Published by the Students of Johns Hopkins since 1896
February 27, 2025

Science & Technology

COURTESY OF ZONGWEI ZHOU  AbdomenAtlas is an extensive dataset of 3D reconstructed and annotated abdominal CT scans that can be used to train AI technology on identifying cancer. 

AbdomenAtlas: an AI-based approach for early cancer diagnosis

By ALEX PAN | February 19, 2025

A recent paper published by Johns Hopkins researchers in the Department of Computer Science details the development and use of AbdomenAtlas: an annotated public dataset containing abdominal CT scans from over tens of thousands of patients around the world. This new extensive dataset serves as the training ground for early-detection artificial intelligence programs, which have the potential to greatly improve the efficiency of cancer diagnosis and treatment.

NATIONAL HUMAN GENOME RESEARCH INSTITUTE / PDM 1.0 Dang discusses the role and dynamics of the human microbiome. 

Trust your gut: The ins and outs of your gut microbiome

By SIMRAN DANG | February 18, 2025

Imagine a bustling metropolis on a weekday morning: vehicles honking, people rushing to work, street vendors setting up shop and delivery trucks weaving through the chaos. Despite the apparent asynchrony, there is order to this chaos. If we shrink this scene down to the microscopic level, we zoom into the gut microbiome, a dynamic and complex ecosystem teeming with trillions of microorganisms checking their own to-do lists to keep us alive.

COURTESY OF KATIE TRUONG Derek Cummings discussed his work with the Infectious Disease Dynamics group (IDD) at the School of Public Health.

Derek Cummings models transient disease dynamics in dengue

By KATIE TRUONG | February 18, 2025

On Tuesday, Feb. 4, visiting professor Derek A.T. Cummings at the Department of Epidemiology at the Bloomberg School of Public Health gave a talk entitled “Challenges in Infectious Disease Dynamics: highlighting work at Johns Hopkins Infectious Disease Dynamics” for the Institute for Computational Medicine. 

WIKIMEDIA COMMONS / CC BY SA 3.0 This image shows the fungal dispersion from an infected fly during what Elya calls the “cycle of death.”

Death at sunset: How fungi create zombie flies

By ARANTZA GARCIA | February 18, 2025

Carolyn Elya gave a talk titled, "The Last of (Fung)us: Mechanisms of Fruit Fly Behavioral Manipulation by the Killer Fungus Entomophthora muscae" on Feb. 13 as part of the Department of Biology Seminar Series. Elya, an an assistant professor in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard University, leads a lab focused on elucidating how parasites manipulate the behavior of their hosts.

RAYHANA ALHOUR / PUBLIC DOMAIN Recently, a human kidney disease patient received a genetically edited pig kidney at Massachusetts General Hospital. 

Science news in review: Feb 17

By GRACE OH | February 17, 2025

As we continue to push through the spring semester, take a break and catch up with some of the latest scientific discoveries, including the transplant of a pig organ into a human and a new tool for pancreatic cancer detection. 

JIYUN GUO / DESIGN AND LAYOUT EDITOR The individual riding an antigen-presenting complex (APC) highlights the two “selves” that exist inside the human body at the cellular and cognitive levels.

The two selves: the immune system and cognition

By VICKY ZHU | February 7, 2025

"Who are you?" This question, in its many variations, is almost inevitable in school applications, job interviews or introspective moments. We spend years, perhaps our entire lives, unraveling the intricacies of who we are. But there exists another sense of self, of which many are unaware, that stands by 24/7 to protect us. It resides within us, a quiet but essential arbiter of identity: our immune system.

NASA / PUBLIC DOMAIN A satellite view of the smoke plume from the Palisades Fire, which ripped through Los Angeles in January of 2025. 

How the LA fires of 2025 became the perfect firestorm

By SIMRAN DANG | February 6, 2025

The Los Angeles (LA) wildfires began with with the Palisades fire, which erupted the morning of Jan. 7 in Pacific Palisades as a mere brush fire. Evacuation orders were issued for that fire and by evening, the Eaton fire in Altadena had begun. The Hughes fire was first reported on the morning of Jan. 22. These devastating blazes had engulfed over 47,000 acres of land by the time they were fully or nearly contained. 

