Research roundup: 6 cool science stories we almost missed

It's a regrettable reality that there is never enough time to cover all the interesting scientific stories we come across each month. In the past, we've featured year-end roundups of cool science stories we (almost) missed. This year, we're experimenting with a monthly collection. August's list includes a 3D digital reconstruction of the Shroud of Turin; injecting succulent leaves with phosphors to create plants that glow in different colors; a nifty shape-changing antenna; and snails with a unique ability to grow back their eyeballs.

Digitally reconstructing the Shroud of Turin

Perhaps the most famous "holy relic" is the Shroud of Turin, an old linen cloth that retains a distinct impression of the body of a crucified mine (both front and back). The legend is that Jesus himself was wrapped in the shroud upon his death around 30 CE, although modern scientific dating methods revealed the shroud is actually a medieval artifact dating to between 1260 and 1390 CE. A 3D designer named Cícero Moraes has created a 3D digital reconstruction to lend further credence to the case for the shroud being a medieval forgery, according to a paper published in the journal Archaeometry.

Moraes developed computer models to simulate draping a sheet on both a 3D human form and a bas-relief carving to test which version most closely matched the figure preserved in the shroud. He concluded that the latter was more consistent with the shroud's figure, meaning that it was likely created as an artistic representation or a medieval work of art. It was certainly never draped around an actual body. Most notable was the absence of the so-called "Agamemnon mask effect," in which a human face shrouded in fabric appears wider once flattened.

It's worth mentioning that skepticism surrounding the shroud's authenticity dates back centuries—even earlier than scholars previously thought, according to a new study published in the Journal of Medieval History. Nicolas Sarzeaud, a fellow of the Villa-Médicis Academy de France in Rome and a postdoc at the Université Catholique of Louvain in Belgium, uncovered a previously unknown ancient document—a treatise written in the 1370s by the medieval scholar Nicole Oresme in which he dismisses the shroud as a forgery—that is the oldest written evidence of skepticism surrounding the shroud to date. The next-earliest is a 1389 account by the bishop of Troyes, Pierre d’Arcis, who also dismissed the shroud as a fraud.

DOI: Archaeometry, 2025. 10.1111/arcm.70030  (About DOIs).

DOI: Journal of Medieval History, 2025. 10.1080/03044181.2025.2546884  (About DOIs).

Snails with eyes that grow back

It's been known since at least the 18th century that some snails possess regenerative abilities, such as garden snails regrowing their heads after being decapitated. Golden apple snails can completely regrow their eyes—and those eyes share many anatomical and genetic features with human eyes, according to a paper published in the journal Nature Communications. That makes them an excellent candidate for further research in hopes of unlocking the secret to that regeneration, with the ultimate goal of restoring vision in human eyes.

Snails are often slow to breed in the lab, but golden apple snails are an invasive species and thrive in that environment, per co-author Alice Accorsi, a molecular biologist at the University of California, Davis. The snails have "camera type eyes": a cornea, a lens to focus light, and a retina comprised of millions of photoreceptor cells. There are as many as 9000 genes that seem to be involved in regenerating an amputated eye in the snails, reducing down to 1,175 genes by the 28th day of the process, so complete maturation of the new eyes might take longer. It's not clear whether the new eyes can still process light so the snails can actually "see," which is a topic for further research.

Accorsi also used CRISPR/Cas9 to mutate one gene in particular (pax6) in snail embryos because it is known to control brain and eye development in humans, mice, and fruit flies. She found that apple snails with two non-functioning pax6 genes end up developing without eyes, suggesting it is also responsible for eye development in the snails. The next step is to figure out whether this gene also plays a role in the snails' ability to regenerate their eyes, as well as other potentially involved genes.

DOI: Nature Communications, 2025. 10.1038/s41467-025-61681-6  (About DOIs).

