Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Health & Medicine
Origins of the swine flu virus
Researchers use evolutionary history to trace the early days of the pandemic.
- Health & Medicine
Stomach surgery helps obese adolescents
Laparoscopic banding surgery to limit appetite improves several health markers in obese adolescents.
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- Health & Medicine
Replacing microRNA for cancer treatment
Replacing missing microRNAs in cancer cells may open up a new field for cancer treatment.
- Health & Medicine
Stressed-out DNA turns mousy brown hair gray
Scientists show how change happens when cells responsible for colorful hair lose their self-renewing abilities.
- Health & Medicine
More troubling news about BPA
Animal studies link bisphenol A — a building block of hard, clear plastics that taints many foods — with new adverse health effects.
- Health & Medicine
Tuberculosis bacterium subverts basic cell functions
The tuberculosis microbe makes compounds that alter basic systems inside key immune cells, facilitating the bacterium’s survival in the body, new research shows.
- Health & Medicine
Hospitals’ drug problem
Hospitals often don't know pharmaceutical-waste rules, and even those that do often release huge quantities of drugs into the environment.
- Earth
The Maine way to get rid of drugs
Maine residents can soon send away old and unwanted drugs for free, "green" disposal.
- Humans
Children get social with virtual peers
Life-size 3-D versions of children can draw kids with autism into social encounters and more news from the annual meeting of the Jean Piaget Society in Park City, Utah, June 4-6.
- Humans
Autism care takes biological toll on mothers
Caring for teens and young adults with autism not only creates intense psychological pressure on mothers but may promote sharply decreased production of a crucial stress hormone, a long-term study suggests.
- Life
Huntington’s protein may have a crony
The mutant protein implicated in Huntington’s may rely on a second protein. The finding could help explain why only some neurons are vulnerable to the disease.
