration's policies.
Virginia is home to around 320,000 federal workers and hundreds of thousands of federal contractors. On the campaign trail, Spanberger argued that federal layoffs, cutbacks by President Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), tariffs and the federal shutdown were an attack on the Virginia economy — and pitched herself as a way for voters to push back.
"We need a governor who will recognize the hardship of this moment, advocate for Virginians, and make clear that not only are we watching people be challenged in their livelihoods and in their businesses and in communities, but Virginia's economy is under attack," Spanberger said at a stop on a campaign bus tour late last month.
Rep. Mikie Sherrill Crushes the GOP in New Jersey Governor Race
After a closely fought campaign, Democrat Mikie Sherrill is projected to be New Jersey’s next governor.
Sherrill, who’s currently the U.S. representative for the state’s 11th Congressional District, on Tuesday night beat Republican Jack Ciattarelli in the Garden State. Her victory, in a race widely seen as an early referendum on the Republican agenda in Donald Trump’s second presidential term, is a blow for the GOP.
Sherrill quickly celebrated her win on social media, thanking voters in the state. ”I promise to listen, lead with courage, and never forget who I serve,” she wrote on Bluesky.
Just after 10 p.m. ET, as she took the stage for her victory speech, Sherrill held more than a 13-point lead over Ciattarelli.
“They always say we’re loud,” she joked of her state as she began her speech. “But you guys just screamed from the rooftops, and people around the country have heard you.”
“Serving you is worth any tough fight I have to take on, and I am incredibly honored to be your next governor,” she added.
Zohran Mamdani Defeats Cuomo a Second Time and is the Next NYC Mayor
Zohran Mamdani has won New York City’s mayoral race, NBC News projects, after the 34-year-old democratic socialist energized progressives in the city and across the country, while generating intense backlash from President Donald Trump and Republicans as well as some Democratic moderates.
Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, on Tuesday handily defeated former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo — who ran as a third-party candidate after losing the Democratic primary — and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa. New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who mounted a third-party campaign for re-election after winning as a Democrat in 2021, dropped out of the race in September and endorsed Cuomo last month.
The victory caps a meteoric rise through New York politics for Mamdani since he launched his campaign roughly one year ago, transforming him from a virtually unknown state assemblyman who barely registered in polling to the incoming leader of America’s largest city.
Along the way, he pushed aside the heir to one of New York’s most iconic political dynasties not once but twice within five months.
Now a nationally known political figure, Mamdani will attempt to enact the sweeping policy platform that inspired his supporters while managing an enormous municipal bureaucracy — and influencing national politics, as one of the most prominent democratic socialists and Democrats in the country. Among other goals, Mamdani wants to freeze rent on rent-stabilized units, enact universal child care, create a free bus program and launch city-run grocery stores.
There is so much more to share in my elections section and elsewhere. Hopefully this isn’t overload! I’ve never seen quite the electoral wipeout that was delivered by the Democrats and inflicted on the GOP as last night. Only three areas as far as I can tell resisted the blue tsunami — Texas, Long Island, and New Hampshire.
But there is no time to rest. The 2026 election starts TODAY. And you are a big part of that whether you help through protests, voting, or even donating!
*ahem*
Let’s GEAR UP TO MAKE A BLUE WAVE IN 2026! Donate to Win the Majority 2026! These are 15 MORE races separate from GoodNewsRoundup’s Take the House in 2026! I’m defending incumbents that had close races in 2024 and selecting other races that could flip next year.
And that’s not all that could flip… the Senate is now in play!
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!
Here goes my November Good News Roundup…
😡 We’re Not Gonna Take It Anymore! 😡
Here’s a secret — Trump is DEEPLY unpopular now on EVERY issue!
Seriously guys, he’s less popular than EVER!
Enthusiasm gap X1000
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I find most interesting in the CNN poll is that Democrats are more enthusiastic to vote in the 2026 midterms than Republicans, 67% to 46%. That big enthusiasm gap is reflected in the early voting numbers for tomorrow's election www.cnn.com/2025/11/03/p...
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— Michael McDonald (@electproject.bsky.social) November 3, 2025 at 7:50 AM
BuT GEN Z MeN R CoNServAtIVe!!!11!
(Almost) every county in Virginia trended blue when compared to 2024!
Spotify owned itself by allowing ICE to run ads on its platform.
💪 Not Afraid To Take a Stand 💪
10-1 map BABY!
Think of the difference this will make in the lives of so many children.
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BREAKING: Colorado voters approved a ballot measure that would raise state income taxes on higher-earning households to fund free meals for all public school students.
Follow AP for live updates.
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— The Associated Press (@apnews.com) November 4, 2025 at 10:33 PM
California Easily Passes Proposition 50
California voters have passed Proposition 50, CBS News projects, approving a measure backed by Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative Democrats that will redraw the state's congressional districts.
The measure is intended to make several Republican-held congressional districts in California more favorable to Democrats in the 2026 midterm elections in an effort to counter recent redistricting in states including Texas that favors Republicans.
Proposition 50 was approved by the Legislature and signed by Newsom on Aug. 21, allowing it to go before voters for a Nov. 4 special election.
Georgia Public Service Commission Candidates Win in a ROMP
Peter Hubbard and Alicia Johnson were projected to win massive victories in their races for seats on Georgia’s Public Service Commission on Tuesday, with 20-point margins over incumbent Republicans on the five-member utility board.
The rare statewide wins came as Democrats also romped to victory in elections in Virginia, New Jersey and elsewhere, raising hopes of a “blue wave” in next year’s congressional midterms.
The Democrats’ campaigns for spots on the utility commission, which regulates telecommunications and power companies, focused on affordability and criticized incumbent Republican commissioners Fitz Johnson and Tim Echols for approving rate hikes.
“We can bring clean, reliable, and affordable energy to Georgia,” Hubbard said at a campaign event last week, according to the Macon Telegraph. “We can put money back in your pockets, not the pockets of utility executives.”
⚖ Trump Fought the Law and the Law WON! ⚖
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JUST IN: Judge Immergut renews her block on President Trump’s National Guard deployment to Portland, saying her three-day trial showed there was no credible evidence justify Trump/Hegseth’s incursion on Oregon’s sovereignty. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
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— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney.bsky.social) November 2, 2025 at 11:41 PM
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WOW. A federal judge says he's going to issue a Temporary Restraining Order requiring ICE to make changes at the Broadview facility in Chicago, a facility that until January was only for stays under 12 hours "absent exceptional circumstances," but has become, in Judge Gettleman's words, "a prison."
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— Aaron Reichlin-Melnick (@reichlinmelnick.bsky.social) November 4, 2025 at 5:29 PM
CREATE A CLONE OF MARC ELIAS!
🐈🐕Pootie/Woozle Video Break 🐈🐕
Given that it was election day yesterday, let’s have a flashback to a well-known woozle from the 2020 election.
❎The Times They Are a Changing ❎
If you’ve made it this far, don’t forget to donate to both the Win the Majority 2026 and the Take the House in 2026 fundraising pages!
VIRGINIA!
Lt. Gov. Hashmi First Muslim Woman Elected Statewide in the USA
Virginia state Sen. Ghazala Hashmi on Tuesday became the first Muslim American woman elected to statewide office in the U.S. with her victory in the lieutenant governor's race, NBC News projects.
Her historic victory comes the same night former Rep. Abigail Spanberger, whom NBC News projects as the winner in the governor's race, became the first woman elected governor in the state.
In a victory speech Tuesday night, Hashmi thanked her supporters and told them, "Together, we have carved a new historic path."
Hashmi, an immigrant, added later in her speech, "My own journey from a young child landing at the airport in Savannah to now being elected as the first Muslim woman to achieve statewide office — the first Muslim woman to achieve statewide office not just in Virginia, but in the entire country ... was possible because of the depth and the breadth of the opportunities made available in this country and in this commonwealth."
In is the second time Hashmi has made history in an election; in 2019 she was the first Muslim American woman elected to Virginia's Legislature. Since then, she has served in the statehouse representing a district southwest of Washington, D.C.
