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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح

@samahrahim.bsky.social
114 followers 287 following 19 posts

PhD student in the Language and Cognition lab at Stanford. Studying how children learn word meanings and construct categories. samahabdelrahim.github.io

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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Open Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science bot @oecs-bot.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The brain is not a static organ, but a dynamic system that physically rewires its own circuitry in response to learning, injury, and environmental… Neuroplasticity by Marina Bedny doi.org/10.21428/e2759450.3d4df41d #CognitiveScience
Open Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science: "Neuroplasticity" by Marina Bedny. Neuroplasticity is the capacity of the brain to change as a result of external influence and internal activity. It underpins learning from the environment, from others and from our own thoughts. Neuro
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Cambridge University Press - Linguistics @cambup-linguistics.cambridge.org · 22/09/2026
💡 Do you have expertise in the scientific study of language behaviour in children? The Journal of Child Language is seeking Associate Editors to join its editorial team. Help shape the strategic direction and editorial policy of a key publication in the field. Learn more: cup.org/4ysu5vX
Announcement for the "Journal of Child Language" seeking applications for Associate Editors. Application deadline is 15 October 2026. The text appears on a purple background with a geometric pattern on the right side.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
NBER @nber.org · 12/09/2026
When experts know more than their evidence proves, verifiability trades credibility for flexibility: it aids communication under conflict but hinders it under aligned preferences, from Alessandro Lizzeri, Yichuan Lou, and Jacopo Perego www.nber.org/papers/w35712
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
samahrahim.medium.com/abraham-fire...
samahrahim.medium.com
Abraham, fire, and Bayesian inference
In the books, and by books I mean arguably divine books like the Quran and post-biblical interpretations, a story about the…
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
“Universities try to show that they embrace diversity. But they often do not give Black academics the space to simply be ordinary scholars, to make mistakes and get things right, to stumble and grow. Instead, these institutions push them to become living monuments, walking ones. .. “
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
"The bullet that kills you, you never hear." A man went out for water on 8 August 2023 and spent the day sheltering from shells in a stranger's house, drinking tea. At the end, he wanted a handful of ful. Mohamed Hamed Nawwar wrote this. I only translated. samahrahim.medium.com/a-handful-of...
samahrahim.medium.com
A Handful of “Ful”: One Day in Omdurman
This is not my story. It belongs to Mohamed Hamed Jumaa Nawwar, a Sudanese writer who stayed in Abbasiya, Omdurman, while it was under RSF…
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Mike Frank @mcxfrank.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
If you’re at #cogsci2026, please come see presentations by some of the great folks collaborating with the Language and Cognition Lab at Stanford!
LangCog lab talks and posters at cogsci2026
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
stanfordbrain.bsky.social @stanfordbrain.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Meet Husna Ayoubi, a 2026 NeURO Fellow! In the Gwilliams @lauragwilliams.bsky.social Speech Neuroscience Lab, Husna researches how the brain processes written language using advanced neuroimaging techniques. A Psychology major @stanford.edu, she's drawn to neuroscience, language, & brain function.
Husna Ayoubi, 2026 NeURO Fellow
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Manuel Bohn @elmanubohn.bsky.social · 27/06/2026
We updated our – free, open source, Rasch-compliant – receptive vocabulary test (oREV) to also include verbs. If you are looking for a task to measure vocabulary/language in German with children 3-8, look no further! Paper: osf.io/preprints/ps... Task: devpsy.web.leuphana.de/orev-vn/
devpsy.web.leuphana.de
oREV-VN
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
1st published paper alert ⚠️ in which @mcxfrank.bsky.social and I ask: How robust is the “shape bias”? a phenomenon that has been central to theories of early word learning: If a child hears a new word for an object, they often extend it to other objects with the same shape. tinyurl.com/JCL-shapebias
cambridge.org
Examining the Robustness and Generalizability of the Shape Bias: A Meta-Analysis | Journal of Child Language | Cambridge Core
Examining the Robustness and Generalizability of the Shape Bias: A Meta-Analysis
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 23/06/2026
I had just started in a new country, language, and field when I entered his language development class. With 0 background before it, I left wanting a lifelong career in it. I will always remember a brilliant scientist, an inspiring teacher, and a kind human. www.tc.columbia.edu/articles/202...
tc.columbia.edu
In Memoriam: Peter Gordon
Gordon, Associate Professor of Neuroscience and Education died on June 7 at the age of 69
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
MIT Press @mitpress.bsky.social · 14/06/2026
"No human musician could stay in time counting as slowly as these whales do."
