There’s no shortage of health food trends on TikTok, but which ones are actually sensible? And should you skip any of them altogether? We asked registered dietitian Vanessa Rissetto, and here’s what you need to know.

Emily Mariko’s Salmon Bowl

Made with rice, baked salmon, soy sauce and spicy mayo — and to be clear, there are a lot of different variations of it online — this passes Rissetto’s test because it’s healthy, fast, easy and has good flavor.

Rissetto says that while she would recommend this recipe, she would also suggest changing the white rice for brown rice for increased nutrients and more fiber.

Healthy Cookie Dough

Cookie dough that’s healthy? This is too good to be true, right? The answer is probably yes.

Rissctto says that while this may be healthy, it probably doesn’t taste good.

“I’m certain this tastes like cardboard, ”she said. “If you don’t care about taste — then this is for you.”

Lettuce Water For Sleep

While harmless, the TikTok trend of pouring boiling water over romaine lettuce leaves to make “lettuce water” for better sleep probably won’t cure your sleep disorder — and it probably doesn’t taste great, either.

“This is not a thing. There’s no evidence to prove it,” Rissetto said. “Instead, steep a banana peel in boiling water to help aid with sleep.”

Nature’s Cereal

As Rissetto points out, it’s basically a fruit smoothie bowl.

“I am all for having berries and coconut water,” she said. “Nutrition-wise, this has lots of vitamins, antioxidants and fiber. It’s basically a fruit salad that would be super refreshing on a hot day or post-workout.”

Consider the following statement: “My husband bought me a pink Lamborghini...” The correct way to finish the sentence, according to some, is not showing appreciation or acting excited, but to complain about the pricy gift. If you say, “The color is so ugly, men have such bad taste!” Congratulations, you have mastered the “Versailles (凡尔赛) literature.”

The term has nothing to do with the French palace nor with literature. It came from the Japanese manga series “The Rose of Versailles” and was coined by a Chinese influencer earlier this year. This new kind of bragging (吹嘘) is called humblebragging, the psychology behind which is to be recognized for one's successes and be liked by others at the same time. “The humblebragger recognizes that it's hard to be liked and be a showoff at the same time,” said psychologist Dr. Susan KraussWhitbourne at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

In an article titled “Why people hate humblebragging” published in Psychology Today, Whitbourne noted that the humblebrag is a “strategy in pursuit of respect” because it draws attention to one's accomplishments, but in a roundabout (迂回的) fashion.

However, studies on social media users show that humblebragging, as a self-promotion strategy does not work. In the essay, “Humblebragging: A distinct-and ineffective-self-presentation strategy,” researcher Ovul Sezer concluded from his research that humblebraggers are perceived more negatively than straight braggers due to the former's insincerity. “The critical factor telling these strategies was sincerity. People don't like braggers, but they at least see them as more sincere than humblebraggers.”

“So, next time if you hear ‘My husband bought me a pink Lamborghini. The color is so ugly, men have such bad taste!’. Just pretend you don’t get whatever it is they try to show off.” a Zhihu user advised others on how to respond to a “pretentious narcissist”, “Respond with genuine sympathy for their complaint.”

Fireflies that light up dark backyards on warm summer evenings use their luminescence (发光) for communication — to attract a mate or scare away enemies.

These shiny fireflies also inspired scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They built electroluminescent soft artificial muscles for flying, insect-size robots. The tiny artificial muscles that control the robots’ wings send out colored light during flight.

This electroluminescence could enable the robots to communicate with each other. If sent on a search-and-rescue task into a fallen building, for instance, a robot that finds survivors could use lights to signal others and call for help.

The ability to send out light also brings these tiny robots one step closer to flying on their own outside the lab. These robots are so lightweight that they can’t carry sensors, so researchers must track them using big infrared (红外线的) cameras that don’t work well outdoors. Now, they’ve shown that they can track the robots exactly using the light they send out and just three smartphone cameras.

“If you think of large-size robots, they can communicate using a lot of different tools. But for a tiny robot, we are forced to think about new modes of communication. This is a major step toward flying these robots in outdoor environments where we don’t have a state-of-the-art tracking system,” says Kevin Chen, who is the senior author of the paper. He and his team members did this by putting tiny electroluminescent particles into the artificial muscles. The process adds just 2.5 percent more weight without impacting the flight performance of the robot.

Joining Chen on the paper are Electrical Engineering and Computer Science graduate students Suhan Kim, the lead author, Yi-Hsuan Hsiao, and Jie Mao, an associate professor at Ningxia University. The research was published in IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters.