It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Tuesday, August 26, 2025
New monthly pill shows potential as pre-exposure prophylaxis HIV drug candidate
The compound, MK-8527, belongs to a novel class of antiretrovirals
HIV Virus Creative artwork featuring colorized 3D prints of HIV virus particles. The virus surface (red) is covered with proteins (dark blue) that enable the virus to enter and infect human cells, and additional proteins (teal spheres) that disguise the virus from the immune system. A colorized transmission micrograph of an H9 T cell (blue) appears in the background. Note: proteins not to scale.
A new HIV antiretroviral shows promise as a long-acting, oral prophylactic agent, according to a new study by Izzat Raheem, Tracy Diamond and colleagues from Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, published August 26thin the open-access journal PLOS Biology.
HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is a key part of reducing the number of new HIV infections. The most common oral PrEP therapies, consisting of once-daily pills, are highly effective at protecting people from acquiring HIV, but they only work if taken properly. Currently, the only long-acting PrEP therapies require injection by a healthcare provider, which isn’t always feasible for people. Long-acting, oral PrEP therapies could facilitate adherence, provide greater privacy and discretion, reduce concerns about stigma, and improve accessibility for more people to initiate and continue on PrEP, ultimately helping to stem the tide of the nearly 1.3 million new HIV infections globally per year.
Researchers from Merck engaged in a lead optimization campaign to develop a novel nucleoside reverse transcriptase translocation inhibitor (NRTTI). NRTTIs are a new class of anti-HIV drugs that have shown potential for long-acting prophylaxis. They inhibit viral replication by more than one mechanism, including blocking translocation of reverse transcriptase on the growing viral DNA chain.
Using a known NRTTI, islatravir, as a starting point, researchers used several medicinal chemistry strategies to modify the structure and optimize it using both in vitro and in vivo assays. The lead compound, dubbed MK-8527, showed robust antiviral activity in vitro,and pharmacokinetics in animal studies demonstrated that it may be suitable as a long-acting oral therapy. Studies in humans are underway to assess the safety and tolerability of MK-8527 as a once-monthly oral pill in volunteers at low likelihood of HIV exposure, and at least one completed clinical study shows promising results.
In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology: https://plos.io/4l6m2h7
Citation: Raheem IT, Girijavallabhan V, Fillgrove KL, Goh SL, Bahnck-Teets C, Huang Q, et al. (2025) MK-8527 is a novel inhibitor of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase translocation with potential for extended-duration dosing. PLoS Biol 23(8): e3003308. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003308
Ramy Elitzur received his Ph.D. from the Stern School of Business, New York University. He is a Professor of Accounting at the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto. His research spans game theory and data analytics—with a particular focus on machine learning and artificial intelligence—as applied to sports, financial reporting and auditing, venture capital, crowdfunding, and entrepreneurship. His work has been published in leading journals, including Contemporary Accounting Research, Journal of Business Venturing, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Journal of Accounting, Auditing & Finance, Journal of Business Venturing Insights, and Healthcare Management Science (Springer Nature).
Toronto - In the run-up to the introduction of accounting standards for the reporting of cryptocurrency, companies took various approaches to disclosing their involvement with the novel exchange medium. Investors had to rely more on contextual narrative explanations about a company's crypto involvement instead of getting it from numerical data.
An analysis of reporting from five major companies as cryptocurrency went on a popularity rollercoaster between late 2018 and the so-called "crypto winter" of late 2022 showed firms increased the frequency and readability of their crypto disclosures when cryptocurrency was riding high but reduced them when markets were less favourable.
"To effectively 'sell' investors on complex issues, such as cryptocurrency activities, firms may intentionally simplify or "dumb down" the information," said researcher Ramy Elitzur, a professor of accounting at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management. "When market conditions are favourable, firms emphasize or actively promote their involvement in these activities. Conversely, during downturns, firms strategically distance themselves to avoid negative associations or heightened scrutiny."
Prof. Elitzur and fellow Rotman accounting and finance professor Wendy Rotenberg applied artificial intelligence methods to help them examine financial disclosures for GameStop, Tesla, MicroStrategy, Coinbase and PayPal. Some, such as Tesla, used cryptocurrency primarily as a financial asset or means of customer payment. Coinbase and PayPal worked mostly on the "supply side," providing trading services or selling cryptocurrency to customers.
Besides looking at the five companies' corporate data, the researchers used Google Trends to gauge the level of public interest in companies and their cryptocurrency activities and compared that to tracking of Bitcoin prices. They applied well-established readability tests to the companies' disclosures as well as machine-learning tools to analyze text.
GameStop "consistently" showed the highest quality disclosures on average with much more detail given, said Prof. Elitzur. On the other hand, disclosures by MicroStrategy -- now known as Strategy -- were consistently ranked below average for readability compared to the other companies, he said. That company has since been named in a class action lawsuit over allegations it made false or misleading statements to investors and did not disclose certain negative information about the business. "It's not surprising that unclear or less transparent disclosure practices could contribute to legal challenges or investor dissatisfaction, as seen in this lawsuit," Prof. Elitzur said.
There was limited guidance on how to disclose a firm's crypto activities until late 2023 and what there was led to significant gaps between the reported value of a company's digital assets and what those would fetch on the market. Then the U.S. Financial Accounting Standards Board released its ASU 2023-08. It stated that cryptocurrency should be reported according to its fair market value with corresponding changes reported in income. The standards made things clearer but also brought more volatility in earnings reporting for companies more heavily invested in crypto as an asset.
Even with the clarity brought by ASU 2023-08, the researchers say their work shows there's room for even tighter regulation so that investors get better quality information.
"Our findings suggest that reporting standards regarding cryptocurrency activities should be refined further by introducing more concrete and explicit disclosure requirements than those currently outlined in ASU 2023-08," said Prof. Elitzur.
Bringing together high-impact faculty research and thought leadership on one searchable platform, the Rotman Insights Hub offers articles, podcasts, opinions, books and videos representing the latest in management thinking and providing insights into the key issues facing business and society. Visit www.rotman.utoronto.ca/insightshub.
The Rotman School of Management is part of the University of Toronto, a global centre of research and teaching excellence at the heart of Canada’s commercial capital. Rotman is a catalyst for transformative learning, insights and public engagement, bringing together diverse views and initiatives around a defining purpose: to create value for business and society. For more information, visit www.rotman.utoronto.ca.
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Wendy Rotenberg is a professor of Finance and Accounting at the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto. Her research interests include financial reporting, financial management, corporate restructuring, and international finance. Her publications appear in such journals as Contemporary Accounting Research, Review of Financial Studies, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis and the Journal of International Financial Management and Accounting.
Obituaries function as time capsules that reflect what people, at any given moment in history, understand to be a life well-lived. By studying how obituaries evolve across time and context, we can gain deeper insight into how societies define a worthy life, express loss and pass on values across generations.
New MSU-led researchtakes a novel approach to the psychological study of legacy by focusing on how individuals are actually remembered by others instead of how they wish to be remembered.
Legacy motivations influence a range of real-world behaviors, from charitable giving to end-of-life decisions.
EAST LANSING, Mich. – What constitutes a life well-lived? A new Michigan State University-led study is turning to a common cultural artifact to find out: the obituary.
In the study, published in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, or PNAS, researchers from MSU, Boston College and the Arizona State University analyzed 38 million obituaries from the U.S. spanning 30 years to examine what values people are most remembered for, how cultural events and time change how people are remembered, and how legacy reflections reinforce societal expectations of a life well-lived based on demographics.
This research introduces a new framework for the psychological study of legacy by shifting focus from how individuals wish to be remembered to how they are actually remembered by others.
“Obituaries serve as a unique source of information about how societies value different kinds of lives,” said David Markowitz, an associate professor of communication in the MSU College of Communication Arts and Sciences and lead author of the study. “They reveal broader patterns of remembrance by showing who is remembered, for what contributions, and how cultural values are expressed through these acts of memory.”
