Babies living with dogs had 90% lower odds of food allergy, MIT’s robot boats copy fire ants’ flood-survival trick, and forecasts suggest this El Niño could reach a record peak. Plus why waist-to-hip ratio can reveal heart risk that BMI misses. [DVYio Newsletter](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/BiWtBu8o) This Week I Learnt [Infographic shows a baby and dog, linking household microbes to immune training and 90% lower food-allergy odds.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/umH7fCNb) [Babies who grow up with dogs are 90% less likely to develop food allergies](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/umH7fCNb) [Researchers tracked 1,303 three-month-old infants in the EAT study (Enquiring About Tolerance), a UK trial originally designed to test ways of preventing food allergy. Among the 1,124 babies with complete data, 68 (6.1%) were later confirmed to have a food allergy using double-blind, placebo-controlled food challenges (the gold-standard test, where neither the clinician nor the family knows whether the child receives the suspected allergen or a placebo). After accounting for family history of allergic disease, the mother’s sensitivity to dogs and cats, and the baby’s eczema, living with a dog was associated with 90% lower odds of food allergy. None of the 49 infants living with two or more dogs developed a food allergy, and each additional dog was linked to lower odds. Cats showed no clear link, and neither dogs nor cats were associated with eczema. One possible explanation is the hygiene hypothesis: the dirt, microbes, and general mess a dog brings indoors might help train a baby’s immune system to distinguish harmless food proteins from genuine threats. That mechanism is plausible, not proven. This was a secondary analysis of an observational cohort, so it shows correlation rather than causation. It isn't evidence that families should get a dog to prevent food allergy.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/umH7fCNb) Tech [Small black aquatic robots mounted on white floating modules form a connected square structure in a water tank.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/6QX2Jyyr) [MIT’s robot boats copy how fire ants build flood-survival rafts](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/6QX2Jyyr) Fire ants survive floods by linking their own into rafts, and MIT borrowed exactly that for a swarm of dinner-plate-sized robot boats called FloatForm. Each 21cm-square bot has its own thrusters and magnetic latches, and in pool tests eight of them self-assembled into a rigid platform, split apart, rebuilt into a new shape, and drove off together as one vessel, without human help 70% of the time. [Chart of four NMR scaffold classes: chloropyridazines, maleimides, spiroketones, and α-silyl methanesulfonamides, with five compounds per class.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/cANzk3bU) [Anthropic says Claude Opus 4.7 beat NMR software on hydrogen peak prediction](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/cANzk3bU) Anthropic pitted three Claude models against the NMR software chemists already use (ChemDraw and MestReNova), predicting hydrogen and carbon peaks for 20 compounds pulled from preprints published after the models' training cutoff. Opus 4.7 came out most accurate on hydrogen (±0.079 ppm, well under the ±0.20 ppm tolerance chemists count as "correct") and tied with MestReNova on carbon, though Sonnet 4.6 badly missed one notoriously tricky proton, placing it at 10-13 ppm when it actually sits between 6.8 and 7.9. [Infographic contrasts human memory limits with AI’s large context window in solving a sum-of-cubes proof.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/nJH8AuFu) [Why AI's maths skills might be less about intelligence and more about not forgetting anything](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/nJH8AuFu) When AI solves a hard maths problem, it's tempting to call it a smarter machine. But it may just be a machine with a much bigger notepad: try multiplying two three-digit numbers in your head and you'll find the maths is easy, it's holding the partial results that trips you up, which is exactly why writing them down helps. An AI's context window works the same way, letting it keep the whole problem, every abandoned approach, and hundreds of intermediate steps written down at once, so it looks more brilliant partly because it isn't fighting the same working-memory limit that trips humans up. Poll If you had to design a warning understood worldwide, what would you rely on most? Colour A simple symbol A sound A gesture Last Week's Poll How much of the technology you use every day could you explain without looking it up? Most of it 28% The broad idea, not the mechanism 39% Only a few things 22% Almost none 11% Science [ECMWF map showing widespread record-warm sea-surface anomalies across the tropical Pacific, with a narrow cooler equatorial band.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/igbdzaVU) [Record westerly winds and a Kelvin wave more than 9 °C warmer than normal are pushing El Niño towards a possible record peak](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/igbdzaVU) The Super El Niño brewing in the Pacific keeps getting stronger: the latest forecasts now put it above every previous Super El Niño on record, driven by record westerly winds and a subsurface Kelvin wave running over 9°C (16°F) warmer than normal. That matters for autumn and winter 2026/2027, since past Super El Niño events have reliably pushed the jet stream into a pattern that brings a wetter, stormier southern US and milder conditions further north. [Two body silhouettes show different waist sizes, with cross-sections of abdominal fat surrounding organs and a heart between them.