Between Saturdays

This week: Autoimmunity’s gender gap, green tea’s long game, a custom cancer vaccine, and why your brain won’t stop scrolling.

May 10, 2025

Some weeks, the research reads like a medical journal. Others? Like a warning label for modern life. This week, it’s a little of both.

From a Stanford study explaining why women are so often struck by autoimmune diseases, to a 20-year investigation into the brain-protective power of green tea, to a personalized cancer vaccine — the findings span the full spectrum of health, healing, and human design.

Also: a quiet nod to the mental toll of scrolling through doom in the name of “staying informed.” (Spoiler: your brain means well, but it’s not helping.)

As always, this roundup skips the jargon and gets to what matters — the small things quietly shaping how we live, parent, and process the world around us.

Caught My Eye…

Women Bear the Brunt of Autoimmune Illnesses
It’s long been observed that women disproportionately suffer from autoimmune diseases, but until recently, the “why” remained frustratingly vague — often chalked up to hormones or stress. A new study out of Stanford Medicine offers a much more compelling explanation.

Researchers identified a gene-regulating molecule called VGLL3 that appears to be significantly more active in women’s immune cells. This molecule acts like a genetic switchboard, dialing up immune responses in ways that, while useful against infections, can tip into autoimmunity when left unchecked.

In short, VGLL3 programs immune cells to overreact to relatively benign triggers, turning mild environmental or cellular stress into chronic inflammation and tissue attack. It's not just one disease, either — VGLL3 has been linked to conditions ranging from lupus to rheumatoid arthritis to systemic sclerosis.

Interestingly, this gene regulation isn’t limited to reproductive age — meaning estrogen alone doesn’t account for the disparity. The study suggests that women’s immune systems are genetically primed to be more vigilant, which may have offered evolutionary protection against infections — but at a high modern cost.

As one of the authors put it:

This isn’t a bug in the system. It’s a feature — one that’s become miscalibrated.

A Personalized Vaccine for Pancreatic Cancer
At Birmingham’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital, a new clinical trial is underway that may represent one of the most promising developments yet in pancreatic cancer treatment. The study is evaluating a personalized mRNA vaccine—autogene cevumeran—designed to prevent the recurrence of pancreatic cancer after tumor removal.

Developed by BioNTech and Genentech, this vaccine is tailored to each patient. After surgery, a patient’s tumor is analyzed to identify up to 20 unique neoantigens—mutated proteins found only in cancer cells. Using mRNA technology, these are encoded into a custom vaccine, effectively training the patient’s immune system to detect and destroy any lingering cancer cells.

In an earlier Phase I trial of 16 patients, the vaccine was administered alongside immunotherapy (atezolizumab) and chemotherapy. Half of the participants developed a robust T-cell response specific to their tumors. More importantly, those who responded had a longer recurrence-free survival, and the vaccine-induced T cells remained detectable in the bloodstream for up to three years—a sign of lasting immunity.

Now in a larger global Phase II trial, the vaccine is being tested in combination with chemotherapy, compared to chemotherapy alone. The Queen Elizabeth Hospital is the first site in Europe to begin patient recruitment.

As Dr. Chris Macdonald of Pancreatic Cancer UK put it:

Finally, there is hope on the horizon. If this research proves successful, the vaccine could be a vital new weapon against the deadliest common cancer.

Green Tea and Healthy Aging: A 20-Year Study
A 2025 study published in Frontiers in Public Health followed 280 middle-aged and older men to explore how long-term green tea consumption influences mental and physical health. The findings were both wide-ranging and striking.

Participants who drank at least one cup of green tea daily, six or more days a week for over 20 years, showed significantly lower levels of depression and insomnia, alongside longer sleep durations—a pattern suggesting meaningful improvements in sleep quality and emotional wellbeing.

Physiologically, the tea-drinking group also had a lower Systemic Immune Inflammation Index (SII), indicating reduced systemic inflammation. They exhibited higher testosterone levels, which the researchers linked to better mood, energy, and overall vitality.

Neuroimaging results revealed another layer: these individuals had greater gray matter volume in regions of the brain associated with memory and emotional regulation—specifically, the left medial occipito-temporal and parahippocampal gyrus.

Finally, regular tea drinkers had a lower Body Mass Index (BMI), pointing to potential benefits for long-term metabolic and weight health.

The study’s modeling suggests that the mental health benefits of green tea—particularly the reductions in depression—were largely mediated by two key mechanisms: improved sleep and decreased inflammation.

In short: a daily cup of green tea may be doing much more than quenching thirst—it may be quietly supporting brain structure, hormonal health, emotional balance, and aging itself.

Why We Can’t Stop Doomscrolling
We all know doomscrolling feels terrible — so why do we keep doing it? A recent piece in Psychology Today explores the psychology behind our late-night news binges and unsettling digital loops. One key insight: our brains treat negative information as potentially useful, so we keep scrolling in a misguided attempt to feel safer or more in control.

Even worse? That constant stream of bad news creates what psychologists call “learned helplessness” — the feeling that everything is awful and there’s nothing we can do about it. That sense of paralysis makes us even more likely to keep scrolling.

The article suggests breaking the cycle by: