You might be surprised at how many daily essentials require some form of fossil fuel. Most of our energy for transportation, electricity, heating, and cooling is derived from fossil fuels. But also, things like packaging, candles, shampoos, makeup, deodorant, electronics, and medical equipment are derived from fossil fuels, and the list goes on and on. In other words, fossil fuels are completely woven into the fabric of our existence.
We know fossil fuels damage the planet. The good news is science hasn’t given up on humanity quite yet. Scientists have created a semi-artificial leaf that can be the building block toward eliminating the need for fossil fuels in everyday products.
Floating gardens with solar panels. Image from Canva
University of Cambridge creates solar-powered leaf
A 2025 study published in Tech Xplore reported that researchers at the University of Cambridge are constructing ways to eliminate the need for fossil fuels. One option is a solar-powered leaf that removes CO2 from the air and produces synthetic petroleum using the energy of natural sunlight. After converting carbon dioxide into formate, they can create a series of chemical reactions that produce compounds used in pharmaceuticals. Combining bacterial enzymes with light-harvesting organic polymers, they’ve made a design that avoids toxic semiconductors and lasts longer than previously explored designs.
Leading the research is Professor Erwin Reisner from Cambridge’s Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry. Reisner said, “This device combines the best of both worlds—organic semiconductors are tunable and non-toxic, while biocatalysts are highly selective and efficient.” Reisner continued, “This could be a fundamental platform for producing green fuels and chemicals in the future. It’s a real opportunity to do some exciting and important chemistry.”
This device, created at Cambridge, doesn’t need any extra electricity or harmful chemicals. Using organic materials, it turns sunlight into clean fuels and other helpful products. These synthetic alcohols and chemicals are required by industry, and producing them while avoiding pollution is an incredible leap in the right direction.
Using nature’s enzymes to produce clean fuels and chemicals can make them more environmentally friendly and help fight climate change. New ways to generate sustainable energy and manufacture are critical to keep pace with an evolving society that needs cleaner fuels.
What can solar fuels do for the world?
A 2025 study in the Royal Society of Chemistry highlighted the need to shift away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy sources such as photovoltaics. Essential for the sustainability of both technically and economically feasible infrastructure, these technologies can help shape human development as we transition away from fossil fuels.
A 2024 study by the U.S. Department of Energy found that improving the efficiency of converting CO2 into liquid fuels demonstrates tangible improvements that can make these energy systems more viable. Solar fuels can help stabilize the grid, enhance energy security, and protect the environment while offering new ways to store, transport, and use solar energy more flexibly.
Studies like this one are imperative for transitioning to green energy. Climate change, pollution, and the depletion of fossil fuels jeopardize both the environment and human health. With global energy demands rising every year, sustainable sources that can also clean CO2 pollution are innovations our future depends on to build a better world.
Navigating the complexities of brain health as we age can be a daunting experience. From the mild frustrations of general forgetfulness to the devastating impacts of Alzheimer’s and Dementia, cognitive decline affects millions of families across the country. However, a groundbreaking 2025 study from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) suggests that we may finally have a way to do more than just manage symptoms. Researchers believe they have found a method to truly reverse age-related memory loss.
The study, published in Nature Aging and reported by MSN, focused on a specific protein found in the brain called ferritin light chain 1 (FTL1). By studying the memory centers of aging mice, the team at the UCSF Bakar Aging Research Institute discovered that FTL1 tends to accumulate over time.
When they successfully reduced the levels of this protein in older mice, something remarkable happened: their cognitive performance improved back to levels typically seen in much younger mice.
A labratory mouse checks out a microscope Canva
The Role of FTL1 and Iron Storage
To understand why this protein matters, it helps to look at how the brain manages iron. Iron is essential for the body, as it assists in distributing energy to cells and keeping the brain functioning at its peak. FTL1 acts as a storage container for this iron. Without it, iron would move freely and cause damage; however, too much FTL1 can disrupt neurons and deprive them of the energy they need to form and recall memories.
The researchers tested this theory by increasing FTL1 levels in healthy young mice, which caused them to immediately experience memory impairments. When they did the opposite with older mice, the results were definitive. “It is truly a reversal of impairments. It’s much more than merely delaying or preventing symptoms,” said Saul Villeda, the senior author of the paper. This suggests that FTL1 is a primary driver of typical age-related decline, even in the absence of specific diseases like Alzheimer’s.
Proactive Steps for Brain Health
While the medical world waits for these “frontier medicine” applications to move toward human trials, there are science-backed ways to protect your cognitive function today.