thereader.mitpress.mit.edu
The Cold War’s Accidental Whale Observatory
Built to track enemy submarines, the Navy’s underwater listening network inadvertently revealed that whales may be singing across entire oceans.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Nico Dosenbach @ndosenbach.bsky.social · 14/06/2026
We've known that socioeconomics (SES) matters for the 🧠. New & 🤯 is that SES drowns out all other brain associations, incl. IQ. If you train an algorithm to predict IQ from brain data, it's still way better at predicting SES. Science Mag: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... @smarek0502.bsky.social 👀🧵👇
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Nature Portfolio @natureportfolio.nature.com · 25/05/2026
Nature spoke to a variety of scientists, from highly adept coders to complete beginners, who are using AI to stretch the limits of the coding they can do. Many use AI-assisted coding in their work, and some are intentionally testing its limits. #Academicsky 🧪
go.nature.com
How to vibe code in science: early adopters share their tips
Using AI coding tools can speed up your work, but there are plenty of pitfalls.
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 25/05/2026
I just published A leap of faith, and evidence? medium.com/p/a-leap-of-...
medium.com
A leap of faith, and evidence?
A believing scientist
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Sam Gershman @gershbrain.bsky.social · 22/05/2026
I totally agree, science is not a simple optimization problem, or at least not in the form conceived by most existing systems. @battleday.bsky.social and I wrote about this recently from a somewhat different perspective (emphasizing the 'problem problem'): gershmanlab.com/pubs/Battled...
gershmanlab.com
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Thomas Yeo @bttyeo.bsky.social · 22/05/2026
(1/5) The paired (sign-flip) permutation test fails under cross-validation. The swap procedure assumes fold-averaged statistics are exchangeable under the null — but they're positively correlated, not independent. The result: inflated FPR. Slide explains the mechanics. 2/N
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Mike Frank @mcxfrank.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
Just wrote a new blogpost trying to summarize my thoughts on the question of how and whether to use AI for research in psychology and cognitive science: babieslearninglanguage.blogspot.com/2026/04/usin...
babieslearninglanguage.blogspot.com
Using AI to improve (not automate away) academic research
Blog about fatherhood, langauge, developmental psychology, and cognitive science.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Judy Fan @judithfan.bsky.social · 08/04/2026
The Cognitive Tools Lab at Stanford (cogtoolslab.github.io) is recruiting two new research staff members to join in AY 26-27. Full-Time Lab Manager: forms.gle/UVwfx5wbY9Km.... IRiSS Predoc Researcher: iriss.stanford.edu/predoc/2026-.... Please share widely in your networks, thank you!!
cogtoolslab.github.io
about the lab – cognitive tools lab
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Nature Portfolio @natureportfolio.nature.com · 09/04/2026
In a Working Scientist profile, conservation researcher Anne Poelina speaks with Nature Careers about giving first authorship to a source with deep knowledge about water, the river itself. 🌍 🧪
go.nature.com
Why I made a river my co-author
Anne Poelina gives first authorship to a source with deep knowledge about water — the river itself.
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 08/04/2026
I just published Allah/God: Why is he a ‘he’? medium.com/p/allah-god-...
medium.com
Allah/God: Why is he a “he”?
“All praise to him,” I was talking to a friend who was confused about what to feel about non-muslims using the word “Allah” to refer to…
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Many Minds podcast @manymindspod.bsky.social · 07/04/2026
Many of us are worried about AI. Many are also interested in what it can tell us about the human mind. Can we separate out our concerns and our scientific curiosity? A topic discussed in our latest episode, w/ @glupyan.bsky.social & @mcxfrank.bsky.social! Listen: disi.org/what-can-ai-...
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Science Magazine @science.org · 07/04/2026
"… higher education must develop students into fluent, intelligent, and ethical users of #AI and work to ensure that the benefits of AI reach broadly across communities," writes Marie Lynn Miranda in a new #ScienceEditorial. scim.ag/4dvOxot
"The greater risk is not that AI will eliminate jobs, but that its benefits will … accrue unevenly." Marie Lynn Miranda, University of Illinois Chicago
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
open.substack.com/pub/thisweek...
open.substack.com
Five Trends that will Shape Urban Africa in 2026
Uncovering the politics of African urbanization
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Can i add, having a very informal 1-1 chat with Barbara Tversky that lasted for 2 hours, to my CV?
