The protein, known as glycoprotein nonmetastatic melanoma B (GPNMB), appears to help harmful Parkinson’s-related damage spread from one brain cell to another. Scientists say targeting it may offer a new strategy for slowing the worsening of the disease over time.

“Many patients with Parkinson’s disease are diagnosed in the early stages, when symptoms are relatively mild, but there is currently no treatment that slows the progression,” said lead author, Alice Chen-Plotkin, MD, Parker Family Professor of Neurology. “These early results are a promising step towards developing this type of treatment.”

How Parkinson’s Disease Spreads in the Brain

Parkinson’s disease affects more than one million Americans, and approximately 90,000 people in the United States are diagnosed each year. Although researchers still do not fully understand what causes the disease, scientists have known for years that it gradually spreads through the brain in stages.

A protein called alpha-synuclein is central to this process. In Parkinson’s disease, alpha-synuclein forms abnormal clumps inside neurons. These clumps damage the affected cells and can then move into nearby healthy neurons, where they continue spreading.

As more areas of the brain become affected, symptoms worsen. Patients may develop tremors, difficulty walking, balance problems, and trouble swallowing.

Current treatments, including levodopa and deep-brain stimulation, can help reduce symptoms. However, no approved therapy has been shown to slow or stop the underlying progression of Parkinson’s disease itself.

Brain Immune Cells May Help Fuel Disease Progression

In earlier research published in 2022, Chen-Plotkin and colleagues identified GPNMB as an important molecule involved in the spread of alpha-synuclein between neurons. That discovery made the protein a promising target for future therapies.

In the new study, the research team found that microglia, the brain’s immune cells, are a major source of GPNMB in Parkinson’s disease. When neurons become damaged or begin dying, nearby microglia respond by producing larger amounts of the protein.

Enzymes then cut part of GPNMB away from the cell surface, allowing it to move freely between cells in the brain.

Using preclinical laboratory experiments with cultured neurons, researchers developed antibodies designed to block GPNMB. The antibodies successfully prevented alpha-synuclein pathology from spreading from one cell to another.

“These results suggest Parkinson’s disease may be driven by a self reinforcing cycle — alpha-synuclein accumulates in neurons, damaging the neurons. The injury to the neurons initiates the release of GPNMB, which accelerates the spread of alpha-synuclein, leading to further damage,” Chen-Plotkin said. “Interrupting this cycle would hopefully slow, or even stop, the spread of alpha-synuclein through the brain and the neurodegeneration that follows.”

Human Brain Analysis Supports the Findings

To examine whether the results were relevant in people, researchers analyzed tissue samples from 1,675 brains stored in the Penn Brain Bank.

The team found that individuals carrying genetic variants linked to higher GPNMB production also showed more extensive alpha-synuclein pathology. According to the researchers, this provides strong evidence that GPNMB plays a significant role in the progression of Parkinson’s disease in humans.

Importantly, elevated GPNMB levels were not connected to markers associated with other neurodegenerative conditions, including Alzheimer’s disease.

“These results are promising for laboratory models and human brain tissue analysis, but we still have a lot of work to do before we can translate this therapy into humans,” said Chen-Plotkin. “That being said, these results are encouraging as we continue to work towards a novel treatment for PD.”

The study received support from the National Institutes of Health (R37 NS115139, P30 AG010124, U19 AG062418, P01 AG084497), SPARK-NS, the Parker Family Chair, and the Lipman Family Fund.

Scientists from the Texas Center for Superconductivity (TcSUH) and the University of Houston department of physics reached a superconducting transition temperature (Tc) of 151 Kelvin (about minus 122 degrees Celsius). That is now the highest Tc ever reported for a superconductor functioning at ambient pressure since superconductivity was first discovered in 1911.

The transition temperature marks the point where a material can carry electricity with zero resistance. Increasing this temperature has been one of the biggest goals in superconductivity research because higher operating temperatures could make superconducting technologies far more practical and affordable.

The findings by physicists Ching-Wu Chu and Liangzi Deng were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Funding for the work came from Intellectual Ventures, the state of Texas through TcSUH, and several foundations.

“Transmitting electricity in the grid loses about 8% of the electricity,” said Chu, professor of physics, TcSUH founding director and the paper’s senior author. “If we conserve that energy, that’s billions of dollars of savings and it also saves us lots of effort and reduces environmental impacts.”

Why Superconductors Matter

Superconductors are materials that allow electricity to flow without resistance. Because no energy is lost as heat, they could dramatically improve the efficiency of electrical systems. Scientists also see superconductors as critical for technologies such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), fusion reactors, quantum technologies, and ultrafast electronics.

The challenge is that most superconductors only work at extremely low temperatures, requiring expensive cooling systems that limit widespread use.

“Once we bring the material to ambient pressure, it becomes much more accessible for scientists to use well-developed instrumentation to investigate it and further develop technologies for ambient condition operations,” said Deng, assistant professor of physics, principal investigator at the TcSUH and lead author of the paper.

New Record Breaks Decades-Old Barrier

Researchers have spent decades searching for superconducting materials with increasingly higher transition temperatures.

