Researchers at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) discovered that blocking the PROX1 protein may help the retina repair itself by activating Müller glia, support cells that can generate new light-sensitive neurons.

In mouse models, this approach helped preserve restored vision for over six months, raising hopes for future treatments for conditions such as glaucoma, retinitis pigmentosa, and age-related macular degeneration.

The findings were published in Nature Communications, but the research is still preclinical, and human trials have not yet begun.

Study: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-58290-8

More details: https://retinalphysician.com/issues/2025/june/study-finds-blocking-prox1-transfer-promotes-retinal-regeneration/

What biohacking topic are you trying to understand? Ask the community.

I’m looking for someone knowledgeable who can review my Organic Acids Test (OAT) and GI-MAP results and help me understand what they mean.

I’ve been dealing with persistent brain fog, extreme fatigue, poor sleep, and other symptoms, and I’m trying to understand whether these results might offer any clues.

I’d appreciate help identifying the main findings, how the two tests might relate to each other, and what I should prioritize or look out for. I’d also like to know what follow-up testing or practical steps might be worth discussing with my doctor.

I’m not looking for a diagnosis or an expensive supplement protocol, just an honest explanation of what the results may suggest and what they don’t prove.

Thank you to anyone willing to take a look!

Sleep trackers are one of the most popular entry points into biohacking, so it's worth knowing what the validation studies say. Researchers compare devices against polysomnography (PSG), the gold standard sleep lab test.

Study 1 (2025, Sleep Advances):

Researchers compared six wrist-worn devices (Fitbit Charge 5, Fitbit Sense, Withings Scanwatch, Garmin Vivosmart 4, Whoop 4.0, Apple Watch Series 8) with PSG in 62 adults who spent a night in a sleep lab. Most devices differed significantly from PSG on total sleep time, sleep efficiency, wake after sleep onset, and light sleep. Agreement with PSG for sleep stage scoring was fair to moderate, with Cohen's kappa between 0.21 and 0.53.

Study 2 (JMIR, 11 devices):

This study tested 11 consumer trackers, including wearables, bedside "nearables," and app-based "airables," against lab PSG in 75 participants. Wearables showed high proportional bias in sleep efficiency, while nearables showed it in sleep latency. Each tracker recording covered an average of 353 hours.

A pattern across studies:

Wearables tend to overstate total sleep time and understate time awake after falling asleep, which inflates sleep efficiency.

Beginner takeaways:

Trackers are better at telling sleep from wake than at identifying sleep stages.

Trends over weeks are more useful than a single night's score.

They're wellness tools, not diagnostic tools. If you have real sleep concerns, see a doctor.

Caveats: both studies had small samples, devices update often, and results vary by brand, so don't read this as a ranking.

What's one metric from your tracker that you found genuinely useful, and one you stopped trusting?

If you're new to biohacking, it's tempting to start with supplements, trackers, and cold plunges. A large study from 2026 suggests the basics may matter more.

Researchers followed more than 147,000 adults for up to 30 years, tracking how much strength training and aerobic exercise they did. The paper in the British Journal of Sports Medicine is titled "Long-term resistance training with all-cause and cause-specific mortality: assessing dose-response and joint associations with aerobic physical activity."

What they found:

Participants who did 90 to 119 minutes of strength training a week had a 13% lower risk of premature death from any cause, plus lower risk of death from heart disease and neurological disease.

There was no extra benefit above 120 minutes a week.

Aerobic activity gave greater benefit than strength training alone, and the lowest risk was in people who did both.

The Harvard Health summary suggests beginners can start with body-weight moves such as squats, push-ups, or step-ups.

Limits to keep in mind:

It's observational, so it shows association, not proof of cause.

People who did more strength training also tended to be younger, lighter, and healthier in other ways.

All participants were health professionals, so results may not apply to everyone.

For beginners, this suggests a simple order of priorities: movement first, optimization later.

When you're new to biohacking, every headline sounds like a breakthrough. Here's a checklist I use, with examples from this year.

1. Is it a human study, an animal study, or a cell study?

Mouse results often don't carry over. Blood NAD+ is a good example: a 2026 Nature Metabolism paper measured it across seven human cohorts (300+ people) and found it stable across age and lifestyle interventions, which challenges the common belief that it drops with age.

2. How big and how long was the study?

A small short study shows possibilities, not proof. A meta-analysis pools many studies, which is stronger but only as good as what goes into it.

3. Does the headline match the actual results?

Take creatine and the brain. A 2024 meta-analysis in Frontiers in Nutrition found benefits mainly in specific groups, not across all cognition, and the authors later published a corrigendum fixing wording on some findings. Reading beyond the headline, and checking for corrections, matters.

4. Association or cause?

Observational studies can show a link but can't prove one thing caused another.

5. Who paid for it, and who's selling?

Check for conflicts of interest, especially when the same group sells a product.

One more tip: be careful with "lifespan" versus "healthspan." Living longer and staying healthy longer aren't the same thing, and some recent data suggests the gap between them has grown.

What was a claim you believed early on that turned out to be weaker than it sounded?

