Targeted drug delivery is a powerful and promising area of medicine. Therapies that pinpoint precise areas of the body can reduce the medicine dosage and avoid potentially harmful “off target” effects. Researchers at the UW took a significant step toward that goal by designing proteins with autonomous decision-making capabilities. By adding smart tail structures to therapeutic proteins, the team demonstrated that the proteins could be “programmed” to act based on the presence of specific environmental cues. 

According to theory, massive red supergiant stars should cause most supernovae, yet they are rarely observed. New James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observations indicate these supernovae likely can occur but are hidden in dust. Star’s dust was unusually carbon-rich, suggesting atypical chemical mixing during its death throes. Study marks first time JWST identified a supernova’s source star and first time supernova was imaged in mid-infrared wavelengths.

Tiny ocean organisms living in oxygen-poor waters turn nutrients into nitrous oxide—a greenhouse gas far more powerful than carbon dioxide—via complex chemical pathways.

Penn’s Xin Sun and collaborators identified the how and why behind these chemical reactions, showing that microbial competition, not just chemistry, determines how much N₂O is produced.

Their findings pave the way for more reliable climate models, making global greenhouse gas estimates more effective, predictable, and easier to understand in response to natural and man-made climate change.