- A user reported an accidental 120 mg dose of noopept (4× intended) that produced two hours of acute short-term memory loss, metallic taste, tinnitus, and auditory hallucinations resembling distant party chatter, all resolving without lasting harm.

- Participants compared racetam stacks: phenylpiracetam was singled out as uniquely potent, delivering amphetamine-like focus when combined with armodafinil and caffeine, yet causing anxiety and GI distress above ~250 mg single doses or 2 g/day.

- Vendor sourcing was reviewed: Nootropics Depot earned praise for on-site GC/MS testing and transparency, while science.bio and Russian pharmacies (Cosmic, RUPharma) were noted for broader but riskier prescription-drug imports, with anecdotes of customs seizures even for mundane items like ibuprofen.

- Engineering skepticism toward China’s announced 2033 crewed Mars mission centered on decade-long delays in Earth-orbit goals, Apollo-era space-suit air seals degrading after only days of lunar dust exposure, and the risk that Martian fines could infiltrate glued joints and disrupt seals via nanoparticle-scale surface chemistry.

- A new gene-editing tool claimed to outperform CRISPR was shared (https://interestingengineering.com/new-gene-editing-tool-lets-scientists-do-things-crispr-cant), along with a PNAS paper on high-throughput functional variant screens using in-vivo–produced single-stranded DNA (https://www.pnas.org/content/118/18/e2018181118).