Virginia Democrats Win 64(!) Seats in House of Delegates
Democrats managed to increase their majority in the Virginia House of Delegates, moving from 51 to 64 seats (with one race still undecided as of 11 p.m.) as voters turned out Tuesday in a pivotal election for control of the chamber. The win came amid a backdrop of fierce competition across suburban and exurban battlegrounds, with both parties viewing the outcome as a bellwether for 2026 and beyond.
Despite heavy Republican spending and Youngkin’s late push to recapture momentum, Democrats successfully defended vulnerable incumbents and flipped several key districts in vote-rich regions around Richmond, Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads.
Turnout surged in several suburban swing areas, reflecting continued polarization over national issues like abortion and democracy as well as local concerns over housing, health care and school funding.
Democratic leaders credited what they described as a disciplined, issue-focused campaign that emphasized protecting abortion access and investing in public services, while Republicans leaned on messages about parental rights, public safety and economic management.
The GOP entered the cycle hoping to regain the majority of the 100-body member that it lost in 2023, but even with competitive candidates their gains fell short. The chamber’s new balance underscores Virginia’s shift toward Democratic strength in its population centers, even as Republicans maintain deep support in rural regions.
OHIO!
New Jersey! (boy was I wrong about that state)
New Jersey Democrats Set to Expand Their Assembly Majority
New Jersey Democrats triumphed in Assembly races Tuesday, and are set to expand their majority next year after winning three long-sought seats in the 8th and 21st districts and threatening to flip four others.
The apparent victories will give Democrats a two-thirds supermajority in the lower chamber for the first time since 2019 and will expand their majority to its largest since the party won 66 seats in 1973 on the heels of President Richard Nixon’s impeachment.
“Tonight, voters decisively backed Democratic legislative leadership in New Jersey and sent a clear message to MAGA extremists whose policies have substantially driven the cost of living up,” said Heather Williams, president of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee.
Democrats went into Tuesday night with 52 of the Assembly’s 80 seats, a majority just one vote shy of two-thirds of the chamber. That majority will likely expand to at least 55 — a historical high watermark — and could stretch further as election officials tally provisional and late-arriving mail ballots over the next week.
Pennsylvania!
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Wow, huge results for Democrats in tough county executive elections in some of Pennsylvania's swingiest counties.
They by the county executive offices in Erie County, Lehigh County, and Northampton County by roughly 20% each.
This is a FLIP in Erie County.
— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) November 4, 2025 at 11:36 PM
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BIG result, folks:
Bucks County, Pennsylvania, was ground zero for the conservative takeover of school boards & anti-LGBTQ policies in 2023, on the Central Bucks and Pennridge boards.
Dems flipped both boards back in 2023.
Tonight, Dems have ousted *all* Republicans from both school boards.
— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) November 4, 2025 at 11:49 PM
Connecticut!
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I'm catching up on local election results in CT before bed and...whoa. We have 169 towns in the state and I count at least 11 flips from GOP to Dem control. Ansonia, Branford, Bristol, East Granby, Enfield, Ellington, Milford, New Britain, Norwich, Stratford, and Westport.
— Amanda Hoey (@amandahoey.bsky.social) November 4, 2025 at 11:57 PM
M-I-S-S-I-S-S-I-P-P-I!
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BREAKING: Democrat Johnny DuPree has flipped a Republican-held Mississippi Senate district in a special election.
DuPree was previously the mayor of Hattiesburg.
His win imperils the Mississippi Senate GOP's narrow supermajority.
www.mississippifreepress.org/democrat-joh...
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— Ashton Pittman (@ashtonpittman.bsky.social) November 4, 2025 at 10:18 PM
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Theresa Gillespie Isom, a North Mississippi Democrat, has won a special election for Mississippi Senate District 2, flipping a Republican-held seat.
Her victory means Democrats could be on the verge of breaking the Republican Party’s supermajority in the upper legislative chamber.
buff.ly/oW1ugOe
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— Mississippi Free Press (@mississippifreepress.org) November 5, 2025 at 12:13 AM
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BREAKING: Justin Crosby just FLIPPED Mississippi’s newly redrawn HD-22!
As a lifelong Aberdeen resident, Justin understands the struggles working parents in Mississippi face, and he will do everything he can to put their needs first.
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— Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (@thedlcc.bsky.social) November 5, 2025 at 1:00 AM
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BREAKING: Democrats just broke the GOP supermajority in the Mississippi Senate!
In a stunning victory, Democrats gained seats in court-ordered special elections and will now head to Jackson to represent and fight on behalf of their constituents.
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— Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (@thedlcc.bsky.social) November 4, 2025 at 11:39 PM
Florida!
Could Democrats Break Through Again in Miami? Democrat Advances to Runoff
Miami voters appeared to break with past politics on Tuesday, selecting at least one mayoral candidate who has not previously been elected to a city office to compete in a runoff next month, according to preliminary results from the Miami-Dade County elections supervisor.
Eileen Higgins, a Miami-Dade County commissioner, received about 36 percent of the vote in the mayoral election, according to unofficial results that still need to be certified. Because she did not receive more than 50 percent of the vote, Ms. Higgins, 61, will face off against the second-place finisher on Dec. 9.
That appeared likely to be Emilio T. González, 68, a former appointed city manager. He received about 19 percent of the vote, according to the elections supervisor, though he held only a narrow margin over Ken Russell, a former city commissioner.
Colorado!
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UPDATE: Dems lead every city council race in Aurora, Colorado - and could flip a 7-3 GOP majority into a 6-4 Dem edge - including what would be a shocking upset of MAGA media star Danielle Jurinsky, whose claims of a "complete gang takeover" led Trump to call Aurora "conquered." #copolitics
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— Kyle Clark (@kylec.bsky.social) November 5, 2025 at 2:05 AM
Washington!
Need a bonus musical interlude here…
TO RECAP IT ALL:
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What we know, 12:10am
[Now in 2 parts]
—Prop 50 wins
—VA Dems flip Gov, LG, AG
—Dems flip ≈13 seats in VA House
—Dems defend NJ-Gov + Assembly
—Dems win NJ+VA trifectas
—Mamdani wins
—PA Dems win supreme court
—ME vote-restricting measure loses
—GA Dems flip 2 statewide offices
—Krasner & Bragg win
— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) November 5, 2025 at 12:10 AM
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—Coloradoans fund free school meals
—JD's half-brother loses
—PA Dems flip Erie County exec, Bucks DA + sheriff
—PA Dems oust all GOPers from Bucks school boards once ground 0 of conservative takeover
—Charlotte approves transit tax
—Dems flip CT towns like New Britain.
(And that's not all!)
— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) November 5, 2025 at 12:13 AM
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—NY Dems flip Onondaga County & Dutchess County legislature, first in decades
—Dem mayors in Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Cincy...
—Seattle GOP city attorney trails big
—MN Dems defend state Senate
—Dems flip legislative seats in MS
—Dems defend swing legislative seats in NY, WA
— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) November 5, 2025 at 12:14 AM
But there is still other good news to share!
🌍We are the World🌎
Amazing news from across the pond.
We know more about the moon and Mars than we do about what’s in our oceans. Good news is that is slowly changing.
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A carnivorous “death ball” sponge is among 30 previously unknown deep-sea species found by scientists in one of the most remote parts of the planet.
They also found new armoured & iridescent scale worms, new crustaceans plus rare gastropods & bivalves.
🧪🐚🦀🦑
www.theguardian.com/environment/...
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— Dan Jagger (@auditorynerves.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 6:24 AM
The Netherlands to Return Sculpture Pilfered During the Arab Spring
The Netherlands has said it will return a stolen 3,500-year-old sculpture to Egypt.
It is "highly likely" the stone head, dating from the time of the pharaohs, was plundered during the Arab Spring in either 2011 or 2012, according to the Dutch Information & Heritage Inspectorate.
A decade later, it turned up at an arts and antiques fair in Maastricht and, following an anonymous tip-off, Dutch authorities determined it had been stolen and exported illegally.
Dutch outgoing prime minister Dick Schoof made the pledge to hand it back as he attended the opening of the archaeological Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza this weekend.
The Dutch government said the sculpture of a high-ranking official from the dynasty of Pharaoh Thutmose III is "deeply meaningful to Egypt's identity".
The statue had been offered up for sale at The European Fine Art Foundation fair in 2022. The dealer voluntarily relinquished the sculpture after authorities had been tipped off about its illegal origin.