Personal values and demographic differences
To analyze what values people are most remembered for, the researchers drew on Schwartz’s theory of basic human values, which argues for a collection of 10 universal guiding principles for one’s life. They found that the most prevalent personal values in obituaries were tradition (represented in about 80% of obituaries) and benevolence (76%).
Using Schwartz’s theory, tradition is defined as “the need for respect, commitment and acceptance of customs and ideas.” It typically was reflected in involvement with religion. Benevolence is the need to care for close others and was indicated by obituaries that characterized the deceased as reliable and trustworthy.
Markowitz and his colleagues found that women are remembered for benevolence more than men, while men are remembered for more achievement than women. Men are also remembered for more conformity than woman; however, in this context “conformity” may signal structured responsibility and adherence to social order, which are common in references to military service and civic involvement — typically male-dominated fields. In addition, men’s obituaries show greater variation in values over a lifespan than women’s.
“Gender stereotypes may not just reflect interpersonal and intergroup biases, but they may also be embedded, and transmitted across generations, in our cultural practices of legacy and memorialization,” said Markowitz.
The study also showed older people were remembered more for tradition and less for benevolence than younger people.
The role of major cultural events
Markowitz and his colleagues examined how three major cultural events — the 9/11 attacks, 2008 financial crisis and COVID-19 pandemic — were linked to changes in how people wrote about their loved ones who passed.
9/11
Security, or the need for safety, harmony and stability, declined after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but tradition and benevolence increased. Those who died in New York State were written about with more benevolence than those who died outside of New York State. At least two weeks after 9/11, there was a reduced focused on security for those in New York State versus those outside of New York State. Markowitz notes that this clear evidence of a language-location link that modifies obituary writing during cultural events.
“These findings suggest that traumatic events affect not only how people react in the moment, but also how they later make sense of meaning and memory. This impact can look different depending on where people live and die,” he said. “In this way, shared trauma can influence what is mourned and highlight regional differences in how people remember, showing how place and closeness shape the idea of legacy.”
2008 financial crisis
Achievement, the need for personal success by showing you have the skills or abilities that society values, gradually fell starting one month after the financial crisis and continued to decrease over the next year. Hedonism, the need for pleasure, enjoyment or gratification, was generally lower than baseline for all time periods, except for one year after the financial crisis, when it was higher.
“Perhaps this reversal reflects a psychological improvement where people began focusing on values related to satisfaction instead of personal survival over the long term,” said Markowitz.
COVID-19 pandemic
Benevolence has experienced a decrease in obituary appearances since 2019 — just before the COVID-19 pandemic — and has yet to recover.
“During a time when communities were making extraordinary sacrifices for the collective good, obituaries became less likely to emphasize caring for others,” Markowitz said.
Two years and four years after the pandemic, tradition increased and did not return to baseline. There was a strong link between COVID-19 deaths and tradition: As more people died during the pandemic, obituaries tended to focus more on religion and social norms and less on conformity.
Markowitz noted that the value shifts in obituaries following 9/11, the 2008 financial crisis and the pandemic signal possible social and psychosocial disruptions that each crisis had on the U.S.
“Shifts in personal values are linked to consequential cultural events history that impact how people think, feel and appraise the world around them — including their loved ones who died,” Markowitz said.
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Michigan State University has been advancing the common good with uncommon will for 170 years. One of the world’s leading public research universities, MSU pushes the boundaries of discovery to make a better, safer, healthier world for all while providing life-changing opportunities to a diverse and inclusive academic community through more than 400 programs of study in 17 degree-granting colleges.
Does insurance play a role in which critically ill patients live or die?
The unfortunate answer may be yes, due in part to a difference in the rate of inter-hospital transfer, according to new research from the University of Michigan.
The research team, led by Emily Harlan, M.D. and Thomas Valley, M.D. of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, examined the factors that determined which critically ill patients with acute respiratory failure were transferred to high volume specialty hospitals for treatment.