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Rodrigo Braga @rodbraga.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
Full thread above, but in summary: When we imagine we re-activate brain regions used during perception, an idea called "sensory reinstatement". However, our results suggest this overlap is actually in transmodal association networks, not sensory areas. Perception culminates in transmodal networks
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Mike Le Pelley @mikelepelley.bsky.social · 22/10/2025
Media release at www.unsw.edu.au/newsroom/new...
unsw.edu.au
Brainwave study sheds light on cause of ‘hearing voices’
A study of the way people process inner and outer speech is the first tangible evidence of a key theory about schizophrenia’s drivers.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Mark Haselgrove @markhaselgrove.bsky.social · 07/12/2025
I agree. For me, at first, Academia was very much an identity and a calling. Years later, after some experience of terrible university management, it is "a job". Some other reflections (which turned out to be about workload management, and ways of working)
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Steve Rathje @steverathje.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
As Andy thoughtfully explains, certain technologies may be new, but our psychology isn't, and decades of psychology research can be used to explain questions like what goes viral online and why people enjoy sycophantic chatbots.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Julie Cachia @juliecachia.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
Honored to give the opening plenary @affectscience.bsky.social this year on AI & mental health! I shared what we’re learning at Flourish Science about bridging the gap between science and the real world. SAS has been my favorite conference since grad school, so this was especially meaningful ❤️
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Anna (Anya) Ivanova @neuranna.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
Language, Intelligence & Thought lab is looking for a lab manager! This is a 2-year postbac position that will allow you to gain experience in human neuroscience, cognitive science, and AI research prior to applying to PhD programs. Express interest here: forms.gle/npXEGUjGUbp5...
forms.gle
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Lucre Snooker @lucresnooker.bsky.social · 25/02/2026
"Western listeners usually find music in major keys happy and in minor keys sad. By contrast, Papua New Guinean listeners felt no difference in happiness between major and minor keys, and Pakistani listeners found minor keys happier than major ones" www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
Music is not a universal language — but it can bring us together when words fail
Societies, animals and even machines have music in common. Our varied experiences of it might tell us about the origins of language.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Simon Fisher @profsimonfisher.bsky.social · 27/02/2026
“Understanding deep evolutionary origins of music & language requires inclusive & equitable collaborations across cultures & disciplines, weaving together Indigenous knowledge & the humanities with natural & social sciences.” Informative engaging essay by @patrickesavage.bsky.social in @nature.com.🧪
nature.com
Music is not a universal language — but it can bring us together when words fail
Societies, animals and even machines have music in common. Our varied experiences of it might tell us about the origins of language.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
PsyArXivBot @psyarxivbot.bsky.social · 28/02/2026
Beyond Self Worth: Social Worth as a Foundation of Subjective Well-being in Sub-Saharan Africa: osf.io/k8hwg
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Toni Klemm @toniklemm.bsky.social · 25/02/2026
👩🏾‍🔬🐝🌌 Want to write popular science articles about your research for small-town newspapers in the U.S. to boost trust in science and support science literacy? Science Homecoming @sciencehomecoming.bsky.social has the information, tools, and volunteers to help you. www.sciencehomecoming.com
sciencehomecoming.com
Science Homecoming
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Laura Simone Lewis @laurasimonelewis.bsky.social · 25/02/2026
New article out exploring great ape name recognition! We find partial evidence that zoo-living chimps & bonobos know each other's names 👀 Huge thanks to Animal Behavior and Cognition (a great open-access journal) & co-authors for your collaboration!🎉🐵 unsvr1.com/web/abc/work...
unsvr1.com
Do Great Apes Know Each Other's Names? Probing Great Ape Comprehension of Social Vocal Labels — Animal Behavior and Cognition
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Mike Frank @mcxfrank.bsky.social · 16/02/2026
New blogpost about a teaching experiment I'm doing this quarter: a "socratic tutor" bot to help students gain understanding of specific reading assignments. babieslearninglanguage.blogspot.com/2026/02/an-l...
babieslearninglanguage.blogspot.com
An LLM-backed "socratic tutor" to replace reading responses
Blog about fatherhood, langauge, developmental psychology, and cognitive science.