The government said it expected to hand the stone head over to the Egyptian ambassador to the Netherlands at the end of this year.
Imagine the potential in places like desert southwest!
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Meanwhile, in South Korea: "Starting at the end of November, public parking lots with more than 80 spaces will be required to install solar power generation facilities. This obligation applies not only to newly constructed parking lots but also to existing ones."
cm.asiae.co.kr/en/article/2...
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— Clara Jeffery (@clarajeffery.bsky.social) November 2, 2025 at 12:38 PM
Egypt’s Grand Museum is Open and Expected to bring in $8B a Year
Near one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World - the Great Pyramid of Khufu at Giza - Egypt is officially opening what it intends as a cultural highlight of the modern age.
The Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM), described as the world's largest archaeological museum, is packed with some 100,000 artefacts covering some seven millennia of the country's history from pre-dynastic times to the Greek and Roman eras.
Prominent Egyptologists argue that its establishment strengthens their demand for key Egyptian antiquities held in other countries to be returned – including the famed Rosetta Stone displayed at the British Museum.
A main draw of the GEM will be the entire contents of the intact tomb of the boy king Tutankhamun, displayed together for the first time since it was found by British Egyptologist Howard Carter. They include Tutankhamun's spectacular gold mask, throne and chariots.
"I had to think, how can we show him in a different way, because since the discovery of the tomb in 1922, about 1,800 pieces from a total of over 5,500 that were inside the tomb were on display," says Dr. Tarek Tawfik, president of the International Association of Egyptologists and former head of the GEM.
"I had the idea of displaying the complete tomb, which means nothing remains in storage, nothing remains in other museums, and you get to have the complete experience, the way Howard Carter had it over a hundred years ago."
Costing some $1.2bn (£910m; €1.1bn), the vast museum complex is expected to attract up to 8m visitors a year, giving a huge boost to Egyptian tourism which has been hit by regional crises.
Australia is trying something novel to rescue their freshwater fish populations. I’m keeping an eye on this.
Of course there’s the classic use of sunken ships to create artificial reefs.
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Research by marine scientists in Thailand is revealing how shipwrecks can benefit the undersea environment.
Early data may show wrecks attract fish from natural reefs & create a habitat for new ones to reproduce, including those that are endangered.
🧪🐠⚓
www.theguardian.com/environment/...
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— Dan Jagger (@auditorynerves.bsky.social) October 31, 2025 at 2:25 PM
🎶Song of the Day🎶
This song is dedicated to all those poor Republicans that lost their races last night… /s
Why not have two oldies for the price of one!
🧪Don’t Stop Believing (in Science) 🧪
Dinosaur fans rejoice!
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This is a cracking bit of research. The tiny tyrannosaur named Nanotyrannus, long thought by many to be just a figment of the imagination (aka a young T. rex that was misclassified) turns out to almost certainly be a real species #science 🧪 #dinosaurs
www.livescience.com/animals/dino...
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— Chris Simms (@chrisnsimms.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 4:10 PM
This could speed up DNA kit backlogs for criminal justice.
Ice Core Extracted from Antarctica Provides a 6 MILLION Year Old Snapshot
Ice excavated from deep under the surface of Antarctica has just yielded humanity's oldest directly dated samples of glacial ice and air ever found.
From beneath hundreds of meters of glacial ice that gradually accumulated over eons at Allan Hills, a team of scientists led by glaciologist Sarah Shackleton of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute has retrieved samples that have been buried for some 6 million years.
"Ice cores are like time machines that let scientists take a look at what our planet was like in the past," Shackleton says.
"The Allan Hills cores help us travel much further back than we imagined possible."
Because our planet is so geologically active, finding records of past climate can be challenging.
Antarctica is one exception; there, the constant accumulation of ice and snow traps and freezes material, creating a time capsule record of Earth's climate history. By studying ancient ice in vertical cores extracted from ice hundreds of meters thick, scientists can reconstruct our planet's past environmental conditions, at least at Antarctica.
At Allan Hills, the concentration of blue ice is particularly valuable. This is ice that has been compressed over time, squeezing out larger air bubbles and enlarging the ice crystals, so that the resulting ice absorbs redder wavelengths, lending it a distinctly blueish hue. Because Allan Hills no longer accumulates snow due to weathering and sublimation processes, the older ice is closer to the surface than in other parts of Antarctica.
