In response to the COVID-19 outbreak, precautionary measures were swiftly adopted. While the early pandemic effects were studied extensively, little is known about long-term impacts on vulnerable groups like the elderly. Researchers in Japan analyzed healthcare use and socioeconomic disparities among older adults during the prolonged pandemic. Their findings reveal both resilience and inequality—offering crucial insights into how healthcare systems can adapt to maintain access for aging populations during extended public health emergencies.

How can we fabricate an artificial brain that mimics the natural brain, from structure to function?

In response to this question, researchers from Xi’an Jiaotong University published a review paper outlining the primary requirements and challenges in biomanufacturing brain-like tissue, summarizing the existing technologies, strategies, and characteristics, and reviewing the cutting-edge developments in biomanufacturing central neural repair prosthetics, brain development models, brain disease models, and brain-inspired biocomputing models.

This review helps readers systematically understand the challenges, current progress, and future directions of brain-like living tissue manufacturing.

Laser-based metal processing enables the automated and precise production of complex components, whether for the automotive industry or for medicine. However, conventional methods require time- and resource-consuming preparations. Researchers at Empa in Thun are using machine learning to make laser processes more precise, more cost-effective and more efficient.

Abstract

Purpose – This paper explores the linkage of digital infrastructure to the cost of debt.

 

Design/methodology/approach – This study uses the implementation of the “Broadband China” policy that improves digital infrastructure as an exogenous shock and exploits the difference-in-differences method (DID).

 

Findings – Empirical analyses show that digital infrastructure leads to increased firms’ borrowing costs, which is robust to several robustness checks. In addition, we find that this unfavourable effect can be attributed to intensified market competition led by digital infrastructure construction. Cross-sectional analysis shows that this effect is greater for non-SOEs and smaller firms. Finally, we offer additional evidence of the unfavourable effect by showing that digital infrastructure construction leads to decreased fundamentals.

 

Originality/value – Our paper unveils how digital infrastructure construction affects firms’ business strategy in using private debts and extends the determinants of firms’ borrowing costs.

How long have you been doing your current job? Have you ever thought about trying a new profession? How difficult does change seem to you? The current rapid transformation of the labor market is putting many workers to the test: they struggle to keep up and move into new roles, while at the same time companies are having difficulty finding qualified personnel. A new study has analyzed the French labor market using methods from statistical physics, and found that over 90% of jobs today function as bottlenecks: they are easily accessible, but once entered, they become traps from which it is hard to move elsewhere—even when other opportunities are available.

The study, conducted by Max Knicker, Karl Naumann-Woleske, and Michael Benzaquen of École Polytechnique in Paris, and published in the Journal of Statistical Mechanics: Theory and Experiment (JSTAT), provides a detailed mapping of accessibility and transferability characteristics within the French occupational network. It reveals strong structural rigidity in the overall labor system and offers a basis for understanding what kinds of interventions and policy decisions might help to break this deadlock.

 

Agricultural economists with the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture and Kansas State University examined product attributes present in dry dog food to show there exist potential price premiums and discounts associated with health and wellness attributes. The findings indicate price premiums are associated with attributes related to digestion and allergy care. Pricing discounts are found to be associated with immune support and dental attributes. The results of this study are anticipated to be a starting point for more sophisticated and dynamic analysis of pricing and willingness-to-pay studies int the pet food industry.