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/CngCkL3P) [Waist measurements can flag higher heart risk in some people with a “normal” BMI](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/CngCkL3P) Among people classed as “normal weight” by body mass index (BMI), 18% had a high waist-to-hip ratio and 5% had a high waist circumference. A study following more than 260,000 people for an average of 20 years linked those measurements to a 15% to 50% higher risk across most of nine cardiovascular outcomes, including heart attack, stroke, and heart failure. BMI does not show where fat is stored, while waist measurements capture central fat that is more strongly associated with disease. The study measured waists only once and did not account for diet, physical activity, or genetic obesity risk. [Labeled photos show an enclosed entangled-photon source in a tent and an outdoor sunlight-concentration apparatus.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/5e2Mw2Us) [Entangled photon pairs made from raw sunlight hit 94% fidelity, hinting at laser-free quantum encryption](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/5e2Mw2Us) Entangled photon sources normally use precise, power-hungry lasers. Researchers at the University of Ottawa and the Max Planck Institute concentrated sunlight through a Fresnel lens into a crystal and produced photon pairs with nearly 94% fidelity to a perfectly entangled state. Sunlight is an awkward source because it arrives across many wavelengths and directions, but the experiment showed that its incoherence does not prevent polarisation entanglement. A brighter, more practical version might eventually generate quantum-encryption keys on satellites using sunlight already available in orbit, but that remains far from deployment. [Hands twist a small green 3D-printed container with a white cap and a visible circular symbol on its side.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/5K5CE6Yj) [MIT’s ShiftLens makes 3D-printed objects change appearance without electronics](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/5K5CE6Yj) MIT’s ShiftLens system can 3D-print objects whose surfaces change when they are pressed, slid, or turned. One prototype is a chemical bottle that shows a green tick when its cap is tight and a red exclamation mark when it is loose. The display uses two surface layers: tiny curved lenses over a patterned backplane. As the layers shift, the lenses reveal a different image. Because the mechanism is mechanical, it avoids the fragile electronics that water, chemicals, or rough handling can damage. [A matte-black gabled building meets a white gabled house, with lit windows and a narrow passage between them.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [A woman in a light dress sits on a bench in a dark, textured courtyard framed by walls and an open sky, with a tree beyond.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [Minimalist bedroom with a large bed, olive-green textured blanket, patterned pillows, pendant lights, and sheer curtains.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [A matte-black gabled building with skylights sits beside traditional tiled-roof houses, trees, and distant apartment towers.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [Bright café-library interior with a coffee counter, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, lounge seating, and a Heart Fields sign.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [Warmly lit bookstore interior with floor-to-ceiling wooden shelves, a large ceiling skylight, tables, chairs, and a blurred person.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [Aerial view of a matte-black gabled building among traditional gray-tiled village houses and trees.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [Heart Fields](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) [Suzhou, China](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/R5Wb9K3q) Data [Bar chart of household air-conditioning rates: Japan 93%, US 90%, China 79%, Southeast Asia 29%, Europe 23%, India 16%.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/yAacoPrt) [Air conditioning is in 93% of Japanese homes and 90% of US homes, but only 23% in Europe and 16% in India](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/yAacoPrt) [International Energy Agency estimates for 2025 put air conditioning in 93% of Japanese households and 90% of US households, compared with 79% in China, 29% in Southeast Asia, 23% in Europe, and 16% in India. The gaps have different causes. In India and much of Southeast Asia, the main barrier is cost: both the unit and the electricity remain out of reach for many households. In Europe, the barrier has been more historical and cultural. Air conditioning was not treated as essential when heatwaves were rarer and milder, but that is changing as the planet warms.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/yAacoPrt) History [Infographic showing potatoes and buttermilk supplying nutrients, while a potato-only diet is linked to vitamin deficiencies.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/nzKdDjeF) [Pre-famine Irish peasants lived almost entirely on potatoes, washed down with buttermilk to fill the vitamin gaps](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/nzKdDjeF) [In 1845, somewhere between a third and a half of Ireland's 8 million people were living almost entirely on potatoes, with an adult man getting through 5 to 6 kg (12 to 14 lb) of them a day. Scurvy was rare: fresh potatoes carry about 30 mg of vitamin C per 100 g, roughly citrus-fruit territory, so a potato-heavy diet isn't the scurvy risk you'd assume. (Scurvy only exploded into an epidemic after the 1845 blight wiped the crop out, once people's vitamin C reserves had quietly drained over the following four to five months with nothing to replace them.) The real trick wasn't the potato, though, it was what the Irish drank with it. Most washed their potatoes down with milk or buttermilk, which supplied the vitamin B12, calcium, and vitamin A that potatoes lack entirely (B12 isn't made by plants at all, and its absence can eventually cause anaemia and nerve damage). Nutrition historians rate potato-and-buttermilk as genuinely adequate as a long-term diet, which is exactly why it sustained so much of the population for so long. It's also why Mark Watney's potato farming in The Martian would eventually catch up with him: NASA and the International Potato Center have actually tested growing spuds in Mars-like soil, and around 40% of varieties sprouted, so the crop itself isn't far-fetched. But without the vitamin A, B12, and calcium that buttermilk was quietly providing the Irish, a Mars colonist living on potatoes alone would be counting down to night blindness, weakening bones, and worse.