English news for Tuesday, October 6, 2026

Measles^*1 is spreading in New York, a state in the eastern United States. On October 5, Kathy Hochul, the governor^*2 of New York, signed an executive order^*3. The order declares a disaster emergency^*4 for the whole state.

By October 3, there were 108 confirmed cases^*5 of measles in the state. Seven of them were in New York City, and 101 were in other parts of the state. Since July 15, there have been 92 cases in 18 counties^*6. These counties are rural^*7 areas where many people have not had all their vaccines^*8.

The order lets more people give vaccines. Now paramedics^*9, advanced emergency medical workers, pharmacists^*10, and midwives^*11 can give the shots. Nurses can also order tests for measles.

Local health departments have already given more than 1,000 doses^*12 of the MMR vaccine^*13. This vaccine protects against measles. When a person gets two doses, it stops the disease 97 percent of the time.

Governor Hochul said that no one should become very sick or die from a disease that a vaccine can prevent.

1. *1 Measles: A sickness that spreads easily from person to person. It gives you a fever and red spots on your skin.
2. *2 governor: The leader of a state in the United States.
3. *3 executive order: A rule that a leader of a government can make by himself or herself, without a vote.
4. *4 disaster emergency: A very serious situation. The government declares it so it can act fast and use special powers.
5. *5 confirmed cases: People who doctors have tested and know for sure have the sickness.
6. *6 counties: Parts of a state. A state is divided into counties, and each one has its own local government.
7. *7 rural: In the countryside, far from big cities.
8. *8 vaccines: Medicine, usually given as a shot, that helps the body fight a sickness before you get it.
9. *9 paramedics: Workers who come in an ambulance and give medical help in an emergency.
10. *10 pharmacists: People who prepare and sell medicine in a drugstore.
11. *11 midwives: People who help women when they have a baby.
12. *12 doses: One dose is one amount of medicine given at one time.
13. *13 MMR vaccine: A vaccine that protects against three sicknesses: measles, mumps, and rubella.

Japan's Ministry^*1 of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said on September 30 that some vegetables will cost more than usual in October. The ministry is the part of the Japanese government that looks after farming and food. Every month, it looks at the vegetables that farmers send to the big wholesale market^*2 in Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Then it reports how the vegetables are growing and what their prices will probably be.

In October, Chinese cabbage^*3, lettuce, broccoli^*4, cucumbers, eggplants^*5, tomatoes and green peppers will probably cost more than in a normal year. Potatoes and onions will probably cost less. Daikon^*6, carrots, green onions and taro^*7 will cost about the same as usual.

Lettuce is a good example. A lot of lettuce comes from Nagano and Gunma, two areas of Japan. In September, it rained there for many days, and there was not much sunshine. So the lettuce did not grow well, and farmers could not use all of it. In October, they will send less lettuce to the market than usual, and the price will stay higher than in a normal year.

Cabbage will cost about the same as usual in the first half of October. In the second half, less cabbage will come to the market, so the price will be a little higher than usual.

Potatoes and onions are different. Potatoes and onions from Hokkaido, a large island in the north of Japan, are growing well, and many of them are big. So farmers there will send more of them to the market than in a normal year, and the prices will be lower.

1. *1 Ministry: a part of a country's government that looks after one thing, like farming or health
2. *2 wholesale market: a big market where shops and restaurants buy food in large amounts
3. *3 Chinese cabbage: a long, light green vegetable with soft leaves, often used in soups
4. *4 broccoli: a dark green vegetable that looks like a small tree
5. *5 eggplants: long, dark purple vegetables
6. *6 Daikon: a long, white Japanese radish
7. *7 taro: a small, round root vegetable that people eat cooked

An underpass^*1 is a road that goes under another road or a railway. When it rains very hard, water can fill the low part of an underpass. Cars drive in, and they get stuck in the water.

This has happened many times in Japan this year. In August 2026, very heavy rain fell in Chiba, an area in Japan. In that storm and other big rains, underpasses filled with water. People were hurt, and cars and other things were damaged.

Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism looks after the country's roads. On October 6, its road office published new guidelines^*2 to stop these accidents.

