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Health

New Research

Sherpas Evolved to Live and Work at Altitude

The Nepali ethnic group handles oxygen more efficiently, allowing them to more easily live in the mountains

Chocolate, coffee and tea all played a role in overturning a medical theory that had dominated the Western world for more than a millennium.

How Coffee, Chocolate and Tea Overturned a 1,500-Year