There may be a way to protect brain energy to preserve cognition — and the secret could lie on your plate. Think fish and seafood, meat, non-starchy vegetables, berries, nuts, seeds, eggs and even high-fat dairy products.

University of Missouri researchers are now testing just how powerful these foods can be. They’ve found that a high fat, low carb diet — known as the ketogenic diet — may not only preserve brain health but also stop or slow the signs of cognitive decline for those at higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

The human brain is able to adapt to different situations, ensuring flexible and effective behavior. The biological mechanisms underlying this ability are the main research focus of neurobiologist Angelo Forli, who received the prestigious Career Development Grant from the Giovanni Armenise Harvard Foundation, worth 1 million dollars for a five-year project. Thanks to this funding, the researcher has left the United States to join the Italian Institute of Technology (IIT – Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia), where he will establish his new lab, ‘Neural Networks for Natural Intelligence.

BUFFALO, NY — October 9, 2025 — A new research paper was published in Volume 17, Issue 9 of Aging-US on August 22, 2025, titled, “The impact of long-term social housing on biconditional association task performance and neuron ensembles in the anterior cingulate cortex and the hippocampal CA3 region of aged rats.”

Published in Journal of Bioresources and Bioproducts, this study reports the first complete microbial route to produce fully bio-based long-chain polyester from renewable substrates. Using engineered Candida tropicalis and Escherichia coli, researchers achieved record monomer titers—150 g/L of 1,12-diacid and 68 g/L of 1,12-diol—later polymerized into bio-polyesters exhibiting thermal and molecular properties equivalent to petroleum analogs. Scalable to a 50 L pilot fermenter, this eco-friendly process marks a key advance toward a circular bioeconomy for sustainable plastics.