Health
How to Give a Ferret a Deadly Flu
The secret to airborne bird flu is out. Dutch researchers published a controversial paper yesterday that detailed how they caused a deadly strain of H5N1 bird flu to transform from a disease transmittable only through contact to one that could be transmitted through the air. The team used ferrets as test subjects, since they respond [...]
June 22, 2012 |
By Sarah Laskow
Your Kid’s New Dermatologists: Barney and Kung Fu Panda
Next time your kid has a pesky wart to remove, it could be everybody’s favorite big purple dinosaur who assists with the procedure. A new study indicates that children are less angsty when having their warts removed if they’ve first watched their favorite movie or TV show just before going under the knife. Reuters Health [...]
June 22, 2012 |
By Rachel Nuwer
Want to Be Healthy? Manage Your Microbes Like a Wildlife Park
Our bodies are slurries of living microbial organisms, without which we’d be rendered ill or worse. Science is only now on the cusp of unraveling the roles that only a handful of our 100 trillion microbes play to keep our bodily systems running smoothly. Carl Zimmer explains the emerging field of medical ecology in the [...]
June 20, 2012 |
By Rachel Nuwer
Glasses Let Doctors, Poker Players See Your Blood
More specifically, O2Amps, a new vision filtration system, could let me see your blood in vivid detail–right through your skin. And with that power, says vision researcher and glasses developer Mark Changizi, comes the ability to, “enhance one’s perception of the emotion, mood and health signals” of those around us. “That means people wearing shades don’t [...]
June 19, 2012 |
By Colin Schultz
What the Taliban and Jenny McCarthy Have in Common
Jenny McCarthy and Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a Taliban commander in Pakistan, have at least one thing in common: they are both paranoid about vaccination. Bahadur blocked a vaccination campaign, scheduled to start in a few days, that would have reached 161,000 children in North Waziristan. Unlike McCarthy, the Taliban commander is not worried that vaccinations [...]
June 18, 2012 |
By Sarah Laskow
Edible Dictionary: Lean Cuisine Syndrome
Where do Mayor Michael Bloomberg's statistics come from? People underestimate junk food and overestimate healthy food in dietary surveys
June 11, 2012 |
By Peter Smith
Mythology and the Raw Milk Movement
What's behind recent claims about a milky unpasteurized panacea?
May 09, 2012 |
By Peter Smith
The Shangri-La of Health Food
The Hunza people supposedly lived to be 100 and had a practically illness-free existence. The American infatuation with their lifestyle ended in a particularly dramatic fashion
April 30, 2012 |
By Peter Smith
Jose Andres and Other Toques of the Town Honor Alice Waters
What do you cook for famed chef Alice Waters? Washington's culinary celebrities faced this challenge at the unveiling of her portrait at the Smithsonian
January 31, 2012 |
By Jeanne Maglaty
A Closer Look at What You Eat
A photographer uses a scanning electron microscope to zoom in on everyday foods—and makes art
January 13, 2012 |
By Megan Gambino
Music Playlists to Soothe Your Mind
Neuropsychiatrist Galina Mindlin suggests that listening to particular songs on your mp3 player can make you a more productive person
January 2012 |
By Erica R. Hendry
Can a Picky Eater Change Her Ways?
Most expand their culinary horizons as they get older, but a few people hold fast to limited diets of safe, familiar things like chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese
December 16, 2011 |
By Lisa Bramen
The Gestational Diabetes Diet: Taking Carbs from a Pregnant Lady
The last thing a pasta-loving pregnant lady with a sweet tooth wants to hear is that she should cut out carbs
December 14, 2011 |
By Lisa Bramen
Is Licorice Dangerous?
Overindulgence in black licorice, according to the FDA, can cause potassium levels to fall, potentially leading to arrhythmia, a rise in blood pressure or other problems
November 01, 2011 |
By Jesse Rhodes
Is it Safe to Eat Roadkill?
Enough with the jokes already. Some people are serious about looking to the roadside for an alternative to mass-market meats
October 18, 2011 |
By Jesse Rhodes
Five Nobel Laureates Who Made Food History
These five Nobelists have made food safer or more available, or increased our knowledge of it
October 07, 2011 |
By Lisa Bramen
Is Home Economics Class Still Relevant?
"Too many Americans simply don't know how to cook," says a historian, and that has contributed to a health crisis
September 07, 2011 |
By Jesse Rhodes
Food For Emergency Situations
While it's hard to be the consummate kitchen maven in the face of disaster, it's still possible to manage food prep without a fully functional kitchen
August 25, 2011 |
By Jesse Rhodes
Sweet Garden Success
Meal planning has become like triage; we eat whatever is most urgently ripe
July 15, 2011 |
By Lisa Bramen
Insects as a Food Source
Entomophagy—the fancy Latin term for eating insects—is beginning to catch on in the Western Hemisphere
June 28, 2011 |
By Jesse Rhodes