"We're still working out the exact conditions that allow such ancient ice to survive so close to the surface," Shackleton explains.
"Along with the topography, it's likely a mix of strong winds and bitter cold. The wind blows away fresh snow, and the cold slows the ice to almost a standstill. That makes Allan Hills one of the best places in the world to find shallow old ice, and one of the toughest places to spend a field season."
In chemistry, we’re on the edge of some possibly AMAZING things at the atomic level.
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Less than a decade ago, reactions for adding, deleting, and swapping single atoms in complex organic molecules were almost unheard of. Now there’s a growing community of researchers working on them. cen.acs.org/synthesis/Sk... #chemsky 🧪
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— C&EN (Chemical & Engineering News) (@cenmag.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 3:59 PM
I’d imagine this cannot be done to scale yet but the proof of concept is neat.
Imagine what could be possible if we understood plants at this level. We need innovations like that in a warming climate to keep all of us fed.
😷I Will Survive (Good Medical News)😷
H/t to the GNR Discord Server!
Cancer Drug Made 20,000 Times More Potent
In a significant step forward for cancer therapy, researchers at Northwestern University have redesigned the molecular structure of a well-known chemotherapy drug, greatly increasing its solubility, effectiveness, and safety.
For this study, the scientists created the drug entirely from scratch as a spherical nucleic acid (SNA), a nanoscale structure that incorporates the drug into DNA strands surrounding tiny spheres. This innovative design transforms a compound that normally dissolves poorly and works weakly into a highly potent, precisely targeted treatment that spares healthy cells from damage.
When tested in a small animal model of acute myeloid leukemia (AML), an aggressive and hard-to-treat blood cancer, the SNA-based version showed remarkable results. It entered leukemia cells 12.5 times more efficiently, destroyed them up to 20,000 times more effectively, and slowed cancer progression by a factor of 59, all without causing noticeable side effects.
According to the researchers, this achievement highlights the growing promise of structural nanomedicine, an emerging area of research where scientists carefully design both the structure and composition of nanomedicines to control how they behave inside the body. With seven SNA-based therapies already in clinical trials, this approach could pave the way for advanced vaccines and new treatments for cancer, infectious diseases, neurodegenerative disorders, and autoimmune conditions.
The findings were recently published in the journal ACS Nano.
H/t to learn in the Sunday APR...
Mental exercise can reverse a brain change linked to aging (NPR-health Oct 22)
… In people who played games like solitaire, acetylcholine levels were unchanged. But in people who did cognitive training, there was a significant increase.
Acetylcholine levels also increased in other brain areas, including the hippocampus, which plays a key role in memory.
Even modest changes are meaningful, Hasselmo says, because acetylcholine does more than carry messages in the brain. It also modulates the behavior of neurons in ways that affect learning, memory and attention.
"If you block the neuromodulator function in the brain, a person can't even think," Hasselmo says. "You go into a delirious state."
On the other hand, even small increases in acetylcholine can have a "profound and notable effect" on memory and thinking in older people.
Noting that the study focused on using interactive computer training (while scanning brains for activity) but many other studies associate the increased cholinergic action with self directed thinking as opposed to endogenous distraction of attention
- ACh plays a vital role in the top-down control of attentional orienting and stimulus discrimination. Incontrast, cholinergic signaling in the septohippocampal system is suggested to be involved in memoryprocesses. Thus, it appears that the role of ACh in cognition is different per brain region and betweennicotinic versus muscarinic receptor subtypes
Oh please be viable. Just in time for my first roto-rooter in a couple of years!
Old Clinical Vaccine May Hold the Secret to Surviving Metastatic Breast Cancer
A small group of women with advanced breast cancer received a vaccine via a clinical trial more than 20 years ago. Today, they’re all still alive. Scientists say that kind of long-term survival is almost unheard of for patients with metastatic breast cancer, and it’s what caught the attention of researchers now.
