Researchers have found that your heart already has its own 'natural bypass' system that can predict whether the heart muscle beyond it is alive or dead. A new study reveals how tiny hidden vessels could hold the key to deciding who really needs complex and risky surgery - and who doesn’t. The team found that a simple angiogram scoring system could help identify patients whose heart muscle is still alive - even when a major artery has been completely blocked for months. It is hoped that the breakthrough could change how cardiac patients are treated.

Researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have found evidence that people who fall at the extreme high or low ends of certain traits, such as cholesterol, blood glucose, height, and age at menopause, are more likely to have a simple genetic explanation than previously thought. Their findings, reported in the May 27 issue of Nature [https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10516-5], may lead to new insights into the causes of common diseases. Many traits linked to human health are considered “polygenic,” meaning they are shaped by the combined influence of many common genetic variants, each contributing only a small effect. But the new study explored whether individuals with extreme trait values may instead be influenced by rarer genetic variants that have a much larger impact. The researchers say this possibility could help explain why some individuals develop unusually high or low levels of traits associated with conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, and stroke.