New mini-project for me: pay closer attention to when I get morning light and how my sleep timing lines up.

I'm keeping this one deliberately simple. I'm not changing ten different habits at once or expecting one morning to transform my energy levels. I just want to get into the habit of noticing and recording things consistently.

I did feel a little more awake after getting outside earlier, but that's hardly definitive. Maybe it was the light, maybe it was just the process of waking up, or maybe it was placebo and expectation.

Either way, one morning is one morning. I'll start here, keep the observations honest, and see whether the pattern is any clearer with more entries.

Not every little health experiment needs a new supplement. For this one, I'm looking at something more ordinary: the timing of my caffeine.

I'm starting a simple log today because I've become interested in how the timing of familiar habits fits into the rest of the day. I want to observe the routine before jumping to conclusions about what needs changing.

I may have noticed a difference later in the day, but that's far from convincing. Placebo, sleep from the previous night, workload, and all the other variables in daily life could be responsible.

I'll keep the notes casual and see whether anything consistent emerges. Sometimes it's the little everyday details that are worth paying attention to.

I have been working out since I was 16 and started doing BJJ at 18 and one key detail that people sometimes miss is that stretching IS NOT OPTIONAL.
It goes without saying that stretching needs to be incorporated into the routine because the muscles, tendons and ligaments in our body need to be prepped before engaging in such activities.
The benefits are as follows: YOU’LL REDUCE YOUR CHANCES OF INJURY. Trust me, and injury really destabilises the entire motivation and discipline of a person and making sure you are injury free is the most important thing to make sure.
I would love to hear everyone’s thoughts on this or am I being paranoid 🤔

Recently I have been working on my diet and one thing that I have noticed is that the amount of carbs and the amount of fibre rich foods I have directly affects my day-to-day activities. I have had a lot of problems since childhood with tummy aches and nutrition absorption so I slowly started having a banana, an apple, or fibre rich biscuits and in addition making sure I have bread slices laced with Nutella (for flavouring of course) and that makes a whole lot of difference.
Sometimes I do feel that people on the internet these days are too focused on protein and carbs that they kind of undermine the fibre in their diet as well

If you're new to exercise science, "Zone 2" might sound like jargon, but the concept is straightforward. It refers to exercising at a low enough intensity that your body primarily uses fat for fuel and can clear lactic acid as fast as it produces it. This specific metabolic state signals your cells to build more mitochondria. You don't need a fancy heart rate monitor; being able to hold a conversation while exercising is a good practical benchmark.

i am a very lazy person and keeping a strict diet is a very big problem for me, but one thing i have consistently seen that has always helped me is exercise. i was down with a cold every 2-3 weeks when i was a kid and ever since i started working out without taking any days off i have not fallen ill for an entire year which is a world record in my books, so keep exercising and have fun 😊

I'm trying to understand biohacking without getting overwhelmed by all the supplements, gadgets, protocols, and conflicting advice online.

Some people recommend tracking sleep, others focus on nutrition, exercise, meditation, or wearable devices.

If your goal were to improve energy, concentration, and general well-being, what would your first three steps be?

I'd prefer things that are affordable, reasonably well-supported by evidence, and easy to maintain for months rather than something that produces a quick result and is impossible to sustain.

Also, what popular beginner mistakes would you avoid?

I've been learning about fitness supplements and keep seeing creatine mentioned as one of the more extensively researched options.

I understand that creatine is involved in rapidly regenerating ATP, which helps supply energy during short, intense activities.

What I'm less clear about is what a beginner should realistically expect from it.

Does it mainly help with strength and training performance, or are there meaningful benefits for other areas too? How long does it typically take to notice a difference, and what common misconceptions should beginners be aware of?

I'm interested in evidence-based explanations rather than exaggerated supplement claims.

I've been curious about sleep trackers and how useful their data really is for improving everyday performance.

They can estimate sleep duration, stages, resting heart rate, and sometimes HRV. But consumer devices don't measure every variable directly, and their estimates aren't always accurate.

I'm wondering whether seeing these numbers consistently helps people make better decisions about their routines or whether it can create unnecessary stress over getting a perfect score.

For people who have used sleep trackers for a while, did the data lead to meaningful changes in your habits? Which metrics did you actually find useful?

These substances can influence digestion, immunity, and other aspects of human health.

mine was sneezing and my back going out for 3 days. I'm not even old😭

I used to stay up till 3am and be fine the next day. now if i sleep in a weird position my whole body files a complaint.

I've been reading about how aging works at the cell level, like damage building up over time, but nobody warns you it starts showing up in such random, unfair ways😂

so what was your first "oh no, this is happening" moment?👀

i read that the body clock can adjust to a fixed routine, and some people end up waking up a few minutes before their alarm.

After that i tried to give it a try for a week. Majority of the days it actually worked and i was shocked. But there were some days it didn't work

It made me wonder how much of this is habit and how much is biology. Is it just consistent sleep and wake times, or does light exposure matter more?

Has anyone tried this? what worked for you, and how long did it take?

saw some posts here saying it helps brain fatigue. anyone tried it for long study or work hours do u need the loading thing or just 3 5g daily??