Microplastics Pose Serious Risk To Our Guts

At this time, almost everyone is aware that microplastics are finding their way deep into our bodies, such is their ubiquity in the world around us. However, their health impacts are still not clear. Those impacts may well include damage to gut integrity and harmful changes in gut bacteria, according to a new study published in Nature Communications.

The study was led by researchers from the National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan, who fed mice polystyrene nanoplastics for 12 weeks. Nanoplastics are the smallest type of microplastic, and in these experiments the fragments were just 100 nanometers in size, thousands of times smaller than the width of a human hair.

Careful analysis of the animals revealed subsequent changes to protein production, gene activity, bacteria levels, and the microRNA coding inside cells. For example, two proteins that normally keep the gut sealed and protected became less abundant.

The beneficial bacteria Lactobacillus decreased, the potentially harmful bacteria Ruminococcaceae increased, and a bacteria called Lachnospiraceae actually ate some of the nanoplastics.

Doing so changed the way the bacteria secreted tiny packages called extracellular vesicles, which in turn inhibited the production of intestinal mucus.

"This study is the first to show that plastic particles can interfere with the microRNA carried by extracellular vesicles between mouse intestinal cells and specific gut microbes, disrupting host–microbe communication and altering microbial composition in ways that may harm the gut health of mice," says microbiologist Wei-Hsuan Hsu, from the National Cheng Kung University.

For those of us who aren't biologists, these changes can be hard to interpret in a simple way, but overall the integrity and health of the guts of the mice took a turn for the worse. It's likely that the risk of related health complications would go up as a result.

In this study, the mechanisms behind how nanoplastics affect the gut are just as important as the effects themselves, and will now point researchers towards new approaches for understanding how microplastics might alter our bodies on a fundamental level.

"The research identifies a molecular mechanism by which plastic particles disturb gut microbiota," says Hsu.

It's important to add some context to this study. Mice are useful substitutes for humans in research, but they're obviously not an exact match, so we need to see if similar gut changes come about in people.

What's more, the mice were fed nanoplastics at a much higher level than humans would usually be exposed to. It's not clear if we are ingesting anywhere near enough plastic to trigger the changes shown in this study.

"Given the current limitations in nanoplastic detection technologies and the uncertainties associated with extrapolating animal model results to humans, continued research is critical to accurately evaluate the potential long-term health effects of nanoplastics in humans," says immunologist Yueh-Hsia Luo, from the National Central University in Taiwan, who wasn't involved in the study.

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UCLA Graduating Student Showed Off His ChatGPT Answers

For a few years now, artificial intelligence posed as both a threat and an opportunity in academia. There is a delicate balance that must be maintain to avoid abuse and improper behaviour.

But while most prefer to keep their AI schoolwork aids confidential, one student at the University of California, Los Angeles, brazenly boasted about employing the tech during his commencement ceremony.

The shocking moment was captured during UCLA’s livestream at the Pauley Pavilion earlier this month, but videos have since been reshared to Instagram and X, where they’ve amassed millions of views.

In the brief clip, which was displayed on the facility’s Jumbotron, Andre Mai, a computational and systems biology major, is seen holding up his laptop to show off walls of AI-generated text that he ostensibly used for his final exams.

The footage shows the undergrad proudly scrolling through the evidence of his so-called high-tech homework hacking as the rest of the graduating class of 2025 whoops and cheers in the background.

"Let’s gooooo!!!!!!" he mouths while hyping up the crowd.

The video didn’t sit nearly as well with online viewers, many of whom saw it as indicative of societal decline.

"We’re so cooked," lamented one disillusioned commenter under a repost on X, while another wrote, "Pandora’s Box has been opened."

"We’re still supposed to take college degrees seriously btw," scoffed a third.

"Our future doctors really gon have one AirPod in asking ChatGPT how to do open heart surgery," quipped one X wit.

"If ChatGPT is why you graduated, ChatGPT has already taken your job," theorized one poster, reiterating techsperts’ concerns that AI could render effectively render human employees obsolete.

These fears were also echoed on Reddit. "This is going to be the biggest problem," fretted one poster. "People just aren’t going to learn anything anymore, instead of a tool to help you learn people are just going to think it’s a magic answer box."

