Meeri Kim
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Science writer | Regular contributor @WashingtonPost | @Penn Physics PhD | Email: meerinkim@gmail.com
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Articles by Meeri Kim
A New Human Organ Chip Reveals How Cancer Invades the Body
A new human tissue model captures how cancer cells escape the bloodstream and begin colonizing other organs. Credit: Shutterstock Cancer’s spread to distant organs can now be studied using lab-grown bone, lung, and blood vessel tissues. Cancer becomes far more dangerous when it stops being confined to one place. Most cancer deaths are not caused by the original tumor, but by cells that break away, travel through the bloodstream, and establish new tumors in distant organs.
Parkinson’s can rob people’s voices. This instrument could help bring them back
About a decade ago, Neal Tomita started to lose his voice. He has Parkinson's, and voice and speech problems are a common issue, affecting up to 90 percent of people as the neurological disease advances. His once-lively speech began to fade into a quiet mumble, and people struggled to understand him. He increasingly retreated into silence and became socially withdrawn, even from his wife. "Neal and I used to have fabulous conversations about everything, and suddenly we didn't.
Parkinson’s can rob people’s voices. This instrument could help bring them back. Original
Parkinson’s can rob people’s voices. This instrument could help bring them back. (washingtonpost.com) Parkinson’s can rob people’s voices. This instrument could help bring them back. By Meeri Kim 2026082809011500 About a decade ago, Neal Tomita started to lose his voice. He has Parkinson's, and voice and speech problems are a common issue, affecting up to 90 percent of people as the neurological disease advances.
Optics and Photonics News
The electrospun purple fabric developed for passive radiative cooling and personal thermal management. [Image: Adelaide University] Researchers in China and Australia have created a purple fabric that incorporates a metal-organic framework (MOF) to keep people cooler in hot weather (Small, doi: 10.1002/smll.74745).
Optics and Photonics News
The miniaturized laser system, developed with major contributions from researchers at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. [Image: Sören Boles] Although Einstein’s theory of general relativity has been remarkably successful, it remains a classical framework that excludes quantum effects. A comprehensive understanding of gravity will require tests that can elucidate the relationship of gravity with the quantum world.
Optics and Photonics News
[Enlarge image] A photonic microchip next to a 10-euro-cent coin for scale. [Image: Tobi Bi / MPL] Over the last decade, photonic inverse design has emerged as a powerful tool for solving complex problems that defy human intuition and standard building blocks. Unlike traditional approaches to photonic design, inverse design begins with desired device performance specifications and systematically generates a geometry that meets those targets.
Optics and Photonics News
A conceptual rendering of KAUST’s new authentication technology, which combines laser-generated physical fingerprints and AI to verify the identity of connected devices without traditional passwords or security keys. [Image: KAUST] The rapid growth of cloud computing, artificial intelligence and the internet of things presents a growing security challenge. Authentication must support many users and devices that are constantly joining, leaving and exchanging information.
Optics and Photonics News
A new method uses light to control in which cells a stress hormone receptor is degraded. This makes it possible to specifically wake cancer cells from a dormant state. [Image: Adobe Stock / Montage Yadi Sialm] Even after patients with cancer have been successfully treated, the risk of relapse continues to loom over them for years or even decades. One explanation is that cancer cells enter a dormant state, where they are nonproliferating and drug-resistant.
Optics and Photonics News
The metasurface integrated into the custom-built telescope. [Image: Noah Rubin] Metasurfaces—artificial 2D planar surfaces that consist of subwavelength metallic or dielectric nanostructures—offer better, more efficient light control than conventional optical devices. Although researchers have successfully created ultrathin optical components like flat mirrors, lenses and waveplates using metasurfaces, most work remains in the proof-of-concept stage.
