October 25, 2026 · Science & Research Daily Digest
A digest of science, space, biomedicine, and climate research for October 25, 2026, with summaries, links, and commentary.
I. Biomedicine
1. ESMO presidential symposium: ivonescimab plus chemotherapy posts 14.9 versus 12.1 months median overall survival in first-line advanced biliary tract cancer (Oncology)
Summary:
Akeso said on October 25 that Jian Zhou, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and president of Zhongshan Hospital, Fudan University, presented the prespecified interim analysis of the registrational Phase III HARMONi-GI1 trial (AK112-309) in Presidential Symposium II at ESMO 2026 in Madrid. The trial compared the PD-1/VEGF bispecific antibody ivonescimab plus chemotherapy with durvalumab plus chemotherapy as first-line treatment for advanced biliary tract cancer. In the intent-to-treat population, median overall survival was 14.9 versus 12.1 months (HR 0.75, 95% CI 0.61-0.92, P=0.0031), with 12-month overall survival of 59.7% versus 50.7% and 18-month overall survival of 44.0% versus 32.5%. Median progression-free survival was 8.4 versus 5.8 months (HR 0.61, 95% CI 0.51-0.72, P<0.0001), the objective response rate was 53.8% versus 32.5%, and the disease control rate was 91.5% versus 77.8%. Serious adverse events were 43.4% versus 43.7%, any-grade bleeding was 9.7% versus 6.5%, and grade 3 or higher bleeding was 1.5% versus 1.8%. The company said no new safety signals were identified and that China's NMPA has proposed the indication for priority review. After discontinuation, 31.8% versus 45.9% of patients received any subsequent antitumor therapy.
Links:
Commentary:
This is an interim overall-survival comparison against the current PD-L1-plus-chemotherapy regimen; the release reports landmark survival in the intent-to-treat population and does not also give enrollment or median follow-up.
2. SAFFRON: osimertinib plus savolitinib cuts the risk of death by 32% in MET-driven lung cancer after progression on osimertinib (Oncology)
Summary:
AstraZeneca said on October 25 that Shun Lu of Shanghai Chest Hospital presented the global open-label Phase III SAFFRON trial (abstract LBA6) in Presidential Symposium II at ESMO 2026, at 16:45 Madrid time. The study enrolled 338 patients with EGFR-mutated, locally advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer and high MET overexpression or amplification whose disease had progressed after first- or second-line osimertinib, at 230 centers in 29 countries. Patients received osimertinib 80 mg once daily plus savolitinib 300 mg twice daily (171 patients) or platinum doublet chemotherapy (167 patients). At a July 6, 2026 data cutoff, blinded independent central review found median progression-free survival of 7.6 months (95% CI 5.6-9.7) versus 5.4 months (4.2-5.8), HR 0.55 (95% CI 0.42-0.72, P<0.001), with 36% versus 10% progression-free at one year. Median overall survival was 17.8 months (15.6-23.7) versus 12.9 months (10.6-16.8), HR 0.68 (95% CI 0.50-0.91, P=0.010), and one-year survival was 70% versus 53%. Grade 3 or higher treatment-emergent adverse events from all causes were 64% versus 63%, and median treatment exposure was 8.5 versus 3.5 months. The company said it has submitted a New Drug Application to the U.S. FDA based on the trial and that the results were published the same day in The New England Journal of Medicine.
Links:
Commentary:
The 32% figure is the overall-survival hazard ratio in an open-label trial; median exposure was longer on the combination, while the rate of grade 3 or higher adverse events stayed close to chemotherapy.
3. ShanghaiTech holographic ultrasound opens the blood-brain barrier at multiple targets with one two-minute treatment in male mice after ischemic stroke (Biomedical engineering)
Summary:
Nature Communications on October 25 published an open-access paper by Bingbing Cheng, Jia-Ji Pan, and colleagues at ShanghaiTech University, with collaborators at Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Harbin Institute of Technology. Their HaMBO platform pairs a low-cost 3D-printed hologram with a single-element ultrasound transducer to open the blood-brain barrier along infarct borders and deliver extracellular vesicles and mesenchymal stromal cells, therapeutics of very different sizes, to peri-infarct tissue. In male mice with transient focal cerebral ischemia, a single two-minute treatment increased peri-infarct delivery of both, reduced brain atrophy by about 56%, increased angiogenesis about twofold and neural-progenitor proliferation about fourfold, and improved long-term behavioral recovery. Spatial transcriptomics linked the vesicle therapy to less macrophage infiltration and stronger pro-angiogenic and neurogenic signaling. Human-skull simulations were used to show how the acoustic field can be adapted across stroke geometries. Funding includes National Natural Science Foundation of China grants 12504539 and 82201459.
