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Want to be smarter? More focused? Free of memory problems as you age? If so, don't count on brain games to help you. That's the conclusion of an exhaustive evaluation of the scientific literature on brain training games and programs. It was published Monday in the journal Psychological Science in the Public Interest. (Hamilton, 10/3)

Rini Kramer-Carter has tried everything to pull herself out of her dark emotional hole: individual therapy, support groups, tai chi and numerous antidepressants. The 73-year-old musician rattles off the list: Prozac, Cymbalta, Lexapro. “I’ve been on a bunch,” she said. “I still cry all the time.” She has what’s known as “treatment-resistant depression. (Gorman, 10/3)

Ask Caltech microbiologist Dianne Newman what she does for a living, and she’ll answer with a chuckle: “I study weird forms of metabolism.” She has spent a career studying the strange ways in which microscopic organisms get the food and energy they need in environments without oxygen — a quest that has taken her from geology to biology and from Earth’s most ancient origins to the pathogens of today. (Blakemore, 9/30)