However, some defenders applauded Mai for seemingly gaming the system with one X fan writing, "Hot take ChatGPT and AI are tools that are going to be with us for good or bad for the foreseeable future."

"So proving that they can effectively use the tools he had to achieve what was required of him is not cheating," they added. "It proves he will be able to provide similar results in the real world."

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AI-Generated Ghost Students Create Problems For U.S. Schools

Across the United States' community colleges and universities, sophisticated criminal networks are using AI to deploy thousands of "synthetic" or "ghost" students—sometimes in the dead of night—to attack colleges.

The hordes are cramming themselves into registration portals to enroll and illegally apply for financial aid. The ghost students then occupy seats meant for real students—and have even resorted to handing in homework just to hold out long enough to siphon millions in financial aid before disappearing.

The scope of the ghost-student plague is staggering. Jordan Burris, vice president at identity-verification firm Socure and former chief of staff in the White House’s Office of the Federal Chief Information Officer, told Fortune more than half the students registering for classes at some schools have been found to be illegitimate. Among Socure’s client base, between 20% to 60 percent of student applicants are ghosts.

"Imagine a world where 20 percent of the student population are fraudulent," said Burris. "That’s the reality of the scale."

At one college, more than 400 different financial-aid applications could be tracked back to a handful of recycled phone numbers. "It was a digital poltergeist effectively haunting the school’s enrollment system," said Burris.

The scheme has also proved incredibly lucrative. According to a Department of Education advisory, about US$ 90 million in aid was doled out to ineligible students, the DOE analysis revealed, and some US$ 30 million was traced to dead people whose identities were used to enroll in classes.

The issue has become so dire that the DOE announced this month it had found nearly 150,000 suspect identities in federal student-aid forms and is now requiring higher-ed institutions to validate the identities of first-time applicants for Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) forms.

"Every dollar stolen by a ghost is a dollar denied to a real student attempting to change their life," Burris explained. "That’s a misallocation of public capital we really can’t afford."

Maurice Simpkins, president and cofounder of AMSimpkins, says he has identified international fraud rings operating out of Japan, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nairobi that have repeatedly targeted U.S. colleges.

The attacks specifically zero in on coursework that maximizes financial-aid eligibility, said Mike McCandless, vice president of student services at Merced College. Social sciences and online-only classes with large numbers of students that allow for as many credits or units as possible are often choice picks, he said.

For the spring semester, Merced booted about half of the 15,000 initial registrations that were fraudulent. Among the next tranche of about 7,500, some 20 percent were caught and removed from classes, freeing up space for real students.

In addition to financial theft, the ghost student epidemic is causing real students to get locked out of classes they need to graduate. Oftentimes, students have planned their work or childcare schedule around classes they intend to take—and getting locked out has led to a cascade of impediments.

According to the DOE, the rate of financial fraud through stolen identities has reached a level that "imperils the federal student assistance programs under Title IV of the Higher Education Act." In a statement, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said the new temporary fix will help prevent identity theft fraud.

"When rampant fraud is taking aid away from eligible students, disrupting the operations of colleges, and ripping off taxpayers, we have a responsibility to act," said McMahon.

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Pre-Wimbledon Matches Are Heating Up

The tune up leading to the Wimbledon has been heating up. This was evident during the match between Maria Sakkari and Yulia Putintseva.

The tennis rivals got into a heated argument after facing off at the Bad Homburg Open in Germany last 22 June, with Sakkari saying to Putintseva: "Nobody likes you."

The incident began when the pair shook hands following Sakkari’s 7-5, 7-6 (6) win in the first round of the tournament, a grass court tune-up for Wimbledon.

There were clear tensions during the clash, and Sakkari was seemingly furious that Putintseva did not look her in the eye while shaking hands and said something to her opponent about it.

That initiated a vigorous back-and-forth, with Putintseva offering Sakkari an incredibly sarcastic curtsy.

As both players went to shake hands with the umpire, Sakkari told Putintseva she should’ve made eye contact "like a human being," to which a clearly frustrated Putintseva replied: "I was a human being – look at yourself."

