Health & Medicine

Health & Medicine

Fattening Carbs—Some Promote Obesity and Worse

Easily digestible carbohydrates induce obesity and liver disease in a test on rodents.

Health & Medicine

The Breast Solution

Reversing earlier advice, health authorities now say that babies of HIV-positive mothers in poor countries have a better chance of avoiding infection if they feed only on breast milk that's not supplemented with other food.

Health & Medicine

Warming to a Cold War Herb

Benefiting from decades of research that took place behind the Iron Curtain, Western physicians are discovering Rhodiola rosea, a cold-weather herb that purportedly fights fatigue and boosts energy.

Health & Medicine

Brain Sabotage: Alzheimer’s protein may spawn miniseizures

Amyloid-beta, a protein implicated in Alzheimer's disease, causes misfiring of neurons and minor brain seizures in mice.

Health & Medicine

Debate Renewed: Diabetes drug ups heart risk

A popular diabetes drug significantly increases the risk of heart failure and heart attack in those who take it.

Health & Medicine

Blood vessel growth factor also does housekeeping

A growth factor that promotes blood vessel development also maintains normal blood vessel health, perhaps explaining the vascular side effects of some cancer drugs.

Health & Medicine

How platelets help cancer spread

A tumor cell protein influences blood platelets in a way that helps a cancer spread through the body.

Health & Medicine

Curry Power

A component of the spice turmeric, the color-giving ingredient in yellow curries, may help prevent and possibly treat Alzheimer's disease.

Health & Medicine

Aura origins show the way in epilepsy surgery

Epilepsy patients who experience multiple auras before a seizure, usually considered poor candidates for corrective brain surgery, might benefit from by a new brain scan procedure.

Health & Medicine

HIV is double trouble for brain

The virus that causes AIDS can also cause dementia, by both killing mature brain cells and blocking the creation of new ones.

Health & Medicine

Bad Bug: Microbe raises stomach cancer risk

A gene in some strains of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori may greatly increase the risk of stomach cancer.

Health & Medicine

When antioxidants go bad

Overproduction of antioxidants, usually thought to be beneficial, is the cause of an inherited heart disease.