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Five real advances in science, medicine, technology, and the environment, each verified against the original reporting. In this episode: The SunZia project, a 3,650-MW wind project with 550-mile HVDC transmission line, is fully operational and; Music therapy at NIMHANS helped a stroke patient regain functional speech and coordination, costing $42 USD; A UNC Chapel Hill study of 1,100+ young adults found that social media messages featuring relatable peers; Crushed concrete from nuclear sites removed 82% of strontium-90 from solution in air-exposed conditions; Soil pH below 7.0 regulates symbiotic bacteria (Burkholderia) acquisition in rice stink bugs, with.
Five Things Going Right is a daily five-minute podcast covering real, verifiable progress in science, medicine, technology, and the environment. Every weekday, hosts Grace and Josh walk through five stories that actually happened, each checked against the original reporting from sources like the WHO, the IEA, Nature, and university research. A calm, fact-grounded start to your day. New episodes every weekday morning.
Welcome, this is 5 Things Going Right, the news that's actually good. Five stories. Five minutes. All of them true. Hi, I'm Grace. And I'm Josh. Let's dive into today's roundup of progress with 5 Things Going Right for Friday, June 26, 2026. First up, the SunZia project is now fully operational. It's being called the largest renewable energy infrastructure project in U.S. history. That's right. It combines a massive 3,650-megawatt wind project with a 550-mile high-voltage direct current transmission line. It's expected to power the western United States for the next 30 years. They're saying it could generate more power than the Hoover Dam, but of course, that depends on various factors like SunZia's capacity and regional wind patterns. Exactly. And the Hoover Dam's output has been declining due to drought, averaging around 4,200 gigawatt hours per year. Moving on to a fascinating case of music therapy. At NIMHAN in Bengaluru, a 53-year-old man named Naresh Chandog used music to regain speech after a stroke in 2023. He started with simple beats and rhythms, even using a smartphone app for tapping exercises. Interestingly, he found he could sing sentences more fluently than speaking them. And the cost? Just about 42 U.S. dollars for a course of 20 sessions. But it's important to note this is a single patient case without quantified outcomes or comparisons to standard rehabilitation. Now onto social media's impact on youth loneliness. A study from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill explored this. Published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, it tested if social media messages could encourage in-person connections among over 1,100 young adults. Messages featuring relatable peers were more effective than control content in sparking interest in face-to-face interactions. However, the study only measured intentions to engage in person, not whether participants actually followed through. Let's talk about some interesting research on concrete and strontium-90. Researchers from the University of Manchester and others looked into this. They found that crushed concrete from legacy nuclear facilities can remove 82% of strontium-90 from solution within three months in air-exposed conditions. This was done using synthetic groundwater in controlled lab conditions, and it's yet to be tested at actual nuclear sites over longer periods. Finally, researchers have discovered a link between soil pH and rice stink bugs. This study involved AIST, the University of the Ryukyus, and the University of Electrocommunications. They found that soil pH below 7.0 is linked to these pests acquiring Burkholderia bacteria, with high-density pest aggregations in acidic soils. The findings were published in Microbiome, but they don't establish if changing soil pH would reduce crop damage, or if large-scale soil pH management is feasible. That's all for today. Thanks for tuning in. Thanks, everyone. See you next time! That's it for today. That was 5 Things Going Right. Come back tomorrow for five more.