- DARPA announced a “Direct to Phase 2” SBIR call for a wearable, conformable light-delivery device that can be paired with optogenetic transgenes, aiming to bring optogenetic stimulation out of the lab and onto freely moving humans.  
- A new lineage-tracing method called TURTLES (“Recording temporal data onto DNA with minutes resolution”) uses timed Co²⁺ pulses to write timestamps into DNA with ~2-minute precision over an hour—200× better temporal resolution than prior DNA recorders.  
- Harvard’s Wyss Institute has demonstrated whole-body lineage mapping in mice by inserting heritable barcodes that record every cell division, providing a scalable platform for studying development, aging, and disease progression.  
- A de-novo aptamer discovery workflow published on bioRxiv loads tumor cells directly onto a NextSeq flow-cell after sequencing a DNA library, letting the sequencer itself become a high-throughput screen for tumor-killing aptamers.  
- UW Protein Design researchers engineered pH-responsive proteins whose conformational switch is driven by precisely placed histidine networks; the transition pH and cooperativity can be tuned by altering the number of histidines and surrounding hydrophobic packing.  
- A Cell/Neuron perspective piece titled “Architecting discovery” outlines how engineers can systematically invent and disseminate new neuroscience tools, emphasizing modular hardware–software ecosystems and rapid community adoption.  
- A bioRxiv preprint describes “acoustically detonated biomolecules” that enable genetically encodable inertial cavitation, potentially giving ultrasound the ability to trigger localized mechanical or chemical events inside specific cell populations.  
- The CZI “Essential Open-Source Software for Science” RFA was circulated, offering grants to sustain foundational open-source projects that underpin modern biomedical research.  
- Links to background reading included Greg Egan’s short story “Crystal Nights,” the interactive “Quantum Country” quantum-computing primer, and two blog posts on retinopetal (brain-to-retina) signaling and its functional implications.