The U.K.’s main research funding agency is looking to put more public money into proof of concept and pre-seed funding of putative university spinouts, to make them more investible and improve relations between academics and investors. The move by UK Research and Innovation, which in 2026 will allocate £9.22 billion (US$12.58 billion) of taxpayer money across all fields of research, is in response to a government edict that the agency prioritizes outputs over inputs.

Google Deepmind is shedding light on the dark genome with its latest AI model, which is trained to decipher the 98% of DNA that does not code for proteins. Alphagenome is designed to predict how variants in the regulatory genome exert their effects on the expression of the genes they control.

A new method, based on gene editing with oligonucleotides and functional analyses, identifies which variants of DNA repair genes associated with Lynch syndrome are truly harmful and which are not. Scientists at The Netherlands Cancer Institute have developed this technique and classified these gene variants in both coding and noncoding regions, distinguishing those that are pathogenic from those that are benign.

The range of effects caused by rhinoviruses – the pathogens responsible for the common cold – motivated scientists at Yale University to study the human nasal epithelium and uncover a previously undescribed defense mechanism. The interferon-mediated protective response in these cells can limit infection, whereas a maladaptive response tends to worsen it. Based on these findings, the researchers have identified potential therapeutic targets to reduce inflammation associated with rhinovirus infection.

Once it was considered to be more or less a passive energy-storing device that could double as a cushion. But increasingly, fat is conceptualized as an endocrine organ as much as a tissue type. Now, separate research groups have reported new insights into the functional roles of different fats based on their anatomical location and functional characteristics.

For decades, scientists have searched for a mechanistic link between viral infection and multiple sclerosis (MS). Insights from three studies recently published in Cell bring that connection into sharper focus. By tracing how the immune system responds to Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) – and how those responses can misfire against the brain – researchers are beginning to uncover a compelling biological explanation for MS.

In 2025, science saw its breakthroughs, which BioWorld will be covering as part of our end-of-the-year wrap-up. But the biggest science story of 2025 is not about any scientific advance. It is the politicized destruction of U.S. science, and the dismantling of a scientific ecosystem that has been the envy of the world since it emerged after Germany destroyed its own pre-eminence in the 1930s.

Advances in antiretroviral therapy (ART) now allow people living with HIV to lead normal lives with undetectable and nontransmissible levels of the virus in their blood. Yet that reality is limited to those with access to treatment. More than 40 million people worldwide live with HIV, with over a million new infections and hundreds of thousands of deaths each year, underscoring that major challenges remain.

The cardiomyositis that is a rare adverse effect of mRNA-based COVID vaccines is due to immune cell activity as a result of increased levels of the chemokines CXCL10 and interferon-γ (IFN-γ). Blocking CXCL10 and IFN-γ could prevent muscle cell damage in cell culture, and cardiomyositis in animal models. The findings, reported in the Dec. 10, 2025, issue of Science Translational Medicine, suggest a way of mitigating the risk of cardiomyositis.

Epilepsygtx Ltd. has raised a $33 million series A to fund a phase I/IIa trial of EPY-201, a gene therapy for treating drug-resistant focal epilepsy. EPY-201 uses an adeno-associated viral vector to deliver KCNA1, the gene encoding Kv1.1, a potassium ion channel that modulates neuronal excitability.