The guidelines ask for several kinds of protection at the same time. First, roads should close before the water comes, or quickly when the water starts to rise. Second, there should be ways to stop cars from entering a flooded underpass. Third, the water must be able to drain^*3 away. The guidelines also say that when something goes wrong, the system must always choose the safe way.

The ministry has a short slogan^*4 for the plan: "Stop before it floods, and don't let them in."

1. *1 underpass: a road that goes under another road or a railway
2. *2 guidelines: written rules that tell people the right way to do something
3. *3 drain: to flow away through pipes or holes
4. *4 slogan: a short, easy sentence that people remember

Scientists in Japan have found how food with too many calories^*1 can make the brain work less well. The study comes from the Institute of Science Tokyo, a university in Tokyo, the capital of Japan. Scientists at Teikyo University, another university in Japan, also worked on it. The university announced the results on September 17. The paper was published in the science journal^*2 Molecular Psychiatry on September 12.

The scientists studied mice. They gave the mice food with a lot of calories. In the brains of these mice, the amount of a protein^*3 called PQBP1^*4 went down. After that, the molecules^*5 that make up the synapses^*6 in the brain stopped working in the normal way. Then the circuits^*7 of brain cells worked less well. This is the first time in the world that scientists have shown this chain of events.

The scientists also found why PQBP1 goes down. When a mouse eats too many calories, its body sends a signal with insulin^*8. This signal stops a second protein, called PPARγ^*9, from doing its job. When PPARγ cannot work, the amount of PQBP1 falls.

Then the scientists tried two ways to fix the problem. First, they gave the mice a medicine for diabetes^*10. Doctors already use this medicine, and it helps PPARγ work better. Second, they used gene therapy^*11 that worked on PQBP1. Both ways helped. The damage to the synapses got better, and the brains of the mice worked better again.

Scientists already knew that PQBP1 is linked to intellectual disability^*12 and Alzheimer's disease^*13. The new study shows that the same protein also plays a part in the brain problems that come from eating too much. The scientists say their results may open the way to new treatments.

1. *1 calories: units that measure how much energy is in food
2. *2 journal: a magazine where scientists publish their studies
3. *3 protein: a very small building block that the body uses to make and run its cells
4. *4 PQBP1: the name of one protein found in brain cells
5. *5 molecules: very tiny pieces that all things are made of
6. *6 synapses: the places where one brain cell sends signals to another brain cell
7. *7 circuits: groups of brain cells that are connected and work together
8. *8 insulin: a substance the body makes to control sugar in the blood
9. *9 PPARγ: the name of another protein in the body
10. *10 diabetes: an illness in which the body cannot control sugar in the blood
11. *11 gene therapy: a treatment that changes or fixes genes, the instructions inside cells
12. *12 intellectual disability: a condition in which a person finds learning and understanding much harder than most people
13. *13 Alzheimer's disease: an illness of the brain that slowly takes away memory and thinking

Francis Halzen will receive the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physics^*1. He gets the prize for his work on IceCube, a large experiment^*2 at the South Pole. Chiba University, a university in Japan, takes part in IceCube. The university shared the news on October 6, 2026.

IceCube looks for neutrinos^*3. Scientists from 14 countries work on it together. They have put more than 5,000 detectors^*4 deep in the ice of Antarctica.

The team from Chiba University is the only group from Japan in IceCube. Professor Shigeru Yoshida and Professor Aya Ishihara are members of the team. IceCube has made some important discoveries. In 2012, it found neutrinos with very high energy from space. This was the first time in the world. In 2018, it found a place in space where these neutrinos come from. No one had done this before. In 2021, it saw the Glashow resonance^*5 for the first time.

IceCube is now getting an upgrade^*6, and the work will finish in 2026. The Chiba team played a central part in designing and building the new detectors. The team will also have a main role in IceCube-Gen2, the next experiment that is planned for the future.

1. *1 Physics: the science of energy, light, and how things move
2. *2 experiment: a careful test that scientists do to learn something
3. *3 neutrinos: very, very small particles that fly through space and are hard to see
4. *4 detectors: machines that can see or feel something that people cannot
5. *5 Glashow resonance: a special and rare kind of crash between a neutrino and another very small particle
6. *6 upgrade: work that makes a machine or system newer and better