La verdad sobre los medicamentos para bajar de peso
Medicamentos como Wegovy están en todas las noticias. Pero ¿son adecuados para ti, especialmente si eres mayor que la mayoría de las personas que los usan? Los medicamentos GLP-1 pueden ayudar a lograr una pérdida de peso significativa, pero también tienen efectos secundarios que podrían causar problemas de salud. By Meeri Kim Últimamente se ha hablado mucho de varios medicamentos por su capacidad para ayudar a bajar de peso y reducir los niveles altos de azúcar en la sangre.
Optics and Photonics News
The gradual replacement of copper wiring with fiber optics is speeding up transmission between computers and other electronic devices. [Image: Getty Images/kynny] While nonlinear optical processes, such as second-harmonic generation, are fundamental to integrated photonics, achieving wide-range electrical tunability within a truly nanoscale device has remained a challenge. Conventional electrically controlled nonlinear devices are relatively large and typically offer only modest tuning.
Optics and Photonics News
The NUS team developed a patented method that gently extracts the thylakoid grana from the cells of the spinach plant and used it as the active ingredient in their eye drops. [Image: College of Design and Engineering, NUS] During photosynthesis, plants use light to generate energy-rich organic compounds critical to their survival. While algae and some bacteria also transform light into biochemically useful energy, such photosynthetic ability isn’t naturally found in higher animals.
Optics and Photonics News
Researchers developed tiny flexible lasers that change emission properties in response to external force, allowing them to be used inside living cells to measure forces in and between cells. [Image: Marcel Schubert, University of Cologne] In the last decade, whispering gallery mode (WGM) lasers have been used to track cell migration and sense cellular forces, highlighting their growing utility as a biosensing tool.
Optics and Photonics News
Lindell Williams (left) and Grant Brodnik align an optical fiber with the edge of an integrated photonics chip. Optical fibers act as pipes for light, enabling the light generated on these chips to be collected and routed off the chip for use in experiments and applications. [Image: R. Jacobson/NIST] Integrated photonics has the power to advance technology in areas such as telecommunications, visible-light consumer electronics and quantum computing.
Why your job’s complexity level may affect your risk of dementia
A growing body of evidence suggests that the jobs we hold throughout our lives may matter just as much or more than years of education • • You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account. A woman is at a crosscroads about staying in her depressng job or chasing after her dream of being a novelist. /Getty Images Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected.
Why your job’s complexity level may affect your risk of dementia
A growing body of evidence suggests that the jobs we hold throughout our lives may matter just as much or more than years of education Author of the article: Published Apr 21, 2026 • Last updated 1 day ago • 3 minute read You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account. A woman is at a crosscroads about staying in her depressng job or chasing after her dream of being a novelist.
Why your job’s complexity level may affect your risk of dementia
A growing body of evidence suggests that the jobs we hold throughout our lives may matter just as much or more than years of education • • You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account. A woman is at a crosscroads about staying in her depressng job or chasing after her dream of being a novelist. /Getty Images Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected.
What to eat (and avoid) to lower your Parkinson’s risk Original
What to eat (and avoid) to lower your Parkinson’s risk (washingtonpost.com) What to eat (and avoid) to lower your Parkinson’s risk By Meeri Kim 2026041910010400 A growing body of evidence suggests that at least some cases of Parkinson's disease may start in the gut, through the spread of an abnormal protein from the stomach to the brain, a process that is thought to take decades.
What to eat (and avoid) to lower your Parkinson’s risk
Now My wife's birthday was a few weeks away. Should I buy her a present? The reason I asked that question is that my wife has dementia. She is now in a stage where she cannot summon up words, where she doesn't always seem to respond to my visits. And even if I were to tell her that her birthday was …
Optics and Photonics News
José Azaña (left) and Benjamin Crockett (right) in their laboratory at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS), Canada. [Image: INRS] For many quantum technologies, background noise can be a major issue that limits their out-of-lab deployment. For example, advances in quantum networking that have enabled secure communications, clock synchronization and optical quantum computing largely require strict conditions to minimize noise.
