Deepfakes are rising — and so is the risk to truth. At UM-Flint, researchers at the SMILES Lab built DeepTect, an AI tool that detects and explains deepfakes before the damage is done. From courtroom evidence to cloned voices, DeepTect helps expose what’s fake — clearly, quickly, and credibly. Watch this video from Michigan Research as AI expert Khalid Malik explains.

Did you know that fighting the urge to urinate could rewire your brain, and not in a good way? “General guidance is that you should empty your bladder every 3–4 hours while you’re awake, assuming you’re drinking a normal amount in a regular day,” says Giulia Ippolito, M.D., a neuro-urologist and pelvic reconstruction specialist.

Courage Therapeutics aims to address obesity and restrictive eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa and cachexia, by targeting neural circuits in the brain known as the central melanocortin system. Roger Cone, a professor of molecular and integrative physiology, has been at the forefront of melanocortin research for decades. Courage Therapeutics is a U-M spinout company.

Because of partnerships with federal agencies like the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Defense, Karl Jepsen has worked for decades to build up the field of bone research. “We are just now seeing the outcomes of funded projects from 20, 30, 40 years ago,” he says.

While usually just irritating, bites from these two insects may also transmit disease. But choosing the right repellent or protection for children can be confusing for some families, according to the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health. Don’t worry. Hear from a Michigan Medicine pediatrician who simplifies the information and offers parents valuable tips to combat these pesky bloodsuckers.

Archaeological excavation as a practice is both expensive and destructive, often causing irreparable damage to sites with sacred and historical significance. LSA archaeologist Robin Beck and his colleagues have developed a project using new technologies to conduct the largest geophysical survey of an archaeological site in the Americas — Cahokia Mounds — at a very large scale without the costs and harms of excavation.

Researchers at U-M’s Rogel Cancer Center recently identified a gene that plays a key role in prostate cancer cells that have transitioned to a more aggressive, treatment-resistant form. The gene can be indirectly targeted with an existing class of drugs, suggesting a potential treatment strategy for patients with aggressive subtypes of prostate cancer.

America’s primary care doctors are burning out, cutting back their hours, and leaving their practices early, driven in part by the demands of handling the flood of digital messages from their patients. But a trio of University of Michigan studies offer hope for easing this crisis, and improving both the care that patients get and the work lives of those who provide it.

The ZEUS laser facility has roughly doubled the peak power of any other laser in the U.S. with its first official experiment at 2 petawatts (2 quadrillion watts). “This milestone marks the beginning of experiments that move into unexplored territory for American high field science,” says Karl Krushelnick, director of U-M’s Gérard Mourou Center for Ultrafast Optical Science.