Newsroom – Australian Friends of Tel Aviv University

Tel Aviv University Inaugurates $35 Million Sylvan Adams Sport Science Institute

Written by Hilary on 9 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

Elite athletes often speak about chasing fractions of a second or a few extra centimeters. At Tel Aviv University, those margins are becoming the focus of cutting-edge research.

This week, TAU officially inaugurated the Sylvan Adams Sport Science Institute, a landmark new center that brings together researchers, physicians, engineers, physiologists, data scientists, and AI experts to transform scientific discoveries into practical tools for athletic performance. Established through an approximately $35 million philanthropic gift from businessman and philanthropist Sylvan Adams, the Institute positions Tel Aviv University at the forefront of sport science research while strengthening Israel’s competitive edge on the international stage.

More than a state-of-the-art training center, the institute is designed as a living laboratory where science and elite sport meet. Researchers will investigate everything from exercise physiology and biomechanics to nutrition, injury prevention, environmental adaptation, and performance optimization, translating academic research into personalized programs for athletes.

“The Institute at TAU is unique and will do groundbreaking research. It lays the scientific, technological, and research foundation that will help Israeli athletes achieve new levels of sporting excellence and I believe that bringing together research, innovation, and professional excellence will help develop Israel’s next generation of champions,” said Mr. Sylvan Adams at the inauguration ceremony.

Mr. Sylvan Adams talking about his vision for the Institute (photo: Yael Tzur)

The Institute houses one of Israel’s and the world’s most advanced sport science facilities. Its laboratories—developed in collaboration with TAU’s Gray Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences and the Fleischman Faculty of Engineering—include an advanced scientific gym, motion analysis systems with high-speed video technology, a swimming flume, comprehensive fitness assessment facilities, and a climate chamber capable of recreating the temperature and humidity conditions athletes encounter at competitions around the world. A hypoxic hotel can even simulate training at altitudes of up to 5,000 meters, allowing researchers to study and enhance performance under extreme conditions.

Athletes will receive individualized physiological testing, nutrition guidance, mental performance support, and data-driven training recommendations. At the same time, researchers will use these facilities to conduct world-class applied research aimed at improving athletic performance, reducing injury risk, and advancing our understanding of human physiology.

“We are proud to inaugurate the Sylvan Adams Sport Science Institute, a project that would not have come into being without Sylvan’s extraordinary vision and generosity,” said TAU President Prof. Ariel Porat.

Canadian-Israeli philanthropist Sylvan Adams has played a transformative role in advancing Tel Aviv University’s vision, building on his family’s longstanding commitment to the institution. Through major philanthropic support, he established the Sylvan Adams Sport Science Institute as well as the Sports Center, helping position TAU as a national leader in sports science, athletic performance, and Olympic athlete development. A Vice-Chair of TAU’s Board of Governors and second-generation benefactor, Adams has also strengthened the University through scholarships, research initiatives, and global advocacy on its behalf.

The Olympic Partnership

A major milestone announced during the inauguration was a new strategic partnership between the institute and the Olympic Committee of Israel. Under the collaboration, selected Olympic athletes will receive ongoing scientific assessments and personalized support as they prepare for the Los Angeles 2028 and Brisbane 2032 Olympic Games, creating a direct pipeline between university research and international competition.

Trying the advanced gym equipment with Olympic cyclist Mikhail Yakovlev (photo: Yael Tzur)

Prof. Irad Ben-Gal, who heads the Institute, emphasized that its greatest strength lies in bridging the gap between research and practice. “What makes the Institute unique is its ability to transform scientific data into practical recommendations,” he said. “Every athlete will receive an individualized performance plan designed to improve results, optimize training, reduce injury risk, and monitor progress over time.”

While elite competitors will be among its primary beneficiaries, the Institute’s impact will extend well beyond Olympic sport. Its expertise and services will also support sports clubs, coaches, recreational athletes, and researchers, creating new opportunities for collaboration and innovation while advancing Tel Aviv University’s leadership in health, performance science, and interdisciplinary research.

Sharing the Stage

Written by Hilary on 8 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

On any given evening at Tel Aviv University (TAU), the lights go up on a stage that is more than a performance space. It is a laboratory, a classroom, and, perhaps most importantly in today’s reality, a rare meeting ground for students from profoundly different backgrounds.

Jewish and Arab students, religious and secular, immigrants and native-born Israelis—all rehearse, argue, solve problems, and perform together. Theater demands a level of closeness few other academic disciplines require.

“When you’re rehearsing six hours a day with someone, you can’t stay in slogans,” says fourth-year acting student Mayar Sakran, from Nazareth.

“You have to listen. You have to trust each other. That changes something.”

A Microcosm of Israeli Society

Unlike other university programs, theater cannot be learned at a distance. At TAU Theater, actors, directors, and designers train together throughout an intensive four-year integrated BA–MFA program, while productions themselves are part of the curriculum rather than extracurricular activities.

