Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Health & Medicine
Fat Fuels PCB Damage: Diet influences toxic effects leading to heart disease
Certain types of dietary fats can magnify PCB damage to artery cells in a way that sets the stage for cardiovascular disease.
- Health & Medicine
Drug-resistant staph causes more pneumonia
A recently discovered variant of Staphylococcus aureus that is resistant to some antibiotics became a major cause of severe pneumonia among people who caught the flu last winter.
- Health & Medicine
Kids’ vaccine guards adults too, for now
Serious infections caused by pneumococcus have decreased in both children and adults since the introduction of a childhood vaccine against seven strains of the bacterium, but other pneumococcus strains are now becoming more prevalent among adults with HIV.
- Health & Medicine
Human antibody halts SARS in hamsters
Human-derived antibodies can not only prevent infections when given in advance of SARS exposure but also mitigate the symptoms of an infection already in progress.
- Humans
What’s Wrong with This Picture?
Scientists and educators increasingly are using analyses of bad science in movies, as well as the good, to inform the public about scientific facts and principles.
- Health & Medicine
Vitamin D: What’s Enough?
Most researchers studying vitamin D agree that many people would benefit from more of the vitamin, but they haven't yet decided just how much.
- Humans
From the October 6, 1934, issue
Glass models of rotifers, anthrax as a threat among agricultural workers, and cosmic-ray studies in the stratosphere.
- Humans
Scrubbing Down: Free soap, hygiene tips cut kids’ illnesses
In urban slums, enhancing family hygiene can prevent about half of childhood diarrhea and respiratory illnesses, including pneumonia, even among infants too young to wash themselves.
- Anthropology
Evolution’s Buggy Ride: Lice leap boldly into human-origins fray
A controversial genetic analysis of lice raises the possibility that some type of physical contact occurred between ancient humans and Homo erectus, probably in eastern Asia between 50,000 and 25,000 years ago.
- Humans
Nobel prizes: The sweet smell of success
Nobel prizes in the sciences went to research on olfactory genes, subatomic particles, and the molecular kiss of death.
- Health & Medicine
Carotid Overhaul: Stents and surgery go neck and neck
Mesh cylinders called stents work as well as or slightly better than surgery in opening blocked carotid arteries in high-risk patients.
- Health & Medicine
Turmeric component kills cancer cells
Curcumin, the component of turmeric that makes the spice yellow, shows anticancer effects in lab-dish tests and in experiments on mice.
