news 2026

Although invasive alien species are very often reduced to predators eliminating defenseless prey, in reality they do more than simply weaken certain species: they fundamentally reshape the environment itself. In order to better assess the impacts of the roughly 3,500 invasive species on the environment, an international team of scientists led by a researcher from the CNRS 1 has developed an evolution of the " Environmental Impact Classification of Alien Taxa " (EICAT) standard.

O A page from Archimedes' palimpsest, considered lost for several decades, has been identified by a CNRS researcher at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Blois. o The sheet contains a passage from the treatise "De la sphère et du cylindre" on one of its still-readable sides, the other side being obscured by an illumination added in the 20th century.

A research team led by a CNRS 1 researcher has for the first time accurately determined the age of the cave paintings at Font-de-Gaume (Les Eyzies) in Dordogne (southwestern France), according to work to be published on 9 March 2026 in PNAS. It had previously been impossible to precisely date the Palaeolithic cave art in the region, including that in Lascaux, using radiocarbon dating, as the paintings were believed to contain only iron and manganese oxides.

Tanycytes (white) capture Tau protein (red) circulating in the cerebrospinal fluid and transport it along their extensions/arms, which pass through brain tissue and come into contact with blood vessels (green), into which they release this protein, which is involved in Alzheimer's disease when it accumulates in the brain.

According to a CNRS communication dated February 19, 2026. Based on a scientific publication in Science Advances , to which the RDP - Plant Reproduction and Development Laboratory contributed: "The actin cytoskeleton is required to maintain plant cell division orientation against cellular geometry." Thumbnail credit: © Camila Goldy In plants, cells cannot move or reorganize freely due to their rigid cell walls.

Sleep apnea affects nearly one billion people worldwide and causes repeated episodes of oxygen deprivation during the night, known as intermittent hypoxia. A study conducted by scientists from the University of Grenoble Alpes, Inserm, and Grenoble Alpes University Hospital, published today in the journal Science Advances , shows that these episodes reorganize the liver's biological clock, altering the daily rhythms of its metabolic activity.

In plants, cells can neither move nor reorganize freely due to their rigid walls. How, then, do they correctly orient their division to build coherent tissues - A study published in Science Advances reveals that, in addition to an already well-documented classical cue, plant cells rely on the actin cytoskeleton to adjust the plane of division according to their environment.

In Paris, districts with more vegetation have a lower risk of death during periods of high heat, while highly mineralized areas with few green spaces and a high potential for urban heat islands are the most exposed. This is the finding of an international study conducted by Inserm, the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, published on January 27 in the journal npj Urban Sustainability, based on data collected over nearly ten years, from 2008 to 2017.

Hypertension and diabetes are often associated, greatly increasing the risk of stroke and severe kidney damage. Researchers from Surrey (UK) and Lille (France), working in the "Multi-omics and pathophysiology of metabolic diseases" unit (Inserm/CNRS/Université de Lille/ CHU de Lille/Institut Pasteur Lille), have identified five biological pathways that explain why type 2 diabetes and hypertension coexist so frequently.

In the event of neuroinflammation, the brain has a rapid defense mechanism: tiny bone channels allow immune cells to pass directly from the cranial bone to the meninges. A recent study by Inserm, CNRS and Aix-Marseille University reveals that these channels are formed in the first few weeks of life, and that their structure can be remodeled to facilitate the passage of immune cells.

Histological markings of an epileptic mouse irradiated with MRT; neurons are shown in blue, astrocytes in violet © Samalens et al, 2025, Epilepsia/Inserm Researchers at Inserm and the Université Grenoble Alpes (UGA) have discovered a new therapeutic approach to drug-resistant epilepsy. Fractional administration of X-ray microbeams induces a significant reduction in the occurrence of seizures in treated animals over a 2-month period: the first evidence in favor of a clinical application.

Documented for 200 years, the Iguanodontia group is expanding with the discovery of a brand-new species, the first known to bear spikes with properties never before observed in dinosaurs. Scientists from the CNRS 1 and their international partners have uncovered in China the fossilised skin of an exceptionally well preserved juvenile iguanodon.

At the Bromacker fossil site in Germany, an international team including a CNRS scientist 1 has identified the oldest terrestrial fossilised vomit known so far. Dated to around 290 million years ago (Early Permian), several tens of millions of years before dinosaurs appeared, this fossilised vomit, or "regurgitalite," contains numerous partially digested bone fragments, including those of two small reptiles and an amphibian 2 , preserved in a phosphate-poor matrix 3 .

Researchers from Inserm and Paris Cité University, involved in the CORIMUNO-19 study promoted by AP-HP and funded by the Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale and ANRS Maladies infectieuses émergentes (ANRS MIE), have identified biological indicators that can predict 3-month mortality in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 pneumonia.

CEA-Leti Demonstrates Combined MicroLED and Organic Photodetector Architecture For Display-Integrated Optical Sensing -System-Level Approach Presented at Photonics West Co-Packages Device Design, Electronics, and Modeling for Multifunctional Display Applications SAN FRANCISCO - Jan. CEA-Leti today demonstrated a co-packaged microLED and organic photodetector (OPD) architecture that enables optical sensing functions.

A team of researchers from Hôpital Henri-Mondor AP-HP, Inserm, Université Paris-Est Créteil (UPEC) and the ComPaRe - Neurofibromatosis cohort, coordinated by Dr Laura Fertitta and Pr Pierre Wolkenstein, has developed the cNF-PUSH-D'oe questionnaire.this is the first questionnaire to measure the stigma experienced by people with neurofibromatosis type 1 in relation to cutaneous neurofibromas.

In an article published in Genome Biology , scientists show that DNA replication not only ensures faithful duplication of the genome, but also helps reshape the three-dimensional organization of chromosomes in the nucleus.