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/nzKdDjeF) [Anamnesis timeline page titled “Twelve ages of medicine,” showing the first era, Egypt and Mesopotamia, circa 3000–400 BCE, with an ancient Egyptian physician statue.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/hjmsLpUm) [The history of medicine, era by era](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/hjmsLpUm) Dr Talal Warsi’s Anamnesis maps 4,000 years of medicine as a scrollable timeline: 12 eras from ancient Egypt to the present, plus a clearly labelled projection of a thirteenth. It covers 53 physicians and their discoveries, checked against sources including Encyclopaedia Britannica, PubMed Central, and the James Lind Library. The site is unusually candid about its gaps (Africa beyond Egypt, Japan, Korea, and most of nursing and midwifery are largely missing). It is a work of synthesis rather than a peer-reviewed history, and it keeps genuine disputes visible, including whether the 1948 streptomycin study was really the first randomised controlled trial. Design [A cantilevered chair formed from a single continuous strip of brushed metal, with a curved backrest and open base.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/irXvbsMY) [ZERO Chair by Davide Bozzo](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/irXvbsMY) [Davide Bozzo’s ZERO Chair is bent from a single ribbon of metal, with no welds, bolts, or separate legs. The base, seat, and backrest are one piece folded into three jobs. Think of paperclip logic at furniture scale: one continuous bend carries the structure, while the cantilevered seat hangs over an open rectangle of empty space. The void is doing almost as much visual work as the metal.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/irXvbsMY) [Infographic explaining IKEA names: Swedish words of 4–12 letters, with sofas named for places, bookshelves for men, and kids’ products for animals.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/L4LtVk9G) [How does IKEA come up with names for its products?](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/L4LtVk9G) IKEA names around 2,000 to 3,000 new products each year. Every name must be a real Swedish word, contain 4 to 12 letters, and preferably include Å, Ä, or Ö. The apparent nonsense follows a category system: sofas get Swedish place names, bookshelves get men’s names, and children’s products get animals and nature. Founder Ingvar Kamprad started naming products because he struggled to remember numbers. Random [Four views of overlapping laser-cut wooden slatted panels, showing moiré patterns changing as the panels shift.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/iNiVzuFY) [How overlapping grids steer ships through narrow channels](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/iNiVzuFY) [The blogger mechatronicsguy laser-cut two striped panels to recreate an Inogon navigation light. The overlapping grids produce a moiré pattern (the moving bands you see when two fine patterns sit on top of each other). Viewed from a ship, the bands shift when the vessel drifts off the intended line, showing which way to steer. His model worked, but he preferred a simpler three-lamp system he had seen in Newcastle. The lamps mark a safe corridor rather than one perfect line, so they warn the pilot only when the ship nears the edge. The moiré version may make more sense when the target really is narrow, such as keeping anchors away from a submarine cable.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/iNiVzuFY) [Grayscale scan of a harbor with tall cargo cranes, reflected in the water, overlaid with “flaming spork transportations.”](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/xtfgTCkv) [Using the railway network as a flatbed scanner](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/xtfgTCkv) Philo turned a roughly $70 industrial camera made for conveyor belts into a train-window scanner. Its sensor can read a single line of 2,048 pixels almost 19,000 times a second; software then selects and stitches those lines into one very long image. A ferry trip from San Francisco to Oakland produced a 56,894 x 2,048-pixel panorama. Early sofa tests, made with a phone on a wobbly office chair, came out squashed and warped because even small changes in motion distort the whole scan. In practice, the finished camera captured around 4,000 lines a second, still more than the final images needed. [A stethoscope rests against a wooden puzzle map of the United States, with one central piece missing.](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/qyWeLBg6) [Yale researchers say the US already spends enough for universal coverage, it's just allocated incorrectly](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/qyWeLBg6) A Yale School of Public Health preprint models a Medicare-for-All-style system using 2024 spending, coverage, and mortality data. It projects annual health spending would fall by $1.04 trillion (nearly 20%) while universal coverage alone would avert about 62,000 deaths. Reversing other coverage rollbacks enacted since 2025 raises the modelled total to 114,000. The projected savings come from lower drug prices, Medicare-level provider payments, less administration and fraudulent billing, and fewer avoidable emergency visits. The authors say the US already spends enough to cover everyone, but the model does not include transition costs, administrative job losses, or how providers might respond to lower payment rates. [“The formulation of a problem is often more essential than its solution.”](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/LkRVB3Vo) [Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/LkRVB3Vo) [Web](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/snmHLWap) · [Twitter](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/mCYD3cCr) · [LinkedIn](https://newsletter.dvy.io/visit/pxAWek7f)