Scientists at Duke Health studied the immune systems of the women in that trial, which was led by Herbert Kim Lyerly, M.D., George Barth Geller Distinguished Professor of Immunology at Duke University School of Medicine. They found something remarkable: The women still had strong, long-lasting immune cells that recognized their cancer.
These cells carried a special marker, called CD27, which helps the immune system remember and fight off threats like cancer. The findings, published in Science Immunology Oct. 28, suggest that targeting CD27 could dramatically improve the effectiveness of cancer vaccines.
“Viral Patch” Could Drastically Reduce Food Poisoning Before it Happens
Each year, hundreds of millions of people worldwide similarly fall sick from microbial pathogens lurking in meals. But bacteria-killing viruses called bacteriophages could offer an unusual solution. Researchers have designed microneedle patches that directly inject food with these viruses, which bear an uncanny resemblance to the martian robots in War of the Worlds. When applied to cooked chicken, a bacteriophage-loaded patch no bigger than a pinkie nail was able to wipe out 99.9% of all the Escherichia coli bacteria in and on the meat, they report today in Science Advances.
This creative application of microneedles—typically reserved for medical applications—could be a “potentially revolutionary” step for the food industry, says University of Calgary biotechnologist Dongyan Niu. “The effectiveness is quite impressive, and it’s a good proof of concept.”
Bacterial contamination from species such as E. coli and Salmonella enterica accounts for more than 40% of food recalls in the U.S. and Canada, and as global supply chains grow more complex, this number is only expected to rise. But current safeguards have limits. Antibiotics given to poultry and livestock or sprayed on crop fields can spur the evolution of resistant strains, and sanitizers and chemical washes used late in food production can strip away desirable bacteria. “We rely on good bacteria in our food for its taste, texture, and smell,” says Zeinab Hosseinidoust, a bioengineer at McMaster University. “We don’t want to get rid of those.”
But for billions of years, nature has been refining its own solution. Bacteriophages, also called phages for short, are completely harmless to us. Instead, each infects only a highly specific subset of bacterial strains. Soon after a phage infects and hijacks a bacterium to make more of itself, the bacterium explodes and dies. Though bacteria can also evolve resistance to phages, those survivors tend to be weaker—and phages can keep multiplying and evolving to counter them.
That makes phages potent antimicrobials. In fact, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved their use on ready-to-eat meats since 2006, typically applied as surface sprays.
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While a new, broad-spectrum 'nanobody' antivenom performed impressively in preclinical trials, the real significance is “showing this is possible,” @andreaslaustsen.bsky.social told me. That and more of the best from @science.org and science in #ScienceAdviser: www.science.org/content/arti... 🧪
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— Christie Wilcox (@nerdychristie.bsky.social) October 30, 2025 at 12:07 PM
Vaccine for Paratyphoid Fever Passes Novel Human Trial
Between June 2022 and January 2024, 70 healthy volunteers in Oxford, England, swallowed a small amount of liquid they knew might make them very sick. It contained Salmonella bacteria that cause paratyphoid fever, a disease that can result in prolonged fever, headache, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and—on rare occasions—death.
Nobody in the Oxford study died, and those who did get sick were soon completely cured with an antibiotic. All were part of an unusual vaccine trial deliberately exposing people to a pathogen under strictly controlled circumstances. A month before drinking the bacterial cocktail, half of the volunteers got inoculated with a candidate vaccine against paratyphoid and the other half got a placebo.
The study, published today in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), showed that the vaccine, named CVD 1902, reduced the risk of infection by 73%, a result hailed by researchers not involved in the study. “Its efficacy and safety profile are remarkable,” says Jacob John, a physician and vaccine researcher at Christian Medical College in Vellore, India, one of several South Asian countries with a high burden of the disease.
Annelies Wilder-Smith, team lead for vaccine development at the World Health Organization (WHO), agrees the results represent “a major step forward.” Researchers say the work also offers more evidence that this type of clinical trial, called a human challenge study, can provide answers faster, and at far lower cost, than traditional vaccine efficacy trials, which evaluate efficacy after people are naturally exposed to a pathogen.
The hidden posts says this:
GOOD NEWS! Researchers have developed a new mRNA vaccine that has been shown to suppress abnormal blood vessel growth in the retina, offering hope to MILLIONS of patients with age-related vision loss. The vaccine triggered strong antibody responses that REDUCED retinal damage by UP TO 85%.
