A study of 13 cereal-based products from Arak, Iran, found that estimated health risks varied widely between brands. Mercury drove the highest risk estimate for Tak pasta, while arsenic was the main factor for Zhik pasta; Zar, Mak and Jahan had much lower estimates.
A systematic review examined whether Passiflora edulis, commonly known as passion fruit, is linked with lower blood pressure. It included six preclinical studies and two human trials; the animal and laboratory findings were generally more extensive than the human evidence. The authors reported possible blood-pressure reductions but emphasized that the human studies were small, varied in the extracts used, and short in duration.
Gond painting has moved from household walls and floors into exhibitions, digital marketplaces and online platforms. Based on 96 interviews and qualitative fieldwork, researchers found that technology expands markets and strengthens the art form’s public status, but unequal access to digital resources continues to exclude some artists.
A paper in the Journal of Applied Volcanology catalogs 18 common misconceptions about volcanoes and eruptions, from volcanic ash and smoke to forecasts and “supervolcanoes.” It also examines seven case studies where incorrect information spread during events at volcanoes including Mount Agung, Kīlauea and Taal.
A study tested a moon-shaped pattern cut into AISI 5115 steel and found lower friction and wear than on untextured steel. At tested rotational speeds, the best texture reduced friction by up to 52% and wear by up to 83.9%.
A study of 147 federally incarcerated people in Western Canada examines how they picture life after release. Many described work, health care, technology and housing as sources of uncertainty, making prison seem more predictable than life outside it.
Researchers studied 96 people with high-risk, locally advanced rectal cancer in a single-center phase II clinical trial. The treatment combined chemotherapy, short-course radiation, and a targeted drug selected for each study cohort. Overall, 40% had a complete response, but the study did not establish how this approach compares with other treatments.
Heat stress before spawning changed reproductive traits in the coral Acropora aspera, but the effects depended on temperature and exposure time. Longer heat exposure increased egg volume while sperm production showed a more variable response.
Researchers describe a streamlined workflow for producing and testing designed proteins at much greater scale than standard laboratory methods. By using pooled DNA and partial automation, the approach could characterize more than 1,000 designs at about $5 per construct.
In a study of 219 people, human authors were judged more competent than AI authors when presenting technical information about large language models. Attitudes toward AI shaped those judgments and were also linked to differences in how credible participants found texts attributed to male and female authors.
AI vulnerability detectors often perform less well on software projects outside their training data. A study finds that cleaner, more varied training data and an encoder-based design improved detection, including a reported 6.8% gain in recall on the BigVul benchmark.
Online retailers often face a choice between ranking products to increase revenue, transactions or consumer welfare. A study found that alternative rankings designed around each goal all improved shopper welfare, transactions and platform revenue relative to neutral and existing rankings, with limited differences between the approaches.
Finding oxygen or methane in a rocky exoplanet’s atmosphere would not by itself show that life is present. A study in Astrobiology finds that a proposed space telescope would need to examine light from near-ultraviolet through near-infrared wavelengths to assess habitability and investigate nonbiological explanations.
A prospective observational study of 143 people undergoing procedures for urinary stones compared pre-surgery urine cultures with cultures taken from the stones during surgery. Stone cultures were positive more often and were associated with postoperative sepsis, while pre-surgery urine culture results were not significantly associated with sepsis. Because this was an observational study, the findings show associations rather than cause and effect.
Researchers examined short-term outcomes after 36,208 cancer operations performed at one institution from 2016 through 2025. Robot-assisted and other minimally invasive operations were associated with fewer major complications, transfusions and shorter hospital stays than open surgery in several procedure-specific comparisons, but this observational study cannot show that the surgical approach caused those differences.