Why your job’s complexity level may affect your risk of dementia
Subscribe to The Post Most newsletter for the most important and interesting stories from The Washington Post. Getting an education is important for a lot of reasons, but there might be one reason you haven’t heard - it could lower your risk of dementia later in life. Decades of research have supported this claim, with one study showing that each additional year of formal education lowers the risk of Alzheimer’s disease or other types of dementia by 7 percent.
Optics and Photonics News
The triple-junction solar cell (54 cm2). [Image: Kerem Artuk] An international team of researchers has developed a perovskite-silicon triple-junction solar cell that achieves a record certified efficiency of 30.02% (Nature, doi: 10.1038/s41586-026-10385-y). The device, composed of a silicon bottom cell and thin-film perovskite middle and top cells, surpasses the previous record of 27.1%.
Optics and Photonics News
Activating genes with light. [Image: Sahand Rahi (EPFL)] Directed evolution, which mimics the process of natural evolution in the laboratory to generate biomolecules of interest, is a powerful tool for protein engineering. However, current methods lack the ability to efficiently produce proteins that are more complex—such as those capable of turning on and off in response to a specific signal.
Optics & Photonics News - NIR Microcavities for Quantum Applications
A fabricated micromirror array next to a penny, compared with a half-inch diameter commercial mirror. [Image: Brandon Grinkemeyer / Lukin lab at Harvard] The rise of quantum optical applications has led to greater demand for smaller optical cavities with high performance, particularly in the near-infrared (NIR) and visible ranges. However, creating such devices is challenging since the traditional fabrication approach based on polished mirrors creates large cavities that are not easily scalable.
Detén el dolor de hombro ahora mismo
Estrategias sencillas que pueden ayudarte a encontrar un alivio real. By Meeri Kim Los hombros tienen el mayor rango de movimiento de todas las articulaciones del cuerpo. Su complejidad– cada uno tiene tres huesos y cuatro articulaciones, además de músculos, tendones y ligamentos– significa que hay muchas cosas que pueden fallar. El dolor de hombro es uno de los síntomas musculoesqueléticos más comunes en los adultos.
Optics & Photonics News - Renewed Momentum for Photodynamic Therapy
Skip To Content Feature New approaches are revitalizing photodynamic therapy, a light-driven therapy with more than a century of scientific history. Illustration of single-point laser photodynamic therapy. [C.S. Carrizo et al. Adv. Therap. 8, e00541 (2025)] Since antiquity, humanity has sought to harness the healing power of light.
Stop Shoulder Pain Now
Simple strategies can help you find real relief February 14, 2026 Photo: Getty Images The shoulders have the greatest range of motion of any joints in the body. Their complexity—each has three bones and four joints, plus muscles, tendons, and ligaments—means there’s a lot that can go wrong. Shoulder pain is one of the most common musculoskeletal symptoms in adults.
Parkinson’s disease symptoms that can show up long before diagnosis
Many people think of a tremor as the quintessential warning sign of Parkinson’s disease. But other symptoms — many of them not involving changes in movement — can appear much earlier than what’s known as a resting tremor. In fact, a resting tremor, which is a rhythmic shaking of a body part such as a hand when at rest, isn’t even required for diagnosis. Up to 20% of people with Parkinson’s disease don’t have one.
La vacuna que toda persona mayor de 50 años debería ponerse
Esta inyección protege contra el herpes zóster y también podría ser beneficiosa para el cerebro y el corazón. By Meeri Kim Es muy probable que, si naciste antes de 1980, hayas tenido varicela en algún momento. Hoy en día, esta enfermedad altamente contagiosa es poco común en Estados Unidos gracias a la eficacia de la vacuna, pero el virus varicela-zóster (que causa la varicela) puede reactivarse en el organismo años después en forma de herpes zóster.
4 Parkinson’s disease symptoms that can show up decades before a diagnosis
Skip to Content Symptoms can be managed with available treatments, but there is no cure • • You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account. Woman with shaky hands suffering from Parkinson's disease. Getty Images Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page.