Active Lifestyles: Physical movement is non-negotiable for brain health. A 2024 study in the National Library of Medicine showed that combining aerobic exercise with cognitive training significantly improved processing speed and memory. Even a 30-minute daily walk supports vital blood flow to the brain.
The Power of Sleep: Never underestimate a good night’s rest. According to a 2024 study in BMC, short sleep cycles are linked to higher levels of amyloid-β, a primary indicator of Alzheimer’s disease. Even short-term sleep deprivation has been shown to immediately impact memory and focus, according to reports in Springer Nature Link.
As the field of neuroscience continues to unlock the secrets of proteins like FTL1, the prospect of maintaining a sharp, youthful mind well into old age is becoming more of a reality. While we wait for technology to catch up, the foundation of a healthy brain remains built on the daily choices we make regarding how we eat, move, and rest.
Eighteen months ago, it was plausible that artificial intelligence might take a different path than social media. Back then, AI’s development hadn’t consolidated under a small number of big tech firms. Nor had it capitalized on consumer attention, surveilling users and delivering ads.
Unfortunately, the AI industry is now taking a page from the social media playbook and has set its sights on monetizing consumer attention. When OpenAI launched its ChatGPT Search feature in late 2024 and its browser, ChatGPT Atlas, in October 2025, it kicked off a race to capture online behavioral data to power advertising. It’s part of a yearslong turnabout by OpenAI, whose CEO Sam Altman once called the combination of ads and AI “unsettling” and now promises that ads can be deployed in AI apps while preserving trust. The rampant speculation among OpenAI users who believe they see paid placements in ChatGPT responses suggests they are not convinced.
As a security expert and data scientist, we see these examples as harbingers of a future where AI companies profit from manipulating their users’ behavior for the benefit of their advertisers and investors. It’s also a reminder that time to steer the direction of AI development away from private exploitation and toward public benefit is quickly running out.
The functionality of ChatGPT Search and its Atlas browser is not really new. Meta, commercial AI competitor Perplexity and even ChatGPT itself have had similar AI search features for years, and both Google and Microsoft beat OpenAI to the punch by integrating AI with their browsers. But OpenAI’s business positioning signals a shift.
We believe the ChatGPT Search and Atlas announcements are worrisome because there is really only one way to make money on search: the advertising model pioneered ruthlessly by Google.
Advertising model
Ruled a monopolist in U.S. federal court, Google has earned more than US$1.6 trillion in advertising revenue since 2001. You may think of Google as a web search company, or a streaming video company (YouTube), or an email company (Gmail), or a mobile phone company (Android, Pixel), or maybe even an AI company (Gemini). But those products are ancillary to Google’s bottom line. The advertising segment typically accounts for 80% to 90% of its total revenue. Everything else is there to collect users’ data and direct users’ attention to its advertising revenue stream.
After two decades in this monopoly position, Google’s search product is much more tuned to the company’s needs than those of its users. When Google Search first arrived decades ago, it was revelatory in its ability to instantly find useful information across the still-nascent web. In 2025, its search result pages are dominated by low-quality and often AI-generated content, spam sites that exist solely to drive traffic to Amazon sales – a tactic known as affiliate marketing – and paid ad placements, which at times are indistinguishable from organic results.
Plenty of advertisers and observers seem to think AI-powered advertising is the future of the ad business.
Highly persuasive
Paid advertising in AI search, and AI models generally, could look very different from traditional web search. It has the potential to influence your thinking, spending patterns and even personal beliefs in much more subtle ways. Because AI can engage in active dialogue, addressing your specific questions, concerns and ideas rather than just filtering static content, its potential for influence is much greater. It’s like the difference between reading a textbook and having a conversation with its author.
Imagine you’re conversing with your AI agent about an upcoming vacation. Did it recommend a particular airline or hotel chain because they really are best for you, or does the company get a kickback for every mention? If you ask about a political issue, does the model bias its answer based on which political party has paid the company a fee, or based on the bias of the model’s corporate owners?
There is mounting evidence that AI models are at least as effective as people at persuading users to do things. A December 2023 meta-analysis of 121 randomized trials reported that AI models are as good as humans at shifting people’s perceptions, attitudes and behaviors. A more recent meta-analysis of eight studies similarly concluded there was “no significant overall difference in persuasive performance between (large language models) and humans.”
This influence may go well beyond shaping what products you buy or who you vote for. As with the field of search engine optimization, the incentive for humans to perform for AI models might shape the way people write and communicate with each other. How we express ourselves online is likely to be increasingly directed to win the attention of AIs and earn placement in the responses they return to users.
A different way forward
Much of this is discouraging, but there is much that can be done to change it.
