Researchers have moved a step closer to new treatments for a rare and often devastating autoimmune disease that interferes with how the brain communicates.

The study highlights a vulnerable point in the disease process, one that could eventually be used to design more precise therapies. The condition develops when the immune system mistakenly targets the NMDA receptor, a protein essential for learning, memory, and normal brain signaling. By identifying where this attack occurs, the work also opens the possibility of a future blood test that could flag the disease earlier, when current treatments may be more effective.

The disorder gained public attention through the bestselling memoir and the 2016 film “Brain on Fire,” but it remains uncommon. Each year, it affects an estimated 1 in a million people, most frequently young adults in their 20s and 30s. Despite its rarity, the illness can progress rapidly and cause life-threatening neurological symptoms.

In people with the condition, the immune system produces anti-NMDA receptor autoantibodies that attach to NMDA receptors in the brain and disrupt their function. This immune-driven damage can lead to dramatic changes in behavior and cognition, severe memory loss, seizures, and, in some cases, death.

Pinpointing a Molecular Targetz
In the new study, scientists focused on identifying exactly where these harmful antibodies bind. They discovered specific regions on a subunit of the NMDA receptor that appear to be central to the disease process. Blocking these regions, the researchers suggest, could help stop or even reverse the progression of symptoms.

First identified in the early 1800s, the Helix Nebula is one of the most recognizable planetary nebulas in the night sky, known for its dramatic ring-like appearance. Because it is one of the closest planetary nebulas to Earth, astronomers have long used both ground-based and space-based telescopes to study it as a detailed example of how stars end their lives.

Those observations have now reached a new level with the James Webb Space Telescope, which has delivered the clearest infrared view yet of this well-known object.

A Glimpse of the Sun’s Distant Future
Webb’s powerful instruments allow scientists to zoom in on the Helix Nebula and examine what could one day happen to our own Sun and planetary system. The telescope’s high-resolution data brings the structure of gas streaming away from the dying star into sharp focus. These observations show how stars return their material to space, providing the ingredients that later form new stars and planets.

Images captured by Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) reveal striking pillar-shaped features around the inner edge of an expanding shell of gas. These structures resemble comets with long tails pointing away from the central star. They form where intense winds of hot gas collide with cooler layers of dust and gas that were released earlier in the star’s life, carving the nebula into its complex and textured shape.

A new image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope of a portion of the Helix Nebula highlights comet-like knots, fierce stellar winds, and layers of gas shed off by a dying star interacting with its surrounding environment. Webb’s image also shows the stark transition between the hottest gas to the coolest gas as the shell expands out from the central white dwarf.

Curious what 22 years of Chandra observations sound like? This sonification includes every Chandra observation from 1999 - 2021. 🎵

40 years ago, Voyager 2 made its closest approach to Uranus.

Over its months-long encounter, the spacecraft returned more than 7,000 photographs of Uranus, revealing 11 new moons, two new rings orbiting the planet, and a wealth of information for scientists to analyze for years to come. To this day, it is the first and only spacecraft to study Uranus up close!

How do scientists search for life in the universe? 🧬

SETIInstitute President & CEO Bill Diamond explains three key methods: send missions like NASAPersevere to explore other planets, use telescopes to detect signs of life in exoplanet atmospheres, or search for alien technology like laser pulses or radio signals that nature doesn’t produce. Each one could reveal intelligent life far beyond our solar system.

Forty years ago, Challenger’s STS‑51L mission lifted off with seven remarkable individuals aboard — explorers, engineers, educators, and pioneers.

Francis “Dick” Scobee, Michael Smith, Judith Resnik, Ellison Onizuka, Ronald McNair, Gregory Jarvis, and Christa McAuliffe brought curiosity, courage, and a shared belief in the power of discovery.

The loss of Challenger on January 28, 1986, was a moment that changed NASA forever. It sparked deep reflection, hard lessons, and a renewed commitment to the safety and care of every crew who follows in their footsteps.

Stopping Alzheimer’s may begin with dissolving tiny tau protein clusters before damage takes hold.

Scientists at Tokyo Metropolitan University have turned to polymer physics to better understand one of the defining features of Alzheimer’s disease: the formation of tau protein fibrils. Their research shows that these fibrils do not form directly. Instead, tau proteins first gather into large clusters, similar to how polymers begin to crystallize. When researchers disrupted these early clusters, fibrils failed to develop in solution.

This finding points to a major shift in how future treatments for neurodegenerative diseases might be designed.