The Trump Administration's restrictions on NIH operations and federal funding have rippling consequences

By SHREYA TIWARI | February 4, 2025

Following President Trump’s inauguration, the flurry of executive orders and funding freezes introduced uncertainty into the period of political transition. Researchers and health practitioners across the country faced questions about the availability of funding for new graduate students and research fellows, as well as the broader impact on their fields in the coming years.

NIAID / CC BY 2.0 RFK has paraded baseless conspiracy theories about the safety of vaccines as facts.

Make America healthy again: America's salvation or a fool's paradise?

By GODSON NKANGINIEME | February 4, 2025

In the coming weeks, President Donald Trump hopes his cabinet nominations will be swiftly confirmed. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (RFK Jr.) — who ran as an independent in the 2024 presidential election before dropping out and supporting President Trump — is eyeing an important position given America’s increasing prevalence of chronic conditions, as Secretary of the Department of Health & Human Services.

COTTONBRO STUDIO / PUBLIC DOMAIN During the event, the future role of AI as a diagnostician and scribe was further commented upon. 

The intersection between writing and medicine with Lakshmi Krishnan, Lenny Grant and Jeremy Greene

By GRACE OH | February 4, 2025

The University Writing Program held an event titled Rx: Conversations about Medicine and Writing  on Jan. 31. The first speaker was Dr. Lakshmi Krishnan, a historian of medicine, medical humanities scholar and physician currently working at Georgetown University. Krishnan received her M.D. from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and attended the University of Oxford, receiving her D.Phil. in English Literature.

NIH IMAGE GALLERY / CC BY-NC 2.0 Immunotherapy is seen as a potential treatment to cancer, yet obstacles persist. 

Dr. Won Jin Ho researches pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma to overcome barriers in tumor microenvironment

By KATIE TRUONG | February 3, 2025

Dr. Won Jin Ho presented a talk as part of the Immunology Neighborhood Seminar on “Overcoming the tumor immune microenvironment — barriers to cancer immunotherapy” on Jan 21. Ho is a physician-scientist at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and director of the Mass Cytometry Director at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Ho’s expertise centers on pancreatic and liver cancer immunology. He emphasizes that immunotherapy is a mainstay in cancer treatment. 

K-STATE RESEARCH / CC BY 2.0  A new analgesic was approved as an alternative to opioid-based pain relievers. 

Science news in review: Feb. 2

By SHREYA TIWARI | February 2, 2025

Welcome to this week’s science news in review, where you’ll find newsworthy scientific innovations or events that have been revealed in the first month of 2025. Astronomers and space lovers across the country enjoyed a rare site throughout the month of January. After dark, stargazers could see Venus, Saturn, Jupiter and Mars. Venus and Saturn appeared in the southwest, Mars rose in the east and Jupiter was overhead. Uranus and Neptune would also be aligned. This incredible astronomical event will continue throughout February, where seven planets will be “aligned” in this way: Saturn, Mercury, Neptune, Venus, Uranus, Jupiter and Mars. 

COURTESY OF DAKE, MYSID / CC BY 1.0 Sophomore Andreas Jaramillo discusses his research experiences as a student majoring in Computer Science at Johns Hopkins University. 

Junior Andreas Jaramillo discusses his journey in computer science research

By SHAAN UDANI | December 11, 2024

With the University’s reputation as a rigorous STEM environment, it is no surprise that the campus features students with robust experiences in computer science. One such student is Andreas Jaramillo, a junior majoring in Computer Science (CS). In an interview with The News-Letter, Jaramillo discussed his journey so far and his next steps in the field. 

COURTESY OF KATIE TRUONG Shawn Burgess spoke about the importance of applying genome assembly methods to fish genomics.  

Shawn Burgess on understanding biological diversity through fish genomics

By KATIE TRUONG | December 3, 2024

Shawn Burgess, chief of the Office of Scientific Core Facilities in the Developmental Genomics Section of the National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), gave a talk titled "Darwinian Genomics: Rapid Advances in Genome Assembly Can Make Any Fish a Model Organism" as part of the Biology Department’s seminar series on Thursday, Nov. 14. Burgess is also co-deputy director of the Division of Intramural Research, senior investigator of the Translational and Functional Genomics Branch and head of the Developmental Genomics Section at the NIH.

