Remember the Day — news feed beginning 2026-09-21

On September 21, NIH unveiled five initiatives to build human-based biomedical research. Animal models remain important; NIH aims to reduce their use when feasible, not declare them obsolete.

The package includes $88 million for 10 construction projects in nine states, a challenge offering more than $7 million for prototype sensing tools, and a planned laboratory combining organoids, robotics, AI and data.

NIH also asked whether annual public counts of live vertebrate animals in its funded labs are feasible and recruited reviewers expert in human-based methods. The infrastructure was announced; its future predictive performance remains to be tested.

A weekend sampler begins with two tiny surprises: researchers reported a possible chemical identity card in cat urine, while another team demonstrated a computer whose DNA molecules calculate inside a drop of water.

Gravity still refuses to yield one perfectly agreed number after a decade-long measurement, while World Cleanup Day turned one global observance into thousands of local acts on September 20.

Southampton made litter picking into a team sport called Spogomi. Elsewhere, a retired British couple showed the quieter teamwork of fostering 59 dogs for stays ranging from nights to months.

Buenos Aires welcomed a major Frida Kahlo exhibition, and Dublin Fringe crowned a spoken-word Gretel retelling that moved its fairy tale into a concrete jungle.

Portland families built paper snails, seed shares and fairy houses, while a village in Aberdeenshire ended its food-and-music weekend with folk singer Ellie Beaton.