Links:
Commentary:
The roughly 56% reduction in brain atrophy comes from a single treatment in male mice; the human evidence in the paper is a skull simulation.
4. Columbia reports glial over-engulfment of synapses at postnatal day 7 in Fmr1 knockout mice (Neuroscience)
Summary:
Scientific Reports on October 25 published an open-access paper by Lindsey Starr, Melissa Lee, Carol Mason, and colleagues at Columbia University. Fragile X syndrome results from loss of the RNA-binding protein FMRP. Fmr1 knockout mice had smaller synapses and faster eye-specific segregation. At postnatal day 7, a critical window for synaptic pruning in the retinogeniculate pathway, single-cell transcriptomics showed coordinated changes in pruning-related genes in microglia, astrocytes, and neurons. Computational modeling indicated stronger astrocyte-to-microglia signaling, particularly through ephrin A and semaphorin pathways, and a preliminary lipidomic profile showed lower levels of EphA-associated lipids used to stabilize lipid rafts. A glial engulfment assay found that microglia and astroglia in the lateral geniculate nucleus over-engulf synaptic material. Funding includes NIH grants R01EY012736 and R21NS122366 and a Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative award.
Links:
Commentary:
The paper identifies early glial over-pruning as a feature of Fragile X pathogenesis; the abstract does not give a fold change for engulfment.
II. Climate and the Environment
5. University of Tennessee model: a shallow groundwater drop from the surface to about 1 meter can raise surface temperature by more than 10 degrees (Hydroclimate)
Summary:
Scientific Reports on October 25 published an open-access paper by A. Paldor of the University of Tennessee and N. Paldor of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. They propose that a falling shallow water table reduces evaporative heat loss and therefore raises ground-surface temperature. A physics-based framework quantifies that relationship, and a geospatial analysis maps shallow groundwater declines across the contiguous United States. The model finds that a decline from the surface to depths on the order of 1 meter can produce a heating effect of more than ten degrees, depending on porosity. The geographic analysis reports a spatial correlation between regions with such declines over decades and regions of rising temperature, with California and Florida described as especially vulnerable.
Links:
Commentary:
The figure of more than ten degrees is a porosity-dependent theoretical estimate, and the geographic result is a spatial correlation.
III. Basic Research
6. Science: defects in Pd5AlI2 trap electron waves inside a metallic continuum (Condensed matter)
Summary:
Science on October 22 published a paper by Morgan Thinel, Raquel Queiroz, Abhay N. Pasupathy, Xavier Roy, Xiaoyang Zhu, and colleagues at Columbia University (volume 394, issue 6822, pages 429-433). The Columbia Quantum Initiative reported it the same day, and science outlets continued to carry the result on October 25. Scanning tunneling spectroscopy identified two defect-induced electronic states that stay localized inside the metallic continuum of Pd5AlI2, a two-dimensional van der Waals metal. Calculations attribute the states to electron-hopping interference on a decorated checkerboard lattice, which produces a nearly flat band of spatially localized eigenstates orthogonal to the dispersive continuum. Atomic defects shift those flat-band states into the metallic continuum, forming symmetry-protected bound states in the continuum. Queiroz told the university that the effect was known for light waves and had not been seen for electrons; the defects in the experiment arise during crystal growth.
Links:
- Science — Electronic bound states in the continuum in a two-dimensional metal
- Columbia Quantum Initiative — Quantum interference is key to catching electron waves
Commentary:
The observation is of localized electron states around growth defects, held by hopping interference, with positions set by how the crystal grew.
7. Tianjin University modular platinum catalyst: 90% yield of 3-vinylaniline from 3-nitrostyrene at a turnover frequency of 83,200 per hour (Catalysis)
Summary:
Nature Communications on October 25 published an open-access paper by Yu Pan, Yingtian Zhang, Qingpeng Cheng, and Xingang Li of Tianjin University, with Riguang Zhang of Taiyuan University of Technology and Jorge Gascon of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. Platinum particles of about 3 nanometers on sodium titanate are encapsulated by an oxygen-vacancy-rich titanium oxide overlayer. Hydrogen dissociates on the platinum, the substrate is kept from contacting it, and the active hydrogen migrates to the surface to hydrogenate nitro groups adsorbed on Lewis-basic oxygen vacancies. The catalyst converts 3-nitrostyrene to 3-vinylaniline in 90% yield at a turnover frequency of 83,200 per hour. The authors say that frequency exceeds previously reported metal catalysts and that the route avoids corrosive alkaline solvents. Funding includes Shandong Provincial Key R&D Project 2024CXGC010410, National Natural Science Foundation of China grant 22408275, and KAUST Baseline Fund BAS/1/1397-01-01. X-ray absorption spectra were collected on beamline 1W1B at the Beijing Synchrotron Radiation Facility and beamline BL14W1 at the Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility.
Links:
Commentary:
The turnover frequency of 83,200 per hour is for this substrate under mild conditions, and the paper's deliverable is a spatially separated catalyst design.
8. NYU: the head-direction attractor in head-fixed male mice recovers several hundred milliseconds before a step (Neuroscience)
Summary:
Nature Communications on October 25 published an open-access paper by Alexandr Pak of Nazarbayev University with Dora Angelaki, André A. Fenton, and colleagues at New York University. Head-direction cells in the anterodorsal thalamus are often modeled as a ring attractor that uses visual and inertial input. Complete head fixation that creates a vestibular conflict disrupted both single-unit and population encoding of direction. Selectively limiting head-on-body movement, in real or virtual reality, impaired population activity on its own. In head-fixed male mice, attractor dynamics changed during immobility, and a computational model reproduced that change by weakening lateral connections among head-direction neurons. The dynamics recovered several hundred milliseconds before locomotion onset. The authors describe the network as a context- and state-dependent predictive estimator. Funding includes NIH DC004260 and the Simons Collaboration.
Links:
Commentary:
Recovery begins several hundred milliseconds before a step, which is the observation the authors use to put forthcoming movement signals into the head-direction model.
9. Hubrecht Institute: antiparallel R-spondin and LGR gradients amplify Wnt oscillations during somitogenesis (Development)
Summary:
Nature Communications on October 25 published an open-access paper by Katharina F. Sonnen of the Hubrecht Institute and Michiel Vermeulen of Radboud University, with colleagues. They synchronized mouse embryo tails in a microfluidic device and used quantitative proteomics and transcriptomics to resolve protein dynamics during somitogenesis. The maps show a dynamic, antiparallel R-spondin/LGR pattern that accounts for rising Wnt oscillation amplitude in the anterior presomitic mesoderm even as Wnt ligand levels fall. Dynamic ligand expression was confirmed in mouse gastruloids. Perturbing ligand dynamics reduced oscillation amplitude and impaired somite formation. Funding includes European Research Council starting grant 850554 and NWO Aspasia and M grants to Sonnen.
Links:
Commentary:
In this study R-spondin acts as a dynamic amplifier of Wnt oscillations, in mouse embryo tails and gastruloids.
Today's Summary
- Biomedicine: At ESMO Presidential Symposium II, ivonescimab plus chemotherapy posted median overall survival of 14.9 versus 12.1 months in advanced biliary tract cancer. Osimertinib plus savolitinib posted 17.8 versus 12.9 months in MET-driven lung cancer after progression on osimertinib.
- Biomedical engineering and neuroscience: One two-minute holographic-ultrasound treatment reduced brain atrophy by about 56% in male mice after stroke. A Fragile X model showed glial over-engulfment of synapses at postnatal day 7.
- Climate and chemistry: A theoretical estimate finds surface heating of more than 10 degrees when shallow groundwater falls about 1 meter. A modular platinum catalyst from Tianjin University reached a turnover frequency of 83,200 per hour on 3-nitrostyrene.
- Physics and development: Science reported bound states in the continuum in Pd5AlI2, maintained by hopping interference. During mouse somitogenesis, antiparallel R-spondin/LGR gradients amplify Wnt oscillations.
Daily Framing:
October 25 was an endpoint-readout day: two Phase III trials in Madrid reported positive overall survival, while papers the same day redrew mechanism maps for groundwater level, electron bound states in a metal, and embryonic signaling gradients.
This digest is compiled from real-time search results and is for reference only.