COURTESY OF SELENA SHIRKIN Selena Shirkin and her team were finalists in the Collegiate Inventors Competition for their work developing a new port system for fetal surgery. 

Design Team spotlight: revolutionizing fetal surgery

By SHREYA TIWARI | November 21, 2024

Innovation in biomedical engineering is accelerating nationally and at Hopkins, a team of ambitious students is similarly pursuing new engineering challenges in the realm of fetal surgery. Led by current Center of Bioengineering Innovation and Design Master’s student Selena Shirkin, the team’s FetalCare Port System aims to address complications in fetal therapy procedures by providing a safer alternative to existing techniques. 

ADAFRUIT INDUSTRIES / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 Sophomore Brianna Gauto-Kennedy conducts research on solid-state electrolyte batteries and lithium-ion batteries in the García-Méndez lab. 

Behind the battery: Brianna Gauto-Kennedy's research with solid-state electrolytes

By MARIE LEE | November 21, 2024

For some students, research is merely ticking another box for med school or a resume builder, but not for sophomore Brianna Gauto-Kennedy, a Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (ChemBE) major, who is currently engaged in research in the Department of Materials Sciences and Engineering . In an interview with The News-Letter, she outlined her journey to her lab and described her current project.

MARTA BRANCO / PEXELS LICENSE  A recent study by lead researcher Peng Zheng developed a chip surface that utilizes the SERS technique to reduce the time for heart attack diagnoses. 

Surface-enhanced raman spectroscopy detects heart attack biomarkers

By ARANTZA GARCIA | November 18, 2024

The SERS technique is a valuable tool for the detection of trace amounts of contaminants in food and water or the identification of biological samples. Regarding its most recent clinical applications, SERS has been adapted to diagnose heart attacks in research settings at impressive speeds and accuracy levels.

COURTESY OF ANNIE HUANG Song examined how AI can be used to drive toward more accurate, patient-specific predictions in cancer treatment.

From AI to Cancer pathology: Andrew Song’s path to AI-enhanced cancer diagnostics

By ANNIE HUANG | November 18, 2024

Andrew H. Song, a postdoctoral research fellow at Harvard Medical School, presented his work on applying deep learning tools to cancer pathology at a talk titled “Taming Large-Scale Pathology Data for Clinical Outcome Prediction” on Nov. 13. In his talk, Song delved into his efforts to leverage AI in improving cancer diagnostics, explaining how machine learning models can fundamentally alter the landscape of clinical outcome prediction.

NIGMS IMAGE AND VIDEO GALLERY / CC BY NC-SA 3.0 A new treatment for LCSD involves using stem cells to develop mature corneas for corneal transplants. 

Science news in review: Nov. 18

By SHREYA TIWARI | November 17, 2024

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, this week’s review highlights scientific breakthroughs we can all be grateful for — advancements that have made a profound impact on human health in the past month. The new at-home test could correctly identify 99% negative and 92% positive COVID-19 samples. For negative Flu A and Flu B samples, 99.9% were identified correctly; for positive Flu A and Flu B samples, the test correctly identified 92.5% and 90.5% of samples, respectively. These quick and affordable tests will be a vital fix for the colder months. 

COURTESY OF FEI MIAO Miao delivered a talk at Hopkins that explored recent efforts to advance Multi-agent Reinforcement Learning for Connected and Automated Vehicles.

Multi-agent learning for safe and efficient autonomous vehicles

By ANNIE HUANG | November 17, 2024

Fei Miao, Pratt & Whitney Associate Professor at the University of Connecticut's School of Computing, delivered a talk titled “Learning and Control for Safety, Efficiency, and Resiliency of Embodied AI” on Nov. 8. Her presentation explored her team’s recent efforts to advance Multi-agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL) for Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs), which models multiple autonomous vehicles that can send and receive real-time information from nearby vehicles and infrastructure to enhance driving decisions.

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