Tuggeranong Medicare Mental Health Centre opens - Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

More people are low in iron than in any other micronutrient, according to the American Society of Hematology. But many live with fatigue, weakness, brain fog and other symptoms for months or years before a deficiency is caught. Nearly one-third of adults in the United States may be iron deficient, according to a 2024 study. And routine screening among children and pregnant women — who are at high risk — may miss more than 70 per cent of cases. Researchers estimate approximately 10.5 per cent of Canadians are iron deficient. Read more here. Some people online are self-diagnosing, citing dark under-eye circles and pale skin as evidence that they are low in iron. Social media influencers call the look “ferritin face,” named after a protein that stores the element in the body. Iron deficiency is common, prevalent and underrecognized, said Dr. Ariela Marshall, associate professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota. New diagnostic recommendations, which ASH released in September, aim to ensure more patients secure early treatment.

A significant amount of Alzheimer's research is looking at ways to tackle the harmful clumps of amyloid-beta protein that build up between neurons in the brains of people with the disease. With that same aim, researchers from the startup Lifemission and the Russian Academy of Sciences previously developed a peptide called HAEE (Ac-His-Ala-Glu-Glu-NH2) to stop these clumps from forming by blocking zinc ions that are thought to act as a kind of biological 'glue'. In tests on mice, the peptide has already been shown to reduce the number of amyloid-beta plaques in the brain. Now there's a plot twist: When the researchers developed a method to measure HAEE in human blood as a step toward clinical trials, they found the peptide was already present – in every sample from 150 healthy volunteers. What's more, the blood samples taken from people with Alzheimer's had around half the level of HAEE on average as healthy controls, suggesting the molecule could even be used as a disease biomarker. The findings have been published in PNAS Nexus.

The next step, anticipated sometime next year, will be to start the process of clinical trials

Children who eat more ultraprocessed foods (UPFs) show stronger responses in the brain's reward network when viewing images of appetizing foods—and these brain responses are linked to increases in body fat one year later. The findings, published in JAMA Network Open, suggest that the brain may become more sensitive to food cues when children consume more UPFs. The study is available here.