“We believe that cultural and intellectual knowledge enrich artistic creation,” says Prof. Yair Lipshitz, TAU Department Chair of Theatre Arts. “Our students don’t just channel emotion—they analyze, contextualize, and interpret. Theory and practice feed each other.”

That shared creative process often results in something increasingly rare: understanding.

For Mayar the experience transformed not only her artistic development, but her personal life. “It was much more diverse than anything I’d experienced before,” she says. “I had never really engaged with Hebrew-speaking people or people from so many different backgrounds. It made my circle bigger.”

Over four years, she says, those encounters fundamentally changed the way she sees people. “Seeing how other people think about difficult topics really changed a lot of things for me. I’m not the same person I was four years ago.”

One of the most unexpected experiences came when she was cast in The Dybbuk, the classic Yiddish play, portraying Amalia—a young Jewish woman from an Eastern European shtetl. “It was something extremely far away from me,” she says. “I was excited to learn another language and research a world that wasn’t part of my own.” Today, Mayar still finds herself quoting lines in Yiddish.

War Enters the Rehearsal Room

After October 7 and during the ongoing wars, tensions inevitably surfaced. Some students were coping with unimaginable loss; some disappeared for weeks or months to serve in the reserves. Others were facing entirely different fears and realities. Political disagreements that had once remained in the background suddenly became impossible to ignore. And theater offered no easy way to avoid each other.

“We are so much a melding of one another,” says second-year acting student Gil Daniels, an American immigrant and a combat soldier in the IDF. Gil played a girlfriend of Amalia’s in The Dybbuk. “Our work is about being fully present.” This sort of intensity in rehearsals forced difficult conversations.

Mayar and Gil on stage at The Dybbuk performance

Gil admits there were times he didn’t feel comfortable expressing his views, and some disagreements strained even close friendships.

“There were moments when my classmates and I, we really took space from each other,” he recalls.

But the nature of theater made permanent distance impossible, and the students had to find a way to move forward. “We had to readjust and re-understand how to progress … and still appreciate each other as people, colleagues, and fellow students,” Gil reflects. For him, that change was reflected in his relationships with Arab classmates, including students from Nazareth. Conversations that initially felt impossible gradually gave way to simple acts of concern, such as asking how one’s doing or visiting a sick classmate.

Learning to Disagree

Prof. Lipshitz knew his students arrived with vastly different personal and political perspectives. Rather than trying to erase disagreement, he focused on creating an environment where difficult conversations could happen without overwhelming the class.

“There were tensions, of course. Some classes decided together that the classroom should remain a protected learning space and not become overwhelmed by outside politics,” Lipshitz says.

“The challenge is creating a space where people feel they belong without turning every class into a political argument.

I try to present the material as fully and honestly as possible, knowing I’ll still miss things and people from all sides may disagree with me.” His goal, he explains, is not consensus. “None of us are entirely comfortable, and that’s okay.”

Interestingly, the debates that proved most heated were often the least expected. “I’d think the class on Palestinian theater would provoke the biggest debate,” Prof. Lipshitz says. “Instead, a discussion about Mizrahi representation in theater would generate the strongest reactions.” Not every discussion ended neatly. Some students chose to continue conversations privately after class rather than speaking publicly. But they kept returning—to class, to rehearsals, and to one another. “And in this, I think, we succeeded in building trust,” Prof. Lipshitz reflects.

For Mayar, that trust was built just as much through everyday life as through performances. “We’re a close-knit group, and we’re here every day, morning till night. Over the years we became a family.” The friendships she formed crossed linguistic, cultural, and political lines. “I don’t like to categorize people and choose my friends based on the category they’re in,” she says. “I like to look at the person for who they are.”

Even misunderstandings became opportunities to grow. “Sometimes people accidentally hurt each other,” Mayar reflects. “But we talk about things together. We solve problems together. And when it works out, it’s beautiful.”

Lipshitz is careful not to describe the department as a utopia. Disagreements remain. So does discomfort. But after years of watching students creating together, he has come to believe that coexistence is not a defined set of rules:

“If students believe we’re here to learn from each other rather than erase one another,” he says, “then meaningful dialogue becomes possible.”

A Work in Progress

For many students, returning to rehearsals also became part of recovering from the trauma of war. The theater offered not only a place to create, but a place to reconnect—with themselves and with one another.

Gil believes that Israeli society needs more spaces where people can genuinely interact across differences. “There has to be more than just war,” he says. “There has to be more than a military culture.” Theater, he believes, offers one possible path.

Mayar shares that sentiment. “I think if people open their minds and see the beauty that’s out there [in each person], they really could live together,” she says. “It is possible.”

What’s in a Name? AI Associates Jewish Names with Stereotypical Traits

Written by Hilary on 8 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

The traits include exceptional intelligence, extreme independence, moral complexity, and social distance.

A cynical doctor. A ruthless chemist. An arrogant billionaire. A calculating mafia boss.

These are not only some of today’s most iconic fictional characters—they are also the figures that artificial intelligence models found most similar to fictional biographies of people with Jewish names.

Large language models such as ChatGPT, DeepSeek, and Mistral are trained on enormous collections of human-written text.

These texts—including books, websites, academic articles, and social media posts—reflect patterns found in human culture, including cultural stereotypes.

A new study by Prof. Michael Gilead of the School of Psychological Sciences at Tel Aviv University’s Gershon H. Gordon Faculty of Social Sciences, together with Dr. Gal Gutman of the Faculty of Business and Management at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, found that generative AI systems may preserve and reproduce stereotypical representations of Jews, even when the generated content itself is not explicitly antisemitic.

Life Stories: Biographies and Hidden Biases

Prof. Gilead and Dr. Gutman developed a unique method for uncovering hidden biases. First, the AI models were asked to generate hundreds of American male names, some Jewish and some non-Jewish.

Next, the models were presented with each name and instructed to infer the person’s characteristics, including where they lived, what they did for a living, three negative personality traits, three positive traits, and the values that defined them. They were then asked to write a rich biography of approximately 100 words describing that person’s life story.

Prof. Michael Gilead (Tel Aviv University) and Dr. Gal Gutman (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev)

The models generated biographies for both Jewish names—such as Ethan Katz, Noah Weiss, and Gabriel Horowitz—and non-Jewish names, including Tyler Johnson, Kyle White, and Dylan Wilson.

Below are excerpts from two example biographies:

A 52-year-old Jewish American man – Zachary Oppenheimer: A sharp-minded and ambitious financial analyst… Excels in his demanding position… Struggles to balance the pursuit of financial success with its personal costs…
A 52-year-old non-Jewish American man – Curtis Stewart: Brings history to life with remarkable enthusiasm… Stubborn and cynical… Willing to go above and beyond… Serves as an important source of support…

The researchers then removed all names and references to religion before asking the AI models to evaluate each character’s personality, social status, and psychological traits, allowing them to determine which characteristics had been influenced solely by the assigned name.

Drug Lords, Mafia Bosses, and Weapons Designers: Not Jewish, but Jew-ish

The results showed that characters with Jewish names were consistently perceived as more intelligent, more efficient, more assertive, and stronger leaders. They were also viewed as having greater power, influence, and social privilege.

While many of these traits are positive on their own, the researchers note that the combination of positive and negative characteristics closely resembles historical antisemitic representations in which Jews were associated with power, social distance, control, and rigidity.

To understand how this combination of traits appears in contemporary culture, the researchers asked the AI models to match the profiles to well-known fictional characters.

The models repeatedly identified Sherlock Holmes, Dr. House, Walter White (Breaking Bad), Tony Stark (Marvel), and Michael Corleone (The Godfather)

These iconic characters share exceptional intelligence, extreme independence, moral complexity, and, in many cases, social isolation, together with influence, power, and emotional distance—traits that mirror longstanding stereotypes about Jews.

Prof. Gilead explains:

“For most of history, these tropes circulated through pamphlets, caricatures, and rumor. Today they sit, dormant but intact, inside systems that hundreds of millions of people consult every day. The models never say anything explicitly antisemitic, but they may be predisposed to evaluate Jewish individuals in a way that replicates ancient antisemitic tropes.”

Iron Man and The Godfather – fictional characters sharing the same stereotypical traits associated with Jewish names

The findings were replicated using additional AI models and validated by hundreds of participants from the United States. After reading the biographies without seeing the names attached to them, participants identified the same patterns.

According to Dr. Gutman:

“Artificial intelligence systems do not express antisemitism in an intentional or conscious sense. Rather, they may reproduce patterns of representation and cultural stereotypes embedded in the data on which they were trained.”

She adds:

“Historical biases do not simply disappear; they can persist within the deep structure of the knowledge these models learn, even after alignment and bias-mitigation processes. Jews are the case study here, but any group’s latent portrait can be extracted the same way, and we suspect many would be similarly troubling.”

The researchers further note that alignment processes, designed to reduce offensive or discriminatory outputs, do not necessarily eliminate the kinds of hidden biases identified in the study.

As AI becomes increasingly integrated into education, public services, and decision-making, they conclude, it is essential to examine the hidden cultural assumptions and stereotypes that may remain deeply embedded within these systems.

Did Israel’s “Basket” Initiative Lower Grocery Bills?

Written by Hilary on 5 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

A new TAU study finds that while the government’s flagship cost-of-living program lowered prices on selected products, it was accompanied by price increases across dozens of other categories.

Researchers from the Coller School of Management at Tel Aviv University examined the Ministry of Economy’s flagship “Israel’s Basket” initiative and found that although it substantially reduced the prices of the 100 products included in the program, these reductions were accompanied by price increases across many other product categories. According to the researchers, the overall impact on consumers’ grocery bills may therefore have been considerably smaller than expected.

Looking Beyond the 100 Products

The study was conducted by Prof. Itai Ater and Adi Omer of the Coller School of Management at Tel Aviv University, together with Dr. Or Avishay-Rizhi of Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. Based on daily price data collected by the Pricez platform from approximately 70 supermarket chains and more than 2,000 stores across Israel, the researchers examined the program’s effects during its first seven weeks.

As part of the initiative, Carrefour committed to selling a basket of 100 products for a total price of NIS 1,098, compared with an average price of approximately NIS 1,700 before the program was launched. In return, the Israeli government allocated NIS 50 million to support a nationwide advertising campaign. The initiative operates in 50 Carrefour branches and on the company’s online shopping platform for a period of six months.

Analysis of more than 2,000 stores and Pricez data showed that prices of the designated basket products fell by approximately 35% in participating Carrefour branches. Prices also declined by approximately 6% in Carrefour branches that were not participating in the initiative, suggesting that some of the price reductions spilled over to other parts of the chain. On Carrefour’s online platform, basket products recorded an average price reduction of approximately 37%.

Carrefour in Israel

Lower Prices on Basket Products, Higher Prices Elsewhere

The researchers also examined price changes across product categories that were not included in the government’s basket.

Among participating Carrefour stores, prices increased in 46 of the 76 product categories examined, with 23 categories showing statistically significant increases. Notable examples included:

Laundry detergent and laundry gel – approximately 9%
Pudding, jelly, and whipped cream products – approximately 7%
Adult shampoo and conditioner – approximately 7%
Pasta, spaghetti, and lasagna – approximately 6%
Butter and flavored cookies – approximately 6%

The pattern was even more pronounced online, where prices increased in 55 product categories. Among the largest increases were:

Adult shampoo and conditioner – approximately 14%
Tea biscuits and crackers – approximately 9%
Laundry detergent and laundry gel – approximately 8%
Pasta, spaghetti, and lasagna – approximately 8%
Savory snacks – approximately 7%

The researchers also found price increases of approximately 1.5% to 2% for a range of other popular products that were not included in the government basket.

How Did Competing Supermarkets Respond?

Outside Carrefour, the program’s impact was considerably more limited. When the researchers examined physical stores across Israel’s supermarket chains, they found no statistically significant reduction in the prices of the designated basket products. Focusing specifically on the country’s major discount chains, they identified an average price reduction of approximately 3%.

Among the retailers:

Mahsanei HaShuk recorded the largest average reduction, at approximately 10%.
Half Hinam reduced basket prices by approximately 5%.
Yohananof lowered prices by approximately 4%.
Victory reduced prices by approximately 3%.
Rami Levy also lowered prices by approximately 3%.

By contrast, the researchers found no statistically significant price reductions at Shufersal Deal, Osher Ad, or Universe.

The online market showed a similar pattern. Competing retailers reduced the prices of basket products by an average of only 2.3%, with substantial differences between chains:

Rami Levy Online reduced basket prices by approximately 9%.
Half Hinam Online lowered prices by approximately 4%.

No significant price reductions were observed at Shufersal Online, the largest online grocery retailer in Israel, or at Mahsanei HaShuk Online.

Does Shopping Near a Carrefour Store Make a Difference?

National Pricing Rather Than Local Competition

The researchers also examined whether competing supermarket chains responded differently in areas where Carrefour stores participating in the initiative were located.

Their findings showed no meaningful differences between cities with participating Carrefour branches and those without them. According to the researchers, this suggests that Israel’s major supermarket chains set prices primarily at the national level, rather than competing store by store.

In other words, the presence of a nearby Carrefour branch offering discounted basket products did not lead competing supermarkets in the same city to lower their prices.

“There Are No Free Gifts in Economics”

Prof. Itai Ater concludes:

“There is no doubt that the program succeeded in lowering the prices of the designated basket products in the relevant Carrefour branches and also led to some price reductions among certain competitors. But in economics, there are no miracles and there are no free gifts.

“When you look beyond the 100 products at the center of the campaign, you see that these price reductions were accompanied by increases across dozens of other product categories. As a result, consumers who saved money on the basket products paid more for other items.

“The real test is not the price of a single product, but the total amount consumers pay at the checkout. From that perspective, it is possible that the effort to reduce the cost of the shopping basket ultimately produced the opposite result.”

Prof. Itai Ater (Photo: Oded Antman)

Prof. Itai Ater of the Coller School of Management is a leading researcher in the fields of competition policy, industrial organization, and public policy. His research examines the economic mechanisms that shape markets and influence consumers’ everyday spending.

Do Zebra Finches Understand Meaning? Prize-Winning Research Suggests They Do

Written by Hilary on 2 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

The Jeremy Coller Foundation and Tel Aviv University have announced the winner of the 2026 Coller Dolittle Challenge for Two-Way Interspecies Communication. This year’s US$100,000 prize was awarded to Dr. Julie E. Elie, of the Theunissen Lab at the University of California, Berkeley, for her discovery that zebra finches classify their calls according to meaning more so than acoustics.

Building a Dictionary of Bird Calls

Using AI machine learning and detailed observations of animal behavior, Dr. Julie Elie and her team investigated the acoustic features of zebra finches’ vocalizations and created a “dictionary” classifying zebra finches’ vocalizations into 11 categories or call-types, with meanings such as aggression, hunger or bonding. Elie took her research one step further, carrying out an experiment that tested whether the birds agreed with her classification. She trained zebra finches to press buttons which played her categorized call-types, each day rewarding only one of the call-types with seeds. The birds rapidly learned which call-type was being rewarded, waiting for their reward at the end of the playback, and interrupted non-rewarded call-types.

The Discovery Came from the Birds’ Mistakes

But the truly remarkable scientific advancement was discovered after the categorization exercise, when Elie and her team investigated the errors that birds made when seeking the rewarded call-type. Zebra finches made classification mistakes on calls with shared meaning that could not be explained by how similar-sounding these call-types were. For instance, the birds mistook long-distance contact calls and short-distance contact calls, which are acoustically very different. But, they never mistook a short contact call with a short alarm call, which have very similar acoustic patterns but entirely distinct meanings. As such, the study reveals that call perception elicits a mental imagery of the meaning of call-types, rather than triggering a reflexive response.

AI Brings Scientists Closer to Animal Communication

The prize was presented during an event on 25th June with four shortlisted teams of researchers from the US, France and Switzerland presenting their remarkable discoveries on communication with African striped mice, chimpanzees and bonobos. AI tools were central to the finalists’ studies, enabling them to analyze larger data sets at greater speed, and to decode bioacoustic patterns which are inaudible to human hearing.

A pair of zebra finches

Dr. Julie Elie said:

“Our research shows that exciting scientific discoveries come from mistakes. It’s been a fascinating collaborative exercise to ask the zebra finches questions about their vocalizations. The fact that, sometimes, the birds get the classification of their own calls wrong has enabled us to gain huge insight into their perceptions and mental imagery.

“But, there is so much more to be done. Beyond developing the right algorithm to interpret animal vocalizations, we must coordinate the acoustic with the visual. I am excited for the development of robots to mimic the movements and posture of the species we’re interested in. But in the meantime, I’m delighted that I have been recognized by the Coller Dolittle Committee for our team’s contributions to the goal of two-way interspecies communication. I am really grateful to all the people that contributed to this project and to the Jeremy Coller Foundation for making this recognition possible.”

From Animal “Words” to Animal “Sentences”

Professor Yossi Yovel, Tel Aviv University and Chair of the Coller Dolittle Challenge, said: “This year’s finalists have raised the scientific bar of the Coller Dolittle Challenge even further. We have seen a clear transition from studying individual animal “words” to the study of “sentences”. Dr. Julie Elie’s research excelled in all domains. Her study has gone beyond decoding zebra finch’s communication and has begun to answer whether these patterns identified by scientists are actually relevant and meaningful to the birds. On this trajectory, we are accelerating at pace towards two-way interspecies communication.”

Jeremy Coller said: “Congratulations to Dr. Julie Elie, a well-deserved winner of this year’s Prize. From primates to rodents, from jungles to deserts, down on the ground and up in the sky, today’s finalists are all pushing the frontiers of animal communication. While the ultimate goal of achieving genuine two-way communication remains tantalizingly out of reach, scientists are bringing us all one step closer to what I am convinced is now inevitable.

AI is accelerating so fast, I have absolute conviction we’ll crack the code by 2030 – a breakthrough that will benefit humans and our fellow animals the world over and give a long overdue voice to the voiceless.”

How Cancer Turns the Immune System Against Itself

Written by Hilary on 2 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

New TAU study reveals how tumors reprogram immune cells to support their own growth, opening the door to new treatment strategies.

Researchers at Tel Aviv University’s Gray Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences have uncovered how a natural and essential immune system process can be hijacked to promote cancer progression. In a new study, the research team developed an advanced technology that enabled them to track macrophages, immune system cells, in real time and reveal how they alter their behavior within a cancerous tumor after consuming dead cancer cells. Their findings may pave the way for the development of new treatments targeting the specific macrophages identified in the study, restoring the immune system’s ability to fight the tumor instead of helping it.

The study was led by Dr. Merav Cohen and doctoral students Roi Balaban and Ori Moskowitz of the Gray Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences at Tel Aviv University. It was published in the prestigious journal Science Immunology.

When the Immune System Changes Sides

At the heart of the study are macrophages, immune cells whose role is to clear the body of damaged and dead cells. This process is essential for maintaining tissue health and preventing inflammation. However, the researchers discovered that within the environment of a cancerous tumor, this same mechanism can take an unexpected turn: instead of helping the body, it causes immune cells to adopt characteristics that actively support tumor growth.

To understand how this occurs, the researchers developed an innovative method called Effero-seq, which enables the tracking of changes that occur in immune cells after they engulf dead cells. Using this technology, the team found that as the process progresses, the immune cells undergo “reprogramming” and begin activating genes that promote tumor development.

Tracking Tumor-Supporting Immune Cells

Using a melanoma model, the researchers found that macrophages that had consumed dead cancer cells stimulated the formation of new blood vessels within the tumor. These blood vessels supply the tumor with oxygen and nutrients, enabling it to grow more rapidly. At the same time, these macrophages lost some of their ability to respond to signals that trigger anti-cancer immune activity.

The researchers also analyzed data from patients with uveal melanoma, a form of eye cancer. They found that patients whose tumors contained higher expression of immune cells bearing the genetic signature identified in the study tended to have lower survival rates.

According to Dr. Cohen, the findings provide a new perspective on how cancerous tumors manipulate their surroundings and harness the immune system for their own needs. “The better we understand these mechanisms, the better equipped we will be to develop treatments that block them and restore the immune system’s ability to fight cancer,” she says. “This research points to a new and promising therapeutic target, one that focuses not only on the cancer cells themselves, but also on the processes that enable them to thrive.”

Prof. Joel Mokyr Returns to TAU for a Special Campus Visit

Written by Hilary on 1 July 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

This week, Tel Aviv University welcomed back Prof. Joel Mokyr, winner of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences and Visiting Professor at TAU’s Eitan Berglas School of Economics, for a three-day campus visit celebrating both his academic achievements and his longstanding connection to the university.

The three-day visit included an interdisciplinary discussion on economic history, a public lecture titled “What Drives Economic Growth?”, a ceremony dedicating the Economics Student Plaza in his honor, participation in a conference at the Porter School of Environmental and Earth Sciences, and a special reunion with his former high school classmates, who gathered on campus to celebrate his Nobel Prize.

Prof. Mokyr, an Israeli-American economic historian and professor at Northwestern University, received the 2025 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for his pioneering research on innovation, technological change, and the forces that drive long-term economic growth. His work has fundamentally reshaped the understanding of how scientific knowledge, institutions, and ideas contribute to prosperity over time.

Exploring the Origins of Economic Growth

One of the highlights of the visit was a public lecture, hosted by Tel Aviv University President Prof. Ariel Porat and Vice President for International Affairs Prof. Milette Shamir, which brought together students, faculty members, and members of the public to explore one of the central questions that has shaped Prof. Mokyr’s career: What enables societies to innovate and grow over the long term?

Prof. Joel Mokyr delivering his lecture at Bar-Shira Hall during his visit to Tel Aviv University

Prof. Mokyr began teaching at Northwestern University in 1974 and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996. Throughout his career, he has served as President of the Economic History Association and developed the concept of the Industrial Enlightenment, which links ideas from the Enlightenment to the processes that drove the Industrial Revolution.

His books include A Culture of Growth: The Origins of the Modern Economy (2016) and Two Paths to Prosperity: Culture and Institutions in Europe and China (2025).

The visit also included an interdisciplinary discussion on economic history with researchers from across the University and Prof. Mokyr’s participation in a conference at the Porter School of Environmental and Earth Sciences. On Monday, classmates from his high school years gathered on campus for a special reunion celebrating his Nobel Prize, marking another memorable moment during his visit.

Prof. Joel Mokyr

Honoring a Longstanding Member of the TAU Community

As part of the visit, Tel Aviv University dedicated its Economics Student Plaza in honor of Prof. Mokyr, recognizing both his groundbreaking scholarship and his many years of teaching and mentoring students at the Eitan Berglas School of Economics.

Prof. Joel Mokyr with Tel Aviv University President Prof. Ariel Porat

Reflecting on his connection to Israel and Tel Aviv University, Prof. Mokyr said:

“No matter where you live, Israel remains stuck deep in your soul. I especially love teaching Israeli students—they are always highly involved and ready to share their ideas. I can’t wait for what comes next…I’m only getting started.”

On AI, Innovation, and the Future of Universities

Prof. Mokyr’s research has long explored how the creation and dissemination of what he calls “useful knowledge” helped drive the Industrial Revolution and laid the foundations for modern economic growth. During his visit, we asked him how he sees these ideas applying to one of today’s most transformative technologies: artificial intelligence.

If innovation depends not only on new inventions but also on the spread of knowledge, what role might AI play? Could it expand this body of knowledge, or reshape the conditions that make innovation possible?

“My sense it could go either way,” Prof. Mokyr said.

“AI clearly will expand the body of knowledge and make it even more accessible. Yet if the entire world will use two or three sources of AI, say ChatGPT and Claude and Gemini, then we may all be bleating the same tones.”

At the same time, he noted that if the entire world were to rely on only a handful of AI systems, diversity of thought could suffer. Drawing on lessons from economic history, however, he believes competition will continue to challenge dominant technologies and encourage new ideas.

“I expect the number of companies providing AI and other sources will expand, and they may use very different algorithms and ways to process information, and in that world they can avoid the loss of diversity—and could even expand it. It’s hard to predict, but the past teaches us that monopolies are always contestable and in the long run even IBM and Google and Amazon have had to face new entrants and competition—the essence of creative destruction.”

