While the world’s attention has been focused on the US midterm elections, exciting strides in various fields continue to be made, including new solutions for ocean clean-up, the battle against endometriosis, bipolar disorder and sugar consumption.
The much-publicised prediction market, Polymarket and Kalshi, were set up to allow people to gamble on political outcomes, and this year’s US elections have demonstrated the power of these tools in bringing truth to the fore in a chaotic information environment.
Meanwhile, a new French start-up Alcediag, is using RNA biomarkers to identify bipolar disorder in weeks, rather than the usual 7-10 years, although critics cite flaws in the testing methodology.
Also featured in this week’s Dose of Optimism is Ulysses, an organisation building autonomous drones to clean the oceans, identifying neuroimmune communication as a way of easing the pain of endometriosis and stunning images of Jupiter, sent back to Earth by NASA’s Juno spacecraft.
