Drugmakers are pursuing medicines based on orexins, peptides involved in the biological system that keeps people awake, for a range of brain-related ailments. The interest follows the success of drugs based on glucagon-like peptide-1, or GLP-1, a hormone released by the gut after meals. GLP-1 drugs were initially developed to treat diabetes and later proved effective at helping people lose weight. They have also shown benefits in heart disease, kidney disease, sleep apnoea and other conditions. Pharmaceutical companies are betting that orexin-based medicines could achieve similarly broad therapeutic use in disorders affecting the brain.

Gray-market peptide sellers and review sites are increasingly using AI-generated websites, testimonials, and forum posts to appear credible. Peptides are short amino-acid chains that generally must be injected or delivered nasally because digestion breaks them down, and demand for them has created a market of suppliers whose quality and legitimacy can be difficult to verify. Qingdao Sigma, a frequently recommended peptide seller, displays low prices, purported laboratory testing, card payments, and favorable reviews. Its apparent Trustpilot page is hosted on its own site rather than Trustpilot, and the reviews were identified as AI-generated. CompoundTalk, a peptide-review site with a “Verified Vendors” forum, contains AI-generated posts, including a thread about Qingdao Sigma. An analysis using Claude found that CompoundTalk was hosted by Moldova-based AlexHost; listed 20 Chinese raw-peptide vendors; and had recurring data anomalies, including exactly five posts per forum thread, 985 threads dated before the domain registration, and posts predating their supposed authors’ registrations. CompoundTalk and the peptide-analysis site PeptideMeter were registered 13 minutes apart through the same registrar and share the same Cloudflare DNS-server pair. CompoundTalk’s robots.txt explicitly permits LLM crawlers, while the site sells vendor-feature packages and says sponsorship does not affect moderation or reviews. The site’s operator could be seeking visibility in AI-generated recommendations, although that intent is not independently established.

Google Research introduced PhotoScan, an investigational deep-learning system that estimates body-fat percentage, Android-to-Gynoid fat ratio and Visceral-to-Subcutaneous fat ratio from standard 2D smartphone photos. The system was pre-trained on more than 35,000 UK Biobank participant records and fine-tuned using a cohort of 677 adults. It is intended to estimate body-composition markers associated with insulin resistance, which is commonly defined by a HOMA-IR score above 2.9 and can precede type 2 diabetes by years. In five-fold cross-validation on the PhotoBIA cohort, PhotoScan produced a mean absolute error of 2.15 for body-fat percentage, compared with 2.91 for smartwatch bioelectrical-impedance analysis. Independent validation in the MetabolicMosaic cohort produced errors of 2.13 for body-fat percentage, 0.085 for the Android-to-Gynoid ratio and 0.085 for the Visceral-to-Subcutaneous ratio. A gradient-boosting model using demographics plus PhotoScan metrics reached an AUROC of 0.760 for identifying insulin resistance, versus 0.692 for demographics alone and 0.773 for demographics plus DXA scan data. Adding smartwatch bioelectrical-impedance data did not improve insulin-resistance classification. Google describes PhotoScan as a research prototype rather than a clinical screening product.

Moderna and Merck announced positive topline Phase 3 results from INTerpath-001, which tested intismeran autogene with KEYTRUDA as an adjuvant treatment for patients with completely resected stage IIB–IV melanoma. Intismeran autogene is an investigational mRNA-based individualized neoantigen therapy jointly developed by the two companies. The trial met its primary endpoint of recurrence-free survival and a key secondary endpoint of distant metastasis-free survival. Noubar Afeyan, Moderna’s co-founder, said the result marks the first positive Phase 3 outcome for an individualized neoantigen therapy and for an mRNA-based cancer therapy. The therapy is designed around mutations unique to an individual patient’s tumor and is intended to be used alongside KEYTRUDA. Moderna was founded in 2010, when, according to Afeyan, using mRNA as a new class of medicines and as a basis for personalized cancer treatment faced substantial skepticism. Afeyan said important work remains and credited Moderna, Merck, trial investigators, patients, and families for contributing to the milestone.

Research into dry eye disease (keratoconjunctivitis sicca) identifies chronic inflammation and oxidative stress in eye tissue as common features stemming from various causes such as aging, contact lens use, and decreased tear production. The study explores potential treatments inspired by plant biology to address these conditions.

AI techniques are increasingly applied in drug discovery, but evidence of their real clinical impact remains limited. Experts in the field emphasize the need for critical evaluation of these applications amidst a flood of promotional content.

Semaglutide is associated with a 26% reduction in the predicted risk of developing dementia over five years. This finding suggests potential cognitive benefits of the drug beyond its use for weight management and diabetes.

Research Gold claims to provide "100% human-written, never AI" medical research services, including drafting manuscripts and conducting reviews. The listed PhD reviewers are AI-generated and do not exist, while some real methodologists are unaware their identities are being used.

Kinney Drugs pulls back AI phone assistant after hundreds of customer complaints BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) - Kinney Drugs is scaling back its AI assistant after customers reported incoherent calls, wrong dosages, and missed prescription notifications. Kinney Drugs first introduced Burt, an AI assistant named after the pharmacy chain’s founder, back in May. The bot’s role was to communicate with patie...

Taxi and ambulance drivers have a lower risk of dying from Alzheimer’s disease compared to most other occupations, according to a 2024 study analyzing nearly 9 million U.S. death certificates. The study suggests that the reliance on complex mental maps and spatial reasoning in these jobs may offer protective benefits for brain health.