Optics & Photonics News - Self-Driving Lab Finds Strategy for Light Control
Sandia National Laboratories scientists Saaketh Desai, left, and Prasad Iyer, modernized an optics lab with a team of artificial intelligences that learn data, design and run experiments, and interpret results. [Image: Craig Fritz] Self-driving labs integrate artificial intelligence, laboratory automation and robotics to operate as closed-loop systems that conduct experiments without human involvement.
Cuatro síntomas de la enfermedad de Parkinson que pueden aparecer décadas antes del diagnóstico
La enfermedad de Parkinson es un trastorno neurodegenerativo que afecta a las neuronas productoras de dopamina (Freepik) Mucha gente considera el temblor como la señal de alerta por excelencia de la enfermedad de Parkinson. Pero otros síntomas, muchos de los cuales no implican cambios en el movimiento, pueden aparecer mucho antes que el temblor en reposo.
4 Parkinson’s disease symptoms that can show up decades before a diagnosis
4 Parkinson’s disease symptoms that can show up decades before a diagnosis (washingtonpost.com) 4 Parkinson’s disease symptoms that can show up decades before a diagnosis By Meeri Kim 2026012811012200 Many people think of a tremor as the quintessential warning sign of Parkinson's disease. But other symptoms — many of them not involving changes in movement — can appear much earlier than what's known as a resting tremor.
Optics & Photonics News - X-ray Diffraction Technique Reveals Tiny Structures in Record Time
Marianne Liebi, Meitian Wang and Christian Appel (from left to right) at the Swiss Light Source. [Image: © Paul Scherrer Institute PSI/Mahir Dzambegovic] A team of researchers based in Switzerland and Sweden has refined a decade-old X-ray diffraction technique to measure the 3D nanoscale information of biological structures (Small Methods, doi: 10.1002/smtd.202500162).
Optics and Photonics News
The researchers of the ArQuS Lab. [Image: University of Trieste] Researchers based in Italy and Germany have developed a novel approach for detecting individual atoms in a rapid and minimally destructive way by leveraging an imaging scheme based on fluorescence microscopy (Phys. Rev. Lett., doi: 10.1103/n3bg-7yw7).
Nuevo estudio: por qué bailar tango podría ser una actividad clave para desacelerar el envejecimiento cerebral Original
WASHINGTON.− Hacer música, bailar, hacer manualidades, y hasta jugar a algunos tipos de videojuegos, no solo son actividades inmersivas, sino también emocionalmente gratificantes, y según un nuevo estudio científico, hasta podrían desacelerar el envejecimiento del cerebro. Analizando datos de la actividad cerebral, los investigadores descubrieron que abocarse a tareas creativas de cualquier tipo está asociado a un cerebro de apariencia más joven.
These creative activities may help slow down brain aging
Playing music, dancing, creating art — and even playing some types of video games — aren’t just immersive and emotionally rewarding. They may actually slow down brain aging, a new study suggests. By analyzing brain activity data, the researchers found that engaging in creative pursuits of all kinds is linked to a younger-looking brain. The study was published by Nature Communications in October. “This is not just a solution for the da Vincis of the world.
These creative activities may slow down brain aging
Playing music, dancing, creating art — and even playing some types of video games — aren’t just immersive and emotionally rewarding. They may actually slow down brain aging, a new study suggests. By analyzing brain activity data, the researchers found that engaging in creative pursuits of all kinds is linked to a younger-looking brain. The study was published by Nature Communications in October. “This is not just a solution for the da Vincis of the world.
These creative activities may help slow down brain aging
Playing music, dancing, creating art — and even playing some types of video games — aren’t just immersive and emotionally rewarding. They may actually slow down brain aging, a new study suggests. By analyzing brain activity data, the researchers found that engaging in creative pursuits of all kinds is linked to a younger-looking brain. The study was published by Nature Communications in October. “This is not just a solution for the da Vincis of the world.