Sakkari walked over to Putintseva’s bench and inaudible arguing ensued, with Sakkari eventually muttering "f–king hell" and then repeating "nobody likes you" after some more back and forth.

Finally, the umpire butted in, saying, "Ladies, please," before Putintseva eventually left the court.

It’s unclear what prompted the no-look handshake from Putintseva, a 30-year-old from Kazakhstan, or if the whole situation was a major overreaction from Sakkari, a 29-year-old from Greece.

"I don’t think she’s going to invite me for dinner for the rest of our lives, but I don’t care," Sakkari said afterwards to the on-court interviewer. "I have very good friends and I’ll go to dinner with them. Let me leave it here, and just say that I have respect for her as a player, but that’s it."

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Mattel Plans To Include AI In Future Toys

Hopefully, kids in the future will be ready to evoke the rich tapestry of the human experience with their favorite toys by harnessing the power of artificial intelligence.

Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, has inked a deal with OpenAI to use its AI tools to not only help design toys but power them, Bloomberg reports.

Details are scant at this point. In a joint interview, Mattel chief franchise officer Josh Silverman and OpenAI chief operating officer Brad Lightcap said the collab is at an early stage, and declined to comment on what the first product would be.

But Bloomberg did float some ideas. AI could be used to create digital assistants based on Mattel characters, for example. And have you considered that toys like the Magic 8 Ball and games like Uno could be even more interactive with a large language model thrown in there?

"We plan to announce something towards the tail end of this year, and it's really across the spectrum of physical products and some experiences," Silverman said, as quoted by Bloomberg. "Leveraging this incredible technology is going to allow us to really reimagine the future of play."

However it all pans out, it's a pretty alarming collaboration. Evidence of AI chatbots' deleterious effects on our mental health has been steadily mounting, with countless friends and family members watching their loved ones become obsessed with ChatGPT and spiral into wild delusions, sometimes with tragic consequences.

It's especially risky for children. Earlier this year, researchers at the Stanford School of Medicine's Brainstorm Lab for Mental Health Innovation released an AI risk assessment warning about teens interacting with AI companions, a type of AI chatbot designed to be eerily human-like and personable.

Their conclusion? That these aren't safe for anyone under the age of 18 to use.

As to the nature of the deal, Mattel's Silverman said that the toymaker isn't licensing its intellectual property to OpenAI and will retain full control over the products that'll be created.

In any case, the two companies are anticipating a fruitful relationship. Mattel has been expanding its empire into the realm of entertainment — as heralded by its smash-hit 2023 blockbuster "Barbie," — while OpenAI is trying to land deals with Hollywood studios to use its AI video generator Sora.

"The idea exploration phase of creative design for companies like Mattel and many others, that's a critical part of the workflow," Lightcap said. "As we think about how AI builds tools that extend that capability, I think we're very lucky to have partners like Mattel that we can work with to better understand that problem."

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There's A New Requirement For U.S. Student Visas

The U.S. State Department said last 18 June that it is restarting the process for foreigners to apply for student visas but says all applicants must have their social media accounts set to 'public' to allow review by officials.

Consular officers will be looking for activity, posts and messages showing "any indications of hostility toward the citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles of the United States," the department said. It said a refusal to do so could be a sign they are trying to evade the requirement or hide their online activity.

The announcement is the latest step in President Donals Trump administration’s crackdown on international students, and the U.S. said applicants who refuse may have their applications rejected.

Students around the world have been waiting anxiously for U.S. consulates to reopen appointments for visa interviews, as the window left to book their travel and make housing arrangements narrows ahead of the start of the school year.

On Wednesday afternoon (18 June), a 27-year-old Ph.D. student in Toronto was able to secure an appointment for a visa interview next week. The student, a Chinese national, hopes to travel to the U.S. for a research intern position that would start in late July.

"I’m really relieved," said the student, who spoke on condition of being identified only by his surname, Chen, because he was concerned about being targeted. "I’ve been refreshing the website couple of times every day."