Signals Deep Within the Brain Could Track Parkinson’s Symptoms
A search for Parkinson's in the hiss of our brain's static has revealed measures of motor control that could one day fine-tune precise forms of stimulation therapy.
Led by the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Germany, an international team of scientists combined five sets of electrophysiological data taken from deep within the brains of 119 people with Parkinson's disease.
By comparing specific brain-wave activity to the severity of individual patients' symptoms, the researchers were able to sift out patterns that could be confidently matched to the condition's impact on movement.
Parkinson's disease is fundamentally a breakdown in the functioning of a part of the brain called the basal ganglia, robbing people of the ability to filter information required to keep their body movements precise and steady. The result is slow, stiff, shaky motion.
In theory, changes in the basal ganglia's operation should be noticeable in their electrical activity, appearing as a general excess of mid-to-high-range oscillations known as beta waves, as well as an increase in spiking signals.
Studies have captured plenty of beta-wave activity in the past through electrodes implanted deep in the brain as a means of treatment. Although it was evident that these waves varied with symptom severity, the methods used to interpret the buzz left a lot to be desired.
A mix of patient diversity, combinations of symptoms, and a lack of unaffected controls made it difficult to compare the brain-wave activity of diseased states with a 'healthy' standard.
By pooling multiple datasets and comparing differences in similar activity between more-or-less affected basal ganglia in each brain hemisphere, the researchers behind this latest study could 'listen in' on harmonies hidden within the brain's roar.
😆Wednesday Wheezes 😆
Thank you Denise Oliver Velez for posting humorous toons in the APR every morning!
👍 Hey Hey What Can I Do? 👍
You might see a theme with this first bundle of action steps… 😏
- If you want to help teachers that desperately need funds (especially at the beginning of the year!), DonorsChoose is the site to hook you up! Another one is Adopt a Classroom!
- Support the Inoculation Project! This is a Daily Kos effort to fund STEM and literacy projects in classrooms!
- Volunteer in a classroom! It can be something as structured and formal as Citizen Schools or as informal as inquiring at a local school district. Be prepared for a background check though!
- Build a Little Free Library! I use these all the time and you never know what you’ll read next. Bonus points for distributing books banned by MAGA! Or convert one into a Little Food Pantry during the shutdown!
- 50501 is the group that sparked the protests against the Trump regime. The next huge day for protests will probably not be until next year (I could be wrong). Be there or be square!
- Calling your representatives matters. 5calls.org makes the process much simpler and more efficient for you! Make it a goal to call their offices once a week or so!
- Support the Hope Springs from Field group (follow snowbored) or Postcards to Voters (follow Progressive Muse) in order to better reach voters!
- Donate to Win the Majority 2026 or Take the House 2026!
Fundraisers for Gnuville, USA:
This Week’s Totals in Thousands of Dollars (Last Week):
GoodNewsRoundup:
bilboteach:
Win the Majority 2026 — 3.6 (3.3)
About the Author
I guess it is time for my political origin story given the election.
I became politically aware on 9/11 in a small town in Michigan. I was I guess moderate compared to most of the GOP but I considered myself a conservative just like most of my small town. It was only after meeting someone from Kuwait at college that my horizons began to broaden.
I’ve never voted for a Republican for President though I wanted to in 2008. I’ve voted for Republicans for other offices — though I haven’t since 2016 (John McCain). I’ll NEVER vote for the GOP again after January 6th. I was coming to that conclusion before then but the that event sealed my hatred of the Trumpian version of the GOP.
I consider myself a pragmatic Democrat these days. I’ll support someone like Sen. Ruben Gallego or Mallory McMorrow but rarely anyone to the left of them. That doesn’t mean I support all moderate Democrats either. Former Sen. $inema would be a good example of someone I could never support (I regret voting for her in 2018).
I’m sure I’ll get some comments about my past and politics today. So be it. I know I am quite the outlier on this site which is why I don’t wade into ideological pie fights. My philosophy is that I won’t @ you if you don’t @ me.
My last vote for a Republican. Thankfully he saved the ACA for about another decade in return.
Last thoughts…