First, it’s important to recognize that today’s AI is fundamentally untrustworthy, for the same reasons that search engines and social media platforms are.
The problem is not the technology itself; fast ways to find information and communicate with friends and family can be wonderful capabilities. The problem is the priorities of the corporations who own these platforms and for whose benefit they are operated. Recognize that you don’t have control over what data is fed to the AI, who it is shared with and how it is used. It’s important to keep that in mind when you connect devices and services to AI platforms, ask them questions, or consider buying or doing the things they suggest.
There is also a lot that people can demand of governments to restrain harmful corporate uses of AI. In the U.S., Congress could enshrine consumers’ rights to control their own personal data, as the EU already has. It could also create a data protection enforcement agency, as essentially every other developed nation has.
Governments worldwide could invest in Public AI – models built by public agencies offered universally for public benefit and transparently under public oversight. They could also restrict how corporations can collude to exploit people using AI, for example by barring advertisements for dangerous products such as cigarettes and requiring disclosure of paid endorsements.
Every technology company seeks to differentiate itself from competitors, particularly in an era when yesterday’s groundbreaking AI quickly becomes a commodity that will run on any kid’s phone. One differentiator is in building a trustworthy service. It remains to be seen whether companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic can sustain profitable businesses on the back of subscription AI services like the premium editions of ChatGPT, Plus and Pro, and Claude Pro. If they are going to continue convincing consumers and businesses to pay for these premium services, they will need to build trust.
That will require making real commitments to consumers on transparency, privacy, reliability and security that are followed through consistently and verifiably.
And while no one knows what the future business models for AI will be, we can be certain that consumers do not want to be exploited by AI, secretly or otherwise.
As we approach the end of the year and reflect on everything that has happened, it’s clear it’s been a doozy. There have been many things to focus our attention on, some magical, some wonderful, and some a little scary.
The journal Nature reported on a rock sample nicknamed “Sapphire Canyon” examined by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover. Describing textures on the rock as “leopard spots” and “poppy seeds,” researchers said the patterns shared features associated with biological activity, possibly created by ancient microbes. Scientists are cautious, noting that many chemical pathways can produce similar mineral patterns, though the features could be biological in origin.
Put those robots to work
Robotic technology is inspecting the sewers and underground utility networks in Bengaluru, India.The Times of India reported on the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Board’s decision to shift from human workers to robotic technology. The new tech has significantly reduced the risk of human exposure to hazardous spaces and helped engineers avoid unnecessary digging.
Light up the skies
The night sky lit up like a scene from Spielberg’s War of the Worlds. Stunning shades of blue, pink, and green were seen across the Midwest, including parts of Colorado and even Florida. The heightened aurora activity was caused by intense solar storms that sent charged particles from the Sun into Earth’s upper atmosphere.WFYI Public Media reported the best viewing times for states like Indiana were just before midnight.
There have been incredible leaps forward in vision-related technology. The Guardian reported on an electronic implant with the thickness of a human hair. Blind patients can read letters again through an eye that had lost the ability to see.
Is this the person or not?
If you didn’t know, deepfakes use artificial intelligence to create audio and video that mimic how a person looks and sounds. A study at Sungkyunkwan University found that the widely used deepfake detection tools were unreliable in identifying deepfakes in real-world conditions. The situation has become concerning enough that 85% of Americans surveyed say realistic deepfakes have made them less likely to trust online photos and videos.Undetectable AI reported that deepfake technology resulted in $200 million in losses in 2025.
There are now brain computers
Co-founded by Elon Musk, Neuralink is a brain-computer interface company. It recently implanted the device in its eighth and ninth participants, connecting their nervous systems to devices that interpret brain activity. Euronews reported that the technology is designed to allow participants to use computers using only their thoughts.
People are going to drive in the sky
Pre-orders have begun for flying cars, with deliveries scheduled to start in 2026. Flying car labs are gearing up for the production scale of these electric, vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. People’s Daily Online reported that the Govy AirCab is a multi-rotor flying car that can accommodate four to five passengers and costs less than 1.68 million yuan.
Beam me up, Scotty
This isn’t quite the same as the exotic teleportation of matter depicted in the sci-fi franchise Star Trek. Instead, it uses quantum entanglement, in which particles far apart remain connected and responsive to one another. Science Alert shared that the success rate was a little over 70%. The new technology will allow information to be transferred between photons, helping secure quantum data and keep it safe.
As technology continues to break through new barriers, the gap between sci-fi and reality grows smaller and smaller.
If you’re curious about other scientific breakthroughs, watch this video:
Floating gardens with solar panels. Image from Canva
Petroleum jelly. Image from Canva
