Membrane Potential News and Research

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Mitochondrial transplantation helps repair donor organs during machine perfusion

Transplant medicine still depends on a limited supply of donor organs, while many retrieved grafts are discarded because ischemia, cold storage, and reperfusion can rapidly damage their cells.

25 Aug 2026

Wake-activated brain circuits reveal what drives the urge to sleep

Researchers identified wake-activated neurons in the median raphe and anterior medial preoptic area that track sleep pressure and help regulate when and how deeply mice sleep. Manipulating these circuits altered NREM sleep, sleep-pressure accumulation, and rebound sleep, revealing key neural mechanisms underlying mammalian sleep homeostasis.

20 Aug 2026

Mitochondrial rewiring may explain why orthoflaviviruses harm humans but persist in mosquitoes

Orthoflaviviruses reshape mitochondrial structure, metabolism, redox signaling, and quality control differently across human and mosquito models, helping explain their contrasting infection outcomes. The review highlights mitochondrial pathways that may support acute cellular damage in vertebrates but persistent, non-lethal infection in mosquitoes, pointing to potential antiviral targets.

12 Aug 2026

New mechanism linked to septic heart injury protection uncovered

Sepsis triggers widespread inflammation, circulatory failure and metabolic stress, and cardiac dysfunction is a common complication associated with sharply poorer outcomes.

31 Jul 2026

New stem cell vesicles accelerate diabetic wound healing

Diabetic foot ulcers are among the most serious complications of diabetes because prolonged inflammation, poor circulation, and defective angiogenesis can leave wounds open for months and increase the risk of infection and amputation.

31 Jul 2026

Researchers discover how stress signals weaken the aging immune system

As we age, our ability to maintain healthy blood and a strong immune system gradually declines, largely because hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), the cells responsible for producing all blood cell types, begin to lose their effectiveness. Normally, HSCs can both self-renew and generate a balanced mix of blood cells, but over time they produce fewer new cells, favor certain cells such as myeloid cells over lymphoid cells, and struggle to support a robust immune response.

16 Apr 2026

Metformin protects neurons after brain injury by restoring mitochondrial health

TBI remains a major cause of death and long-term neurological disability worldwide, yet effective treatments for secondary injury are still lacking.

13 Apr 2026

Microplastics found in human bile may be associated with gallstones

Findings show microplastics in bile may trigger cellular senescence, suggesting a link to gallstone disease and highlighting the need for further research.

9 Apr 2026

Study reveals bile as reservoir for microplastics in humans

Plastic pollution has become one of the defining environmental issues of modern life, and microplastics are now known to enter the body through food, drink, and air.

6 Apr 2026

Decoupling of metabolism and vasculature in tumors revealed by novel Capillary-Cell microscopy

A multidisciplinary team from Harvard Medical School, Duke University, and Massachusetts General Hospital has developed the dual-scale Capillary-Cell (CapCell) microscope, a revolutionary tool for visualizing tumor metabolism and vasculature dynamics.

21 Jan 2026

NSLLMs: Bridging neuroscience and LLMs for efficient, interpretable AI systems

Large language models (LLMs) have become crucial tools in the pursuit of artificial general intelligence (AGI).

26 Dec 2025

New research reveals a hidden source of cellular bioelectricity

Many biological processes are regulated by electricity-from nerve impulses to heartbeats to the movement of molecules in and out of cells.

19 Dec 2025

Trojan horse strategy using cesium nanosalts shows powerful anti-cancer effects

Recently, a team led by Academician Hongjie Zhang, Researcher Shuyan Song, Associate Researcher Pengpeng Lei, and Dr. Ran An at the Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, developed an innovative strategy to construct a series of biodegradable cesium nanosalts.

4 Nov 2025

How walnuts combat inflammation and oxidative stress in the body

This review in Food Science & Nutrition synthesizes evidence showing that walnuts (Juglans regia L.) exert potent antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, apoptosis-regulatory, and immunomodulatory effects through bioactive compounds influencing mitochondrial, cytokine, and redox pathways.

3 Nov 2025

New research links postictal symptoms in epilepsy to hidden brain waves

In everyday clinical practice, symptoms are regularly observed after epileptic seizures, known as "post-ictal symptoms", which, in contrast to the usually short duration of seizures, typically last several minutes to hours. Besides symptoms such as impaired speech and language comprehension, a state of disorientation may occur.

19 Sep 2025

Researchers identify seizure-associated depolarization as cause of post-ictal symptoms

People with temporal lobe epilepsy in particular often wander around aimlessly and unconsciously after a seizure. Researchers at the University Hospital Bonn (UKB), the University of Bonn, and the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) have identified a neurobiological mechanism that could be responsible for this so-called post-ictal wandering and potentially other postictal symptoms.

18 Sep 2025