Gorgeous glowing succulents

Perhaps you caught the launch last year of the first genetically modified glowing plant: Light Bio's  green-hued "Firefly Petunia." It's not a particularly bright glow and genetic engineering is expensive, but it was nonetheless a solid step toward the long-term goal of creating glow-in-the-dark plants for sustainable lighting. Scientists at South China Agricultural University came up with a novel, cheaper approach: injecting succulents with phosphorescent chemicals akin to those used in commercial glow-in-the-dark products, aka "afterglow luminescence." They described the work in a paper published in the journal Matter.

The authors weren't initially looking at succulents for their phosphor injection experiments, because they thought the thicker barrier tissues would make the phosphor particles stick to the surface or cluster around the roots; they thought bok choy, for instance, would be a better medium. But their initial tests showed that the succulent Echevedia "Mebina" had a higher loading capacity and a more uniform glow when the phosphors were loaded into the mesophyll cell walls. The ideal particle size is roughly that of a red blood cell. They could even swap out the phosphors to create different glowing hues: green, red, or blue (cyan).

The resulting photographs are quite pretty, but not everyone is a fan of this approach. Michael Le Page, an environmental reporter at New Scientist, wrote a rather scathing takedown of the paper, dismissing the achievement as "little more than a cheap gimmick." He hastened to add that he is not opposed the idea of genuine glowing plants, ideally genetically engineered to make their own persistent phosphors. "But making plants glow by physically injecting glowing compounds into them is cheating," he wrote, adding that there could also be potential pollution issues when the plants inevitably die.

DOI: Matter, 2025. 10.1016/j.matt.2025.102370 External Link  (About DOIs).

Seabirds only poop when flying

Leo Uesake of the University of Tokyo was studying the biomechanics of sea birds running on the surface of the ocean to take off, when he noted an unusual behavior. His video footage showed that these streaked shearwater birds frequently defecated while in flight (see video above), and while he was initially amused, he realized there could be significant implications for marine ecology, according to a paper published in the journal Current Biology. That's because seabird feces has high levels of nitrogen and phosphorus and can hence enrich soil and coastal waters.

Uesake and co-author Katsufumi Sato of the University de la Rochelle in France strapped small backward-facing cameras roughly the size of an eraser to the bellies of 15 streaked shearwaters for their experiments. They captured about 200 "defecation events," almost always while the birds were flying and frequently just after takeoff. In fact, the birds let loose with the feces every four to ten minutes while in flight, excreting roughly 5 percent of their body mass every hour. As for why the birds choose to poop mid-air rather than when they are floating on the ocean surface, Uesake hypothesizes that it might be a way to avoid fouling their feathers or attracting predators. Or maybe it's just easier for the birds to defecate while flying compared to floating.

DOI: Current Biology, 2025. 10.1016/j.cub.2025.06.058  (About DOIs).

A shape-changing antenna

Think of an antenna and one is likely to envision the classic thin metal rods used for receiving TV signals, for instance. But MIT scientists have devised a different kind of antenna out of so-called "metamaterials": engineered materials whose geometry determines the mechanical properties, like stiffness and strength. Their antenna can dynamically adjust the frequency range by reconfiguring its shape to adapt to changing environmental conditions, reducing the need for multiple antennas, according to a forthcoming paper in The Proceedings of UIST'25. A special editing tool can create customized versions using a laser cutter.

The materials in question are known as "auxetic metamaterials" and can deform into three different geometric states, changing the radiation properties (specifically the resonance frequencies) in the process. That makes the antennas well-suited for sensing applications, such as monitoring someone's breathing by detecting the expansion of the chest. The meta-antenna has a dielectric rubber layer sandwiched between two conductive layers created with conductive flexible acrylic spray paint. They tested their prototype by incorporating meta-antennas into curtains that can dynamically adjust lighting in a room, and headphones that can transition smoothly between noise-cancelling and transparent modes. They could also be woven into smart textiles for noninvasive biomedical sensing or temperature monitoring.