These creative activities may help slow down brain aging
Playing music, dancing, creating art — and even playing some types of video games — aren’t just immersive and emotionally rewarding, they may actually slow down brain aging, a new study suggests. By analyzing brain activity data, the researchers found that engaging in creative pursuits of all kinds is linked to a younger-looking brain. The study was published by Nature Communications in October.
Want to slow down brain aging? These activities might help.
Want to slow down brain aging? These activities might help. (washingtonpost.com) Want to slow down brain aging? These activities might help. By Meeri Kim 2025112811000000 Playing music, dancing, creating art — and even playing some types of video games — aren't just immersive and emotionally rewarding. They may actually slow down brain aging, a new study suggests.
Optics & Photonics News - Single-Shot Tensor Computing at Light Speed
Optical computing is an emerging platform for the computation and acceleration of neural networks that drive artificial intelligence technology. Advantages over traditional computing platforms include large bandwidth, high parallelism and low energy consumption. However, a major drawback is that tensor processing—a key operation in neural network computations—typically requires multiple light propagations.
Optics & Photonics News - Precise Mode Control in Laser Frequency Comb
A critical tool in the search for Earth-like exoplanets is the astro-comb, a broadband and uniformly spaced laser frequency comb optimized for wavelength calibration of astronomical spectrographs. Astro-combs provide a reference akin to a precise wavelength ruler, with an ability to measure the Doppler “wobble” from increasingly smaller planets.
Optics & Photonics News - AI Factories: Photonics at Scale
[A. Morozov / Getty Images] The demand for photonics is being pushed to an unprecedented degree by the dramatic scale-up and scale-out of artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure. As current copper-based networks are stretched to their limit, photonic links are being called upon to overcome bottlenecks in bandwidth, power and latency.
4 surprising things that may reduce your risk of Parkinson's
Advertisement 1 Although current treatments can manage symptoms, there is no cure or therapy that can slow disease progression. • • You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account. Article content Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page.
4 surprising things that may reduce your risk of Parkinson's
Skip to Content Advertisement 1 Although current treatments can manage symptoms, there is no cure or therapy that can slow disease progression. • • Article content Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page.
4 surprising things that may reduce your risk of Parkinson's
Although current treatments can manage symptoms, there is no cure or therapy that can slow disease progression. Author of the article: Published Oct 26, 2025 • Last updated 2 days ago • 6 minute read You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account. Drinking coffee or tea may help lower the risk of developing Parkinson's disease.
Optics & Photonics News - Coupling Time Crystals to a Mechanical Resonator
A time crystal is a unique form of matter that exhibits a repeating structure in time, similar to how atoms in a conventional crystal repeat in space. Time crystals, first experimentally realized in 2016, have been created in a range of physical systems and coupled to other time crystals, but always in isolation from their environment. Now, researchers at Aalto University in Finland say they have, for the first time, connected a time crystal to an external physical system (Nat.
Want to reduce your risk of dementia? Play a board game
By Meeri Kim For The Washington Post Board games have made a massive comeback in the past decade. And researchers are discovering that board games are not only fun, they may also benefit our brains, especially as we age. The global board games market has an estimated value of $18.53 billion and is projected to grow by $5.17 billion from 2025 to 2029. Classic games such as chess, Monopoly, Scrabble and Go remain popular, now joined by modern favorites such as Ticket to Ride, Pandemic and Wingspan.
4 surprising things that may reduce your risk of Parkinson’s
4 surprising things that may reduce your risk of Parkinson’s (washingtonpost.com) 4 surprising things that may reduce your risk of Parkinson’s By Meeri Kim 2025102010000000 Parkinson's disease, once considered relatively rare, is now one of the most common neurological disorders in the world, and the second most common after Alzheimer's disease. The number of people living with Parkinson's has more than doubled in the past 25 years to 8.5 million, and is predicted to hit 25.2 million by 2050.
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