News & Discoveries

June 16, 2025

Here’s how music may help flex our neurons. An expert in cognitive neuroscience shares the ways that music may help flex our neurons, plus her top tips for a music-filled life.

June 16, 2025

A neuroscientist unpacks how big breakthroughs happen – and why public understanding of science matters. Neuroscientist Grae Davis, PhD, unpacks why public understanding of science matters.

June 16, 2025

Scientists are working to rewire the brain’s pain pathways and unlock lasting relief. Scientists are working to rewire the brain’s pain pathways and unlock lasting relief.

May 14, 2025

Clues about frontotemporal dementia (FTD), the primary form that strikes in midlife, could finally lead to a way to diagnose it. UCSF researchers have found clues about how frontotemporal dementia develops that could lead to new diagnostics and get more patients into clinical trials.

May 12, 2025

Neurosurgeon Edward Chang, MD, developmental geneticist Thomas Kornberg, PhD, and virologist Raul Andino-Pavlovsky, PhD, have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), one of the highest honors in American science.

April 29, 2025

A UCSF pilot study finds psilocybin therapy surprises, showing meaningful improvements in mood, cognition, and motor symptoms. A first-of-its-kind study tested the safety of psilocybin on patients with mild to moderate Parkinson’s disease and found that patients experienced clinically significant improvements in mood, cognition, and motor function that lasted for weeks after the drug was out of their systems.

April 04, 2025

Graduate students present research about how to track down HIV, fight brain tumors with T cells, and treat brain disorders prenatally. Ten UCSF graduate students presented their research in accessible, 3-minute talks at the 2025 Grad Slam event. This year’s first-place talk was by Sophia Miliotis on how our immune system uses matchmaking skills to look for signs of viruses in cells that should be destroyed.

March 24, 2025

A study followed the sleep patterns of older female participants to see if specific patterns of change were associated with a higher risk of dementia. The participants, whose average age was 83, were monitored by wrist devices that track movement and time spent asleep.

March 10, 2025

Research funded by the National Institutes of Health transforms patient care and buoys the Bay Area’s innovation economy. UCSF received $815 million in awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) last year for research that will improve the lives of patients in the U.S. and around the world.

March 05, 2025

In a surprise, work in mice has found that the dormant X chromosome in females can reawaken late in life and turn on genes that keep the brain healthy. Why do women's brains fare better in aging than men's? A study found that the second, 'silent' X chromosome turns on in the brain of old female mice and improves learning and memory – opening new paths to slow the decline in men and women.

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