Students from China, India, Mexico and the Philippines have posted on social media sites that they have been monitoring visa booking websites and closely watching press briefings of the State Department to get any indication of when appointment bookings might resume.

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Danica Patrick: "Stop Blaming Age"

Danica Patrick had a blunt message for out-of-shape Americans on social media last 16 June.

The retired professional racing star, who retired in 2018, has remained very physically active. Patrick, now 43, hits the gym most days. She has also been getting into golf and tennis, among other things.

Patrick, it's safe to say, is still in very good shape for someone of her age - or any age, for that matter.

But most Americans are not like that. The United States is one of the most obese countries in the world. It's unfortunate when you look at the statistics.

Patrick, who often posts on social media about her gym going habits, had a three-word message about Americans who are out of shape.

"Stop blaming age," the post shared by Patrick read.

Patrick shared a post on social media about the current state of Americans and their fitness.

"Stop blaming age," the post read.

"You don't lose muscle because you're getting older. You lose muscle because you stop using it."

Patrick likes to hit the gym hard, as she's revealed that her workout routine consists of high-intensity interval training and combines aerobic exercise with calisthenics.

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Blanket Ban On Transgender Athlete Might Be Adopted In The Next Olympics

In the next Olympics, transgender women will likely be banned from the female category across all sport after another leading candidate to become International Olympic Committee president backed a new blanket policy.

Individual sports were able to set their own rules at last year’s Paris Games, prompting a patchwork of policies that prevented anyone who had gone through male puberty competing in sports such as athletics and swimming, but potentially eligible in women’s football.

There are also sport-by-sport Olympic rules regarding athletes with differences in sexual development, with athletics, led by Lord Coe, ruling that athletes must reduce their testosterone level to below 2.5 nanomoles per litre. That has meant that Caster Semenya, who won the 800 metres Olympic title in 2012 and 2016, is ineligible.

Coe, who is the president of World Athletics and a leading candidate to succeed Thomas Bach as president of the IOC, has long made it clear that he would bring similar clarity to gender policy across all Olympic sports.

Among the other leading candidates is Kirsty Coventry, a member of the IOC executive board since 2018, who now also supports an Olympic-wide policy similar to athletics or swimming.

"Protecting the female category and female sports is paramount – it’s a priority that we collectively come together," said Coventry, who won seven Olympic medals, including two gold, in swimming.

"There is more and more scientific research. We are not having a conversation about how it is detrimental to men’s sport. That, in itself, says we need to protect women’s sport. It is very clear that transgender women are more able in the female category, and can take away opportunities that should be equal for women."

Coventry was also part of the executive board that handled the huge Olympic controversy in Paris when Lin Yu-ting and Imane Khelif won gold after they were previously deemed ineligible for the female category by the International Boxing Association; a body that was subsequently stripped of the right to run the sport because of governance and ethical issues.

Coventry said that "lessons are always going to be learnt – Paris is definitely one of those times", but claimed that they could not have foreseen the specific controversy.

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The WNBA "Phenom" Is Back!

Last 14 June , WNBA phenom Caitlin Clark made her return to the Indiana Fever after suffering a quad injury that kept her out of the lineup for five games.

She nearly pulled off a 30-point triple-double by dropping 32 points, 9 assists and 8 rebounds in a 102-88 victory over the New York Liberty, handing the reigning WNBA champions their first loss of the season.

"Don't we always expect that kind of game from Caitlin?" Indiana coach Stephanie White said after the game. "I knew her adrenaline was going to be high to start. She's been itching to get back out there. [Her scoring] carried us in the first half, and then everybody else carried us in the second half. Her decision-making was outstanding. She did a really good job of getting everybody involved, and that's what she does."

Despite missing the previous five games, Clark didn't suffer an off shooting night and didn't feel fatigued.

"I saw three in a row go in, so that gives you a lot of confidence," Clark said. "Even in the second half, they all came off my hand feeling really good...My legs felt really strong. I felt in good shape," she said. "A lot of that is credit to our medical team. They have kept me in shape. Now for me, it's just how I recover, especially with the schedule that we have coming up."

The Fever went 2-3 without Clark on the court, but got back to .500 on the season with the big win on Saturday afternoon.

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