Humans
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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
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Health & MedicineCommon antibiotic may cure river blindness
Tests in cows suggest that tetracycline might kill the tiny worm that spreads river blindness, a disease that infects about 18 million people.
By Nathan Seppa -
HumansFrom the June 14, 1930, issue
1,500,000,000 YEARS OF LIFE PORTRAYED IN GREAT HALL OF PAINTINGS Fifteen hundred million years of life on this planet will be unrolled as a single connected epic in a series of three majestic new halls planned for the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. Fossils, rocks, mounted plant and animal specimens, paintings, and statuary […]
By Science News -
Health & MedicineImaging Parkinson’s
A new brain-imaging technique can supply proof of Parkinson's disease in people whose symptoms fall short of the standard definition of the disease.
By Nathan Seppa -
Health & MedicineZapping bone brings relief from tumor pain
By unleashing radio waves inside bone, researchers have stopped intractable pain in people with cancer that has spread to their skeletons.
By Nathan Seppa -
Health & MedicineBilirubin: Both villain and hero?
Bilirubin, which causes jaundice in newborns, may protect against cellular damage.
By John Travis -
Health & MedicineIn Silico Medicine
Medical researchers are increasingly turning to computer simulations to help them understand the complexity of living systems, design better drugs, and treat patients more effectively.
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Health & MedicineAn alternate approach to Parkinson’s
While levodopa is the treatment of choice for Parkinson's disease, drugs called dopamine agonists, which mimic the neurotransmitter dopamine, may work as well early in the disease, cause fewer side effects, and preserve levodopa's effectiveness.
By Nathan Seppa -
Health & MedicineBypass surgery in elderly works fine
Coronary bypass surgery works as well in people over age 75 as it does in people 15 years younger.
By Nathan Seppa -
HumansFrom the December 10, 1932, issue
CALVES RETAIN PART OF WILD THINGS’ CHARM Cows are prosaic. Like all the rest of us who have grown into maturity and (alas!) responsibility, they have their workaday jobs in a workaday world, seeing to it that we get butter and, eventually, beefsteaks. But calves still have something reminiscent of the long-lost wild freedom of […]
By Science News -
Health & MedicineHome Cooking on the Wane
Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Passover are among the few holidays on which home-cooked meals remain the norm. On most other days of the year, a large and growing share of U.S. diners happily leave the cooking of at least one meal to professionals. Eating in. Eating out. Home cooking used to signify meals with a healthy […]
By Janet Raloff -
Health & MedicineCluster Bombs: Metabolic syndrome tied to heart disease deaths
Men with a certain cluster of metabolic characteristics are about three times as likely to die of heart disease as men without the traits are.
By Ben Harder -
Health & MedicineJarring Result: Extreme biking can hurt men’s fertility
Men who maintain grueling mountain-bicycling programs are apt to have lower sperm counts than nonbikers are.
By Nathan Seppa