Science Stories

While the world focuses on ongoing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, Professor Maarten van Aalst poses a pressing question: how do these developments affect our fight against climate change? Is an oil crisis yet another setback — or could it also be an opportunity to make our world more liveable at a faster pace?

Imagine your hand moving without you telling it to. Not because you flinched, but because an electrical signal in your brain gave the command. That's what happens in Parkinson's disease. At the same time, electricity on the brain can also help to reduce the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. That's exactly what researchers at the Brain Stimulation Lab of the University of Twente are trying to understand.

What if an algorithm could predict which beer you would enjoy? At the University of Twente, postdoctoral researcher Berry Gerrits studies how artificial intelligence is transforming the brewing process, from designing recipes to helping (smaller, local) breweries and bars make better decisions.

You doom scroll past another wildfire. A melting glacier. You might feel dread, or maybe a hollow kind of sadness. You close the tab, because what can you actually do about it? If that sounds familiar, you're not alone. Just like sea levels and temperatures, levels of eco-anxiety are rising globally. This feeling, uncomfortable as it is, might be exactly where meaningful action begins.

Life-support machines can save your life. But sometimes they can make patients sicker. When doctors use an artificial lung to keep someone alive, the kidneys often also fail. Up to 70% of patients on this treatment develop kidney problems. Could both be solved with the same device?