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Jewelia Yao @jeweliayao.bsky.social · 20/02/2026
Check it out🧠
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Trends in Cognitive Sciences @cp-trendscognsci.bsky.social · 18/02/2026
Online Now: Reminders that chatbots are not human can be risky
dlvr.it
Reminders that chatbots are not human can be risky
Concerns about mental and physical health harms from chatbots are prompting policies mandating ongoing reminders that chatbots are not human. While well-intended, evidence suggests that reminders may be either ineffective or harmful to users. Discovering how to best remind people that chatbots are not human is a critical research priority.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Nature Portfolio @natureportfolio.nature.com · 19/02/2026
A Nature Astronomy paper shows that Earth lies within a narrow “Goldilocks zone” that allows both nitrogen and phosphorus to be present with the right abundances in the mantle. More oxidized or reduced exoplanets may lock these elements in their cores, limiting habitability. 🔭 🧪
go.nature.com
The chemical habitability of Earth and rocky planets prescribed by core formation - Nature Astronomy
A narrow ‘Goldilocks zone’ of oxidation levels during exoplanetary core formation allows both nitrogen and phosphorus to remain in the mantle. Earth lies within this zone, but more oxidized or reduced exoplanets may lock these elements in their cores, limiting habitability.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Jamie Reilly 🦜 @reilly-coglab.com · 01/02/2026
2026 big update to the psycholinguistic database page! If you know of corpora, lexical databases, or other resources that I've missed, please LMK. Trying to keep this thing relatively current and could use the help www.reilly-coglab.com/data
reilly-coglab.com
Psycholinguistic Databases, Stimuli, Utilities — Concepts & Cognition Laboratory
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Mike Frank @mcxfrank.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
I always thought preschoolers were too egocentric to do well on communication tasks where they had to talk about novel referents. Old papers reported they'd say stuff like "this one looks like my uncle's hat." @vboyce.bsky.social shows that this is wrong! osf.io/preprints/ps...
Abstract of the paperFigure 1 - experimental setupFigure 2 - accuracy over timeFigure 3 - semantic similarity within/across games
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Association for Psychological Science @psychscience.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
Learn how to teach students that confidence is not equivalent to accuracy with a new Teaching Current Directions #Teaching #AI #cogpsyc
psychologicalscience.org
Teaching Metacognition in Humans Versus Artificial Intelligence
Teaching: Use this lesson plan to demonstrate to students that confidence is not equivalent to accuracy.
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Earth Species Project (ESP) @earthspecies.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
We’ve proven machines can learn to use language, but it took brute force to get there. Meanwhile, animal communication evolved over millions of years under real-world constraints, shaping systems that are adaptable and efficient. What can #AI learn from nature? 🧠 Read more: bit.ly/ai-biomimicry
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Simon Fisher @profsimonfisher.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
“Our findings suggest the capacity to form secondary representations of pretend objects is within the cognitive potential of, at least, an enculturated ape & likely dates back 6-9 million years, to our common evolutionary ancestors.” Amalia Bastos & @chriskrupenye.bsky.social today in @science.org.🧪
science.org
Evidence for representation of pretend objects by Kanzi, a language-trained bonobo
Secondary representations enable our minds to depart from the here-and-now and generate imaginary, hypothetical, or alternate possibilities that are decoupled from reality, supporting many of our rich...
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Sasha Winkler @sashawinkler.bsky.social · 06/02/2026
Great apes may use playful teasing to learn about their social relationships. In a new paper, Erica Cartmill & I propose a bond-testing hypothesis for ape teasing. Out today in Phil Trans Biology: royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/article...
royalsocietypublishing.org
Does playful teasing help great apes learn about social relationships?
Abstract. Understanding social relationships is critical to succeeding in primate societies. In species with complex social networks (including humans), co
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Samah Abdelrahim | سماح @samahrahim.bsky.social · 04/02/2026
Could sometimes be a lack of understanding of what science is or how it works rather than a conscious anti science stance. Although it does lead to the same outcome at the end.
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Reposted by Samah Abdelrahim | سماح
Roddy Grieves @roddy-grieves.bsky.social · 13/11/2025
Publication bias is bad, sure. But has anyone studied publication bias in studies on publication bias? (They have. There isn’t.) doi.org/10.1136/bmj.... Next up: publication bias in studies on studies on studies of publication bias. #AcademicHumor #metascience #nerdhumor
doi.org
Systematic review of publication bias in studies on publication bias
Publication bias is a well known phenomenon in clinical literature,1 2 in which positive results have a better chance of being published, are published earlier, and are published in journals with high...
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Felix Riede @felixthehauskat.bsky.social · 15/12/2025
Hey @andrameneganzin.bsky.social, this is such a great paper on why defining, capturing, and (most of all) analyzing the emergence of 'behavioural modernity' still is such an important topic link.springer.com/article/10.1.... Congrats.
link.springer.com
The Fate of Behavioral Modernity - Biological Theory
Biological Theory - Over the past twenty years, empirical and theoretical advances have significantly reshaped the research agenda on “behavioral modernity” and its conceptualization....
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Nature Communications @natcomms.nature.com · 23/01/2026
The urgent need for African research collaboration on medicine quality " #Africa cannot regulate what it cannot see, and it cannot see what it has not studied" @sociologyoxford.bsky.social #Health #PublicHealth
dlvr.it
The urgent need for African research collaboration on medicine quality - Nature Communications
Substandard and falsified medicines are a global health threat. The fight against them is a regulatory and research challenge; here, the authors argue the importance of global and regional oversight, monitoring of, and research into the extent of the issue.
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