Although September’s nTIDE COVID Update graphic shows lower unemployment, levels are still higher than pre-pandemic levels for both groups,” noted nTIDE co-author Andrew Houtenville, PhD, professor of economics at the University of New Hampshire (UNH) and research director of the UNH Institute on Disability. “It remains unclear whether these chronic elevations constitute a ‘new normal,’ or a phase that will be followed by more substantial recovery. There will be multiple factors at play over the coming months, including the ongoing vaccination campaign and new recommendations for booster doses.”

An international team of researchers, led by a University of Houston biomedical engineer, has uncovered that the spleen is controlled by different terminal nerves, and that the sutrode, a new electrical stimulation device, can be used to control them. The discovery marks an advance in electroceutical research for treatment of diseases including rheumatoid arthritis, colitis and sepsis.

People who are blind take pictures and videos and share them with others but face a unique challenge—they cannot independently review their pictures and videos to identify unnecessary private or sensitive content. A set of new techniques being developed by researchers at the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and partner institutions will empower people who are blind to independently safeguard private information in their pictures and videos. The collaborative project received a four-year, $1,199,993 grant from the National Science Foundation.

It’s not all in your head, but your expectations can sway your perception of pain intensity. Information about expectations — the driver of the placebo effect — travels from the cortex to groups of cells in the brainstem, which then modulate pain signals in the spinal cord, according to new research published in JNeurosci.