Los Angeles, CA – October 07, 2026 - The Terasaki Institute for Biomedical Innovation announced today that OnVagus, a medical device company incubating at the Institute, has received institutional and regulatory approval to begin the first human trial of its noninvasive nerve-stimulation device for patients experiencing cancer-related wasting.

Researchers at South China University of Technology, in collaboration with the Dongguan Institute of Materials Science and Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, have developed a novel supranano multi-precipitate microstructure in amorphous soft magnetic composites using Ar/O₂ plasma treatment. By facilitating magnetic-moment reversal, this approach significantly reduced the coercivity while maintaining  excellent overall performance. The optimized material exhibits an ultralow coercivity of 0.13 Oe, an effective permeability of 37.3, a high saturation magnetization of 185 emu g^-1 and an ultralow core loss of 191.18 kW m⁻³ at 1 MHz and 20 mT. These results provide for a promising strategy for developing next-generation soft magnetic composites for miniaturized, high-frequency, and high-efficiency power electronics devices.

A new study revealed molecular features linked to more aggressive prostate cancer in a subset of patients who had been classified as low risk, highlighting biological differences that may not be apparent from clinical measures alone. The results could lead to new therapeutic strategies.

Nanotechnology using plant-based fibers could be the answer to detecting and cleaning up pesticides, fertilizers and other chemicals before they become harmful on the farm and in the environment.

A University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture research project led by Mi Li, associate professor in the Center for Renewable Carbon and the School of Natural Resources, received $300,000 for two years from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture’s Agriculture and Food Research Initiative nanotechnology program to create these prototype materials. The project also includes researchers from the University of Memphis and Auburn University.