Health & Medicine

  1. Health & Medicine

    Beating two infections with one vaccine

    Identifying key similarities between related viruses could enable researchers to coax some vaccines to do double duty.

    By Ben Harder
  2. Health & Medicine

    Spice component versus cancer cells

    Curcumin, a compound in the spice turmeric, teams up with an immune-system protein to kill prostate cancer cells in a new laboratory study.

    By Nathan Seppa
  3. Health & Medicine

    A Cold Observation about Wine (with recipe)

    Show this story to your boss, and she might just offer you a glass or two of wine. After all, downing this beverage–especially the red varieties–appears to help ward off the common cold, according to a new study. Though colds usually arent dire, they remain one of the leading causes of missed days at work. […]

    By Janet Raloff
  4. Health & Medicine

    Feel the Burn: Alcohol sets pain-sensing nerves aflame

    Alcohol makes certain pain-generating nerves trigger more easily than normal.

    By John Travis
  5. Health & Medicine

    Hidden Damage: Parkinson’s harm to nerves in heart may explain dizziness and fainting

    Parkinson's disease patients have damaged nerve endings in the heart, kidneys, and thyroid gland, suggesting the disease harms the autonomic nervous system that regulates involuntary functions of these and other organs and glands.

    By Nathan Seppa
  6. Health & Medicine

    Could nicotine patch fight depression?

    Chronic nicotine administration blocked a symptom of depression in an animal model of the disease.

    By Janet Raloff
  7. Health & Medicine

    Fetal stress begets adult hypertension

    Intense stress during pregnancy may program the baby's development in ways that foster high blood pressure during adulthood.

    By Janet Raloff
  8. Health & Medicine

    With this bait, TB won’t play possum

    An oral tuberculosis vaccine, designed to help curtail the spread of the disease in wildlife populations, may also find use in people.

    By Janet Raloff
  9. Health & Medicine

    No benefit from screening

    Two large studies confirm that a urine test for a common childhood cancer—neuroblastoma—offers no benefit.

    By Damaris Christensen
  10. Health & Medicine

    Cancer Link Cooks Up Doubt: Heating may form potential carcinogen in food

    Foods cooked at high temperatures contain large concentrations of acrylamide, a compound suspected to cause cancer in people, but researchers are cautious about acting on preliminary, unpublished data.

    By Ben Harder
  11. Health & Medicine

    Virus gives cancer the cold treatment

    A genetically engineered version of a common cold virus appears to kill cancer cells without harming healthy tissue.

    By Damaris Christensen
  12. Health & Medicine

    Deadly Pickup: Enzyme permits plague germ to ride in fleas

    Acquisition of a gene that enables the plague bacterium to live inside blood-sucking fleas may have set the stage for the Black Death.

    By John Travis