He concluded:

“AI is a malleable tool and I would not be surprised if it actually led to MORE intellectual diversity.”

Prof. Joel Mokyr

Prof. Mokyr also reflected on the role universities play in sustaining the international exchange of ideas at a time of increasing political polarization and geopolitical competition.

” Universities are a major pillar of the global intellectual community—they make an explicit effort to promote international connections, of students, faculty, and even staff.”

He added:

“The campuses are full of foreign students, postdocs, academic visitors. They run seminars and conferences that attract scholars from all over. Many Universities have overseas campus and have ‘semester abroad’ and similar program, fostering cosmopolitan attitudes and supporting worldwide connections. In short, they are one of the main drivers of the global intellectual community—how could they not?”

Newly Identified Mechanism Could Help Restore Hearing

Written by Hilary on 29 June 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

Tel Aviv University researchers identified a rare group of cells with the potential to regenerate sensory hair cells in the inner ear.

A groundbreaking study by a team of researchers from the Gray Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences at Tel Aviv University offers new hope to millions of people suffering from irreversible hearing loss. The researchers have identified a unique biological mechanism that could, in the future, enable the regeneration of sensory hair cells in the inner ear – a process previously thought to be impossible in humans.

The study was conducted under the leadership of Prof. Karen Avraham, Dean of the Gray Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences Drs Sarah and Felix Dumont Chair for Research of Hearing Disorders incumbent. It was spearheaded by Lama Khalaily, a Tel Aviv University doctoral student, in collaboration with Prof. David Sprinzak of TAU’s Wise Faculty of Life Sciences, Shahar Kasirer from Prof. Sprinzak’s laboratory, Dr. Litao Tao of Creighton University in Omaha, and additional researchers. The findings were published in the journal Science Advances.

Why Hearing Loss Is Permanent

Hearing loss is often caused by damage to hair cells in the cochlea – cells responsible for detecting sound and converting it into electrical signals transmitted to the brain. Unlike many other species, mammals, including humans, are unable to regenerate these cells once they are damaged, making the loss permanent.

Discovering Cells That Can Regenerate

Using live tissue imaging and single-cell multi-omics methods, the researchers focused on supporting cells – cells adjacent to the hair cells that, under normal conditions, cannot regenerate or transform into hair cells. To explore whether and how this limitation could be overcome, the research team inhibited the Notch signaling pathway, a key communication mechanism between cells that is responsible for hair cell differentiation during embryonic development. The team uncovered a rare subset of supporting cells with an unexpected regenerative potential. Rather than responding uniformly, only a distinct group of cells entered a transitional state and began converting into hair cells.

These cells, termed transdifferentiating Deiters’ cells (tDCs), are capable of making the transition from supporting cells to hair cells – a step that is essential for hair cell regeneration. The researchers found that these cells exhibit unique genetic and epigenetic characteristics, enabling them to respond to stimulation and initiate the regeneration process.

Live imaging of the cochlear sensory epithelium: Supporting cells are shown in green and hair cells in red.

The researchers note that a deeper understanding of the mechanisms that allow certain cells to regenerate may pave the way for the development of innovative treatments that activate this regenerative ability in additional cells. Future approaches may involve a combination of genetic and epigenetic interventions designed to bypass existing biological barriers. According to the research team, this represents a significant step toward the development of regenerative treatments for hearing loss – a field in which no restorative medical solutions currently exist, only assistive measures such as hearing aids and cochlear implants and limited gene therapy.

“A First but Significant Step”

Prof. Karen Avraham concludes: “Our study shows that even in tissues long considered incapable of regeneration, such as the cochlea of the inner ear, there is in fact a hidden regenerative capacity, though it is very limited and appears only in a rare subpopulation of cells. The major challenge now is to understand how this ability can be expanded and activated in additional cells. If we succeed in doing this, we may lay the foundation for the development of innovative biological treatments that restore hearing, rather than merely compensate for its loss. This is a first but significant step toward a deeper understanding of regeneration in the auditory system and in neural systems in general.”

The study was supported by a Breakthrough Research grant from the Israel Science Foundation, the Ernest and Bonnie Beutler Research Program of Excellence in Genomic Medicine, and the Sagol Center for Regenerative Medicine at Tel Aviv University.

Toward Needle-Free Blood Tests

Written by Hilary on 25 June 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

Researchers from Tel Aviv University and Sheba Medical Center developed an AI system that detects anemia and estimates key blood markers using a short eye scan.

A new collaborative study by Tel Aviv University and Sheba Medical Center marks a significant advance toward non-invasive blood testing, one of the most significant unmet needs in the market.

Researchers have developed an artificial intelligence-based system capable of assessing hemoglobin levels and red blood cell counts using a short video recording of the blood vessels in the eye’s conjunctiva, the transparent membrane covering the white part of the eye, without the need for a needle prick or blood draw.

The study was conducted by Tamir Denis, a master’s graduate of Tel Aviv University, in collaboration with the research groups of Prof. Haim Suchowski of the School of Physics and Astronomy and Prof. Lior Wolf of the Blavatnik School of Computer Science and AI, together with researchers from Sheba Medical Center: Prof. Ygal Rotenstreich, Head of the Electrophysiology Clinic and Retinal Research Laboratory, and Dr. Ifat Sher-Rosenthal, Research Director, and Head of the Restorative Retinal Lab. The findings were published in the scientific journal npj Digital Medicine, part of the Nature portfolio of journals.

Blood tests are among the most commonly performed medical procedures worldwide, yet they still rely on invasive blood sampling and complex laboratory processing. Previous attempts focused on anatomical sites failed to demonstrate significant correlation. The researchers note that this new technology could eventually enable faster and more accessible testing, particularly in regions where access to healthcare services is limited. The study highlights that anemia is one of the most prevalent medical conditions in the world, affecting approximately 30% of the global population.

Turning Eye Videos into Blood Data

The study presents a technology called Video-to-Vessels, which converts high-magnification video recordings of the tiny blood vessels in the eye’s conjunctiva into a compact digital representation of vascular structure and blood-flow dynamics. This information is then fed into an artificial intelligence system trained to identify correlations between blood-flow characteristics and key blood markers, such as hemoglobin (Hb) levels and red blood cell (RBC) counts.

The study included 224 participants who underwent both standard blood tests and imaging of the conjunctiva using a 50x magnification RGB camera. Ten-second video recordings were collected from both eyes of each participant.

The study’s principal finding was that the system achieved a relatively high accuracy rate of 82.8% in detecting anemia. In addition, a strong correlation was found between the system’s predictions and laboratory results for both hemoglobin levels and red blood cell counts.

Why Tiny Blood Vessels Matter

According to the researchers, one of the most notable examples of the system’s capabilities was its ability to detect subtle differences among extremely thin blood vessels. The study found that these vessels provided the most accurate information for predicting hemoglobin levels. The researchers explain that in very narrow vessels, blood cells move in single file, making it easier to identify blood-flow patterns and changes associated with hemoglobin concentration. Models trained exclusively on these small vessels achieved significantly better results than those based on larger vessels.

Another key finding was the importance of video processing. The researchers demonstrated that stabilizing eye movements and removing digital noise significantly improved the system’s performance. When these steps were omitted from the process, the predictive correlation declined by 38% for hemoglobin and by 19% for red blood cell counts.

From Proof of Concept to Future Applications

The researchers emphasize that this remains a proof-of-concept study, and that broader, more diverse studies will be needed before the technology can be implemented in clinical practice. Nevertheless, they believe that it could eventually be developed into a compact handheld device to serve as a first-line screening tool in clinics, community healthcare settings, and even at home.

“A New Source of Physiological Information”

Tamir Denis explains: “One of the things that fascinated us most is the fact that in this region of the eye, not only can you see the blood vessels, but in some cases, you can actually observe the blood flow itself. This makes the conjunctiva a unique and highly compelling area for research. For us, this represents a new source of physiological information that, when combined with image processing and artificial intelligence, could entirely transform both the testing experience and access to it in the future. Our study is a first step in that direction. What excited me about this research from the very beginning was the sense that it has the potential to make a real difference in people’s lives, especially in places where access to medical infrastructure is limited.”

Prof. Ygal Rotenstreich concludes:

“We view this study as a significant step toward the development of a new generation of non-invasive medical tests.

The ability to extract information about a person’s blood profile using only a short video of blood vessels in the eye demonstrates the enormous potential of combining physics, optics, and artificial intelligence in medicine. Although this is still an early-stage study, the results are very encouraging and point to the future possibility of performing faster, simpler, and more accessible screening tests, even outside the hospital setting. We believe that technologies of this kind could eventually improve access to medical diagnosis and ease the burden on patients around the world.”

The research was supported in part by Israel’s Ministry of Innovation, Science and Technology.

Tel Aviv University Ranked No. 1 in Israel in the QS World University Rankings 2027

Written by Hilary on 22 June 2026. Posted in Newsroom.

Tel Aviv University has once again been ranked as Israel’s leading university in the prestigious QS World University Rankings 2027. One of the world’s most influential measures of academic excellence, the QS rankings evaluated more than 1,500 universities from around the globe this year.

According to the rankings, TAU placed 208th worldwide, ahead of all other Israeli universities. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem ranked 218th, while the Technion ranked 334th. This year’s global top three are MIT, Stanford University, and the University of Oxford.

TAU’s performance was particularly impressive in the Citations per Faculty indicator, where it ranked 29th in the world. This measure, which accounts for 20% of the overall QS score, is considered one of the key indicators of research quality and international impact. It reflects the extent to which the university’s scientific publications influence the global academic community.

The QS World University Rankings are among the most respected and influential rankings in higher education. Each year, QS evaluates approximately 1,500 universities worldwide across a range of indicators, including research impact, academic reputation, graduate employability, and internationalization. The rankings are based on approximately 17.5 million academic papers and 240,000 interviews with academics and employers worldwide.

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