Pregnancy complications such as preeclampsia and preterm birth often arise during the late stage of pregnancy. However, researchers have primarily relied on placental cells from early pregnancy to study these conditions, which may not fully reflect the biology of late-stage complications. Now, a research team in Japan has successfully developed human placental stem cells from the smooth chorion (a part of the placenta) taken from full-term pregnancies. These new stem cells, called Ch-TS cells, share the same characteristics as placental stem cells from early pregnancy and can develop into the key cell types essential for proper placental function. This advancement allows scientists to study placental complications using cells from the actual time period when these complications occur, potentially leading to better understanding, earlier detection, and improved treatments for pregnancy-related conditions.

Researchers at AIMR and NUS have demonstrated field-free, energy-efficient switching of perpendicular magnetization using magnon torques in a WTe₂/NiO/CoFeB heterostructure. By exploiting crystal symmetry and spin canting, they achieved low-current operation with minimal impact of Joule heating—offering a promising path toward scalable, low-power spintronic memory devices based on magnon transport.