Humans

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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.

  1. Health & Medicine

    Prenatal Cares: Popular painkillers linked to miscarriage

    A new study finds that pregnant women taking nonprescription painkillers such as ibuprofen and aspirin have a higher risk of miscarriage.

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  2. Health & Medicine

    Guggul extract fails its cholesterol test

    Guggul extract, long used in parts of Asia and gaining popularity in Western countries as a weapon against high cholesterol, does not appear to work.

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  3. Health & Medicine

    Tuesday Can Be Fat, but Weekends Are More Fattening

    Unsuccessful weight watchers are well aware that the winter holiday season can bestow, besides gifts, a few extra pounds. But according to Barry M. Popkin of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, people seem to approach every weekend as a holiday: They eat and drink too much. For the average adult in the […]

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  4. Health & Medicine

    Viruses, but not bacteria, tied to mental decline

    Past infection by multiple common viruses may contribute to cognitive decline in some elderly people.

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  5. Health & Medicine

    Drug reduces risks for dialysis patients

    Kidney-dialysis patients getting the vitamin D drug paricalcitol survive longer than those getting a similar medication called calcitriol.

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  6. Health & Medicine

    Predicting Prostate Cancer’s Moves

    To guide treatment decisions in individual cases of prostate cancer, medical researchers are using gene-expression profiling and other novel techniques to develop better predictive markers of how a given tumor will behave.

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  7. Humans

    From the August 19, 1933, issue

    CONSTRUCTION BEGUN ON 80-INCH TEXAS TELESCOPE The giant 80-inch reflecting telescope that will spy upon the stars from McDonald Observatory, to be erected on a peak of Davis Mountains, Texas, is now under construction. A contract for the telescope has been approved by the University of Texas board of regents, and Warner and Swasey Company […]

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  8. Humans

    Small World After All: Short e-mail chains reach targets worldwide

    A large-scale study of e-mail users has borne out the notion that one person on the planet can reach any other person through a chain of about six social ties.

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  9. Health & Medicine

    Brawny Brains: Creatine pills may aid memory and cognition

    The popular muscle-building supplement creatine can boost performance on mental tests.

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  10. Health & Medicine

    Switching Off Pain: Modeling relief on the action of marijuana

    A new drug, tested in rats, blocks pain caused when the nervous system goes awry without producing unwanted side effects.

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  11. Humans

    In Search of a Scientific Revolution

    A year after self-publishing a best-selling book in which he proposes a new framework for doing science, Stephen Wolfram is taking new steps to transform science.

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  12. Health & Medicine

    Blood Sugar Fix

    A new class of experimental drugs that mimic the actions of the hormone glucagon-like peptide 1 shows benefits against type 2, or adult-onset, diabetes.

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