A major milestone came in 1987 when Chu and his collaborators discovered that a material known as YBCO could become superconducting at minus 180 degrees C, or 93 K. That discovery helped launch a global race to develop high-temperature superconductors.

In 1993, scientists discovered a mercury-based copper-oxide ceramic called Hg1223 that reached superconductivity at minus 140 degrees C, or 133 K. That material held the ambient-pressure record for more than 30 years.

The new University of Houston achievement pushes the record 18 degrees C higher to 151 K.

Pressure Quenching Creates Stable Superconductivity

The breakthrough relied on a process known as pressure quenching. While pressure techniques are commonly used in other fields, including diamond production, the method is relatively new in superconductivity research.

Researchers first subjected the material to extremely high pressure, which enhanced its superconducting behavior and increased its transition temperature. While still under pressure, the material was cooled to a carefully chosen temperature before the pressure was suddenly removed.

That rapid release effectively preserved the enhanced superconducting properties, allowing the material to remain stable even after returning to normal pressure conditions.

“Other researchers have shown that reaching superconductivity at room temperature under pressure is achievable,” Chu said. “Our method shows that it is possible to retain that state without maintaining pressure.”

A Step Toward Room-Temperature Superconductors

Although room-temperature superconductivity at ambient pressure remains out of reach, researchers say the new record is an important advance toward that goal. Room temperature is roughly 300 K, leaving a gap of about 140 degrees C from the newly achieved record.

“This finding has great potential,” Chu said. “We believe, with enough people working on it and given enough time, we should be able to realize the potential.”

Chu and Deng also contributed to a companion perspective paper funded by Intellectual Ventures and published in PNAS. The paper discusses six different approaches researchers could use to raise superconducting temperatures further, including pressure quenching.

“Room-temperature superconductivity has been seen as a ‘holy grail’ by scientists for over a century,” said Rohit Prasankumar, director of superconductivity research at Intellectual Ventures. “The UH team’s result shows that this goal is closer than ever before. However, the distance between the new record set in this study and room temperature is still about 140 degrees C. Closing this gap will require concerted, intentional efforts by the broader scientific community, including materials scientists, chemists, and engineers, as well as physicists.”

Using observations from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), astronomers discovered this dramatic daily weather cycle on the distant world, located nearly 700 light years from Earth in the constellation Microscopium. The findings mark one of the first times scientists have directly observed cloud cycling on a Hot Jupiter exoplanet.

The discovery also gave researchers a much clearer view of the planet’s atmosphere, helping them better understand what the world is made of and how its weather behaves. The study was published in the journal Science.

“I’ve been looking at exoplanets for 20 years, and general cloudiness has been a thorn in our side. We’ve known for quite a while that clouds are pervasive on Hot Jupiter planets, which is annoying because it’s like trying to look at the planet through a foggy window,” said co-author and program PI, David Sing, a Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Johns Hopkins. “Not only have we been able to clear the view, but we can finally pin down what the clouds are made out of and how they’re condensing and evaporating as they move around the planet.”

Extreme Weather on WASP-94A b

To study WASP-94A b, scientists observed the planet as it crossed in front of its host star. During this transit, JWST was able to separately examine the leading and trailing edges of the planet as it moved across the star’s light.

The leading edge represents the planet’s morning side, where atmospheric winds carry air from the cooler night side toward the intensely hot day side. The trailing edge acts as the evening side, where air moves back toward darkness.

The observations revealed a striking difference between morning and evening conditions. The morning side was packed with clouds made of magnesium silicate, a mineral commonly found in rocks on Earth. The evening side, however, appeared almost cloud free.

Researchers believe there are two possible explanations for the disappearing clouds. One idea is that powerful winds drag the clouds deep into the planet’s atmosphere on the scorching day side, effectively hiding them from view. Another possibility is that the clouds evaporate as they move into temperatures exceeding 1,000 degrees, similar to morning fog burning away on Earth but under far more extreme conditions.

“It was a huge surprise. People have expected some differences, like its cooler in the morning than the evening — that’s something natural that we experience here on Earth,” Sing said. “But what we saw was a real dichotomy between the weather on both sides of the planet, and huge differences in cloud coverage, and that changes our whole picture of the planet.”

James Webb Peers Through Alien Clouds

The clearer evening skies gave scientists an opportunity that had previously been impossible with older telescopes such as Hubble. By isolating the cloud free side of the planet, researchers could directly examine the atmosphere itself instead of averaging cloudy and clear regions together.

“With the Hubble telescope, when we used to do this type of observation, we got an average view of the whole planet with data from the clouds and the atmosphere squished together and indistinguishable,” said first author Sagnick Mukherjee, a postdoctoral fellow at Arizona State University who was a student at Johns Hopkins and UC Santa Cruz at the time of the research. “This approach with the JWST lets us localize our observations, which helped us see the cloud cycle.”

The clearer data also solved a long standing mystery about the planet’s chemistry. Earlier measurements suggested WASP-94A b contained hundreds of times more oxygen and carbon than Jupiter, something that did not fit with existing theories of planet formation.

The new observations paint a very different picture. Scientists now estimate the planet contains only about five times more oxygen and carbon than Jupiter, making it far more similar to the giant planet in our own solar system than previously believed.

A New Window Into Alien Atmospheres

Hot Jupiters are giant gas planets that orbit extremely close to their stars, even closer than Mercury orbits the Sun. Because of their intense heat and radiation, these planets provide scientists with ideal natural laboratories for studying atmospheric chemistry and cloud behavior under extreme conditions.

After studying WASP-94A b, the research team examined eight additional Hot Jupiters and identified similar cloud cycling on two more worlds: WASP-39 b and WASP-17 b.

Next, researchers plan to expand the search using a larger JWST observing program that will investigate cloud cycles across many different exoplanets, including an unusual gas giant that travels through the habitable zone on an eccentric orbit.

The Fermi mission is part of NASA’s network of observatories designed to track changing events across the universe and help scientists better understand how cosmic phenomena work.

“For nearly 20 years, astronomers have searched Fermi data for gamma-ray signals from thousands of supernovae, and while a few intriguing hints have been reported, none were definitive until now,” study lead Fabio Acero at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the University of Paris-Saclay.

The findings were published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Rare Supernova Emits Powerful Gamma Rays

Core-collapse supernovae occur when a massive star exhausts the fuel needed to support its core. Without that energy source, the core collapses under gravity and triggers a violent explosion. Depending on conditions, the collapse can leave behind either a neutron star or a black hole. The rest of the star is blasted outward into space as an expanding cloud of extremely hot gas.

Over the past two decades, astronomers have identified nearly 400 unusually powerful examples known as superluminous supernovae. These rare explosions can shine at least 10 times brighter in visible light than ordinary supernovae.

In 2024, researchers led by Li Shang at Anhui University in Hefei, China, suggested that Fermi’s Large Area Telescope may have detected gamma rays from one of these events years after the explosion occurred.

The object, called SN 2017egm, erupted in the galaxy NGC 3191, about 440 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. Even from that enormous distance, it remains one of the closest superluminous supernovae ever observed from Earth.

“We searched for gamma rays from the six nearest superluminous supernovae seen during the first 16 years of Fermi’s mission,” said Guillem Martí-Devesa, a researcher previously at the University of Trieste in Italy and now a fellow at the Institute of Space Sciences in Barcelona, Spain. “Only SN 2017egm shows evidence for gamma rays, confirming earlier hints that some supernovae can be as luminous in gamma rays as they are in visible light. This opens up a new window for studying these fascinating events.”

Magnetars May Be the Hidden Engine

Scientists have long debated what gives superluminous supernovae their extraordinary brightness. One leading explanation involves magnetars, which are neutron stars with the strongest magnetic fields known in the universe. Their magnetic fields can be up to 1,000 times stronger than those of ordinary neutron stars, reaching strengths roughly 10 trillion times greater than a refrigerator magnet.

To investigate further, the team closely examined both the visible light and gamma-ray signals from SN 2017egm and compared the observations with different theoretical models.

A model created by co-authors Indrek Vurm at the University of Tartu in Estonia and Brian Metzger at Columbia University in New York City followed how radiation and particles from a newborn magnetar would move through the expanding supernova debris.

Researchers believe a newly formed magnetar can rotate several hundred times every second. That incredible speed generates a powerful flow of electrons and positrons, which are the antimatter versions of electrons. Together, these particles create a huge cloud of high-energy material called a magnetar wind nebula.

Inside this nebula, particle interactions can generate gamma rays in several ways. Electrons and positrons can collide and transform into gamma-ray photons, while gamma rays themselves can collide and create new particles. As these interactions continue, much of the gamma-ray energy becomes trapped inside the supernova debris and is converted into lower-energy visible light, helping make the explosion exceptionally bright.

Gamma Rays Escape Months Later

“About three months after the collapse, as the supernova debris expands and cools, the gamma rays can begin to leak out,” Acero said. “This magnetar model best reproduces the supernova’s luminosity and the arrival time of its gamma rays during the first months, but we see room for improvement at later times, when the visible light fades quite irregularly.”

The researchers suggest that additional processes likely influenced the supernova during its long decline in brightness. These may include material falling back toward the magnetar and collisions between the expanding blast wave and matter expelled by the star centuries before it exploded.

The team also explored whether future observatories could detect similar events. They found that the upcoming Cerenkov Telescope Array Observatory should be capable of spotting supernovae like SN 2017egm from distances up to about 500 million light-years away with roughly 50 hours of observation time.

Scientists say future cooperation between ground-based observatories and NASA’s space telescopes will help reveal even more about these violent stellar explosions and the extreme objects hidden inside them.

“The magnetar central engine mechanism discussed in this paper builds upon a lot of observational and theoretical advances in magnetars over the last 20 years,” said Judy Racusin, a deputy project scientist for the Fermi mission at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “Observing gamma rays from supernovae will give us a new way to explore their inner workings.”