Care in such hospitals is associated with a lower risk of death for patients on a ventilator.
“We were motivated to do this study because there are times that, as doctors, we get a call from an outside hospital asking us to accept a patient for transfer to our ICU. We’ll accept a patient, but then we’re told that the patient’s insurance needs to be reviewed first. We wanted to see if those experiences were unique to us,” noted Valley.
“There are laws in place to ensure that anyone who needs emergency care is stabilized and admitted to the hospital. But those laws tend to end there. If a patient needs more advanced treatments at another hospital, there is nothing that requires hospitals to accept those patients for transfer—that’s where factors like a patient’s insurance might play a role.”
Looking at data from more than 700,000 patients from throughout the U.S. who were critically ill and on ventilators between 2017 and 2021. Over half were insured through Medicare, 19 percent through Medicaid, 18 percent through commercial insurance and 6 percent were uninsured.
After controlling for patient characteristics, such as age, sex, chronic illnesses, severity of illness and the year they were admitted (to account for the COVID-19 pandemic), the team discovered that around 4 percent of patients underwent inter-hospital transfer and 37 percent of patients died or were discharged to hospice.
The odds of transfer for patients without insurance were nearly half that of patients with commercial insurance. Patients with Medicare or Medicaid were also less likely to receive inter-hospital transfer than those with commercial insurance. Patients without insurance or with Medicare or Medicaid were also transferred later during their hospital stays than patients with commercial insurance.
Furthermore, patients without insurance had significantly higher odds of death relative to patients with commercial insurance.
This study adds to the growing body of evidence of a relationship between insurance status and inter-hospital transfer for serious health conditions.
“We need to further evaluate how hospitals make decisions to transfer patients to ensure transfer decisions are made equitably,” said Harlan.
Additional authors: Muhammad Ghous MBBS, Noella Cortinas, MD, Nandita R. Nadig MD, Kelly C. Vranas MD, Mari Armstrong-Hough PhD, Sarah L. Krein PhD
Disclosures: This manuscript does not necessarily represent the view of the U.S. Government or the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Paper cited: “Health insurance and inter-hospital transfer for critically ill patients with respiratory failure,” JAMA Network Open DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.28889
Storm surge and rainfall — not wind — cause the majority of hurricane deaths, yet are absent from the current warning system.
Researchers developed and tested the Tropical Cyclone Severity Scale, which incorporates all three hazards and can rate storms up to Category 6.
Study shows people are more likely to correctly identify risks and evacuate when informed using the new scale.
TAMPA, Fla. (Aug. 26, 2025) – Wind alone does not account for all hurricane-related fatalities. Storm surge and rainfall do as well. Yet the current warning system – the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale – measures a storm’s strength solely by wind speed.
A new research paper published in Nature Scientific Reports and co-authored by Jennifer Collins, a hurricane researcher and University of South Florida geosciences professor, argues that in order to keep people safe, it’s time for a change. The authors propose replacing the SSHWS with the Tropical Cyclone Severity Scale, which incorporates storm surge and rainfall in addition to wind.
“Frequently, people use the storm’s category to decide whether to evacuate,” Collins said. “That’s incredibly dangerous because if they hear it’s only a tropical storm or Category 1, too often no alarm bells go off, and they see no cause for concern.”
The paper cites hurricanes Katrina and Florence as examples. In 2005, Katrina was listed as a Category 3 based on wind speed, but most of the 1,800 deaths and $125 billion in damage were caused by storm surge and rainfall. Similarly, in 2018, Florence made landfall as a Category 1, yet its massive flooding killed 55 people.
It also cites a 2014 study by Edward Rappaport, then-deputy director of the National Hurricane Center, that stated wind is responsible for 8% of hurricane-related fatalities, while storm surge accounts for 49% and rainfall 27%.
“There have been too many instances of incredible loss of life and destruction because a low category number on the SSHWS, or even if it’s listed as a tropical storm, did not match the danger of the storm,” Collins said. “Based on our research, we now know that people are more likely to evacuate if they understand the dangers from rainfall and storm surge in addition to wind.”
Here’s how the TCSS works:
Wind, rain and storm surge are each given a number from 1 to 5 based on predicted severity, but the final combined number can reach as high as 6 to communicate the additional risk from multiple extreme hazards.
If one hazard is worse than the others, the hurricane’s final category is at least that high. For example, if wind and rainfall are rated 2 but storm surge is 4, the final category is at least 4.
If two hazards are rated Category 3 or higher, the final number increases by one. So, if storm surge is 4 but wind and rainfall are 5, the hurricane is predicted as Category 6.
The TCSS will then list the hazard-specific categories, as well as an overall category.
To test public response to these warnings, Collins and her research team conducted an online experiment with 4,000 residents along the Gulf and East coasts – regions frequently threatened by hurricanes.
Participants received forecasts for 10 fictional hurricanes affecting their communities; half received warnings using the SSHWS, and half using the TCSS.
“We were interested in whether better identification of the main hazard would improve precautionary measures,” the paper explains, “and whether the overall category difference would increase evacuation intent for more dangerous storms.”
Questions the participants were asked included:
What is the main danger of the storm – wind, rain or storm surge?
On a scale of 1–5, how risky would it be to stay in your home?
On a scale of 1–5, would you evacuate?
Those who received the TCSS were more likely to correctly identify the main hazard and significantly more likely to evacuate for non-wind hazards.
“The higher category is important,” Collins said. “According to my evacuation research, many people base their decision to evacuate on that number, not just on the details of the hazard.”
The National Hurricane Center began using the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale in 1971, utilizing pressure, storm surge and wind measurements. But in 2012, that was modified to include only the wind component and was named the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale.
“Without satisfactory and complete information, individuals are likely to miscalculate their personal risk or even be moved to inaction,” the paper reads.
Collins, a native of England who moved from Pennsylvania to Florida in 2005, longed to study evacuation behavior during hurricanes.
After an approximately 10-year lull in hurricanes impacting Florida, she was able to conduct her studies due to Hurricane Matthew in 2016, and then subsequent hurricanes including Irma in 2017 and Ian in 2022. In 2024, hurricanes Helene and Milton provided ample opportunity for her team to study hurricane evacuation behavior in Florida.
At a 2017 hurricane conference, she met University of Amsterdam co-author Nadia Bloemendaal, who shared similar interests. Together with the other co-authors, Jantse Mol from the University of Amsterdam and Hans de and Dianna Amasino of Tilburg University, they developed the TCSS, publishing their findings in 2021 and moving on to testing its effectiveness.
Next, Collins and her co-authors plan to present their research to the National Hurricane Center. While others have suggested changes to the hurricane scale, Collins believes their work offers strong evidence supporting such a shift.
“Change is hard for any institution that’s been doing the same thing for years,” Collins said. “But I’m fairly optimistic that now is the time. We now know many people make decisions based on the category messaging, so we need to ensure that we are communicating with a scale which is more realistic of the severity of the hurricane, considering other hazards which commonly occur, particularly from storm surge and rainfall flooding, which is considered in our scale.”
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About the University of South Florida
The University of South Florida is a top-ranked research university serving approximately 50,000 students from across the globe at campuses in Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota-Manatee and USF Health. USF is recognized by U.S. News & World Report as a top 50 public university and the best value in Florida. U.S. News also ranks the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine as the No. 1 medical school in Florida and in the highest tier nationwide. USF is a member of the Association of American Universities (AAU), a group that includes only the top 3% of universities in the U.S. With an all-time high of $738 million in research funding in 2024 and as a top 20 public university for producing U.S. patents, USF uses innovation to transform lives and shape a better future. The university generates an annual economic impact of more than $6 billion. USF’s Division I athletics teams compete in the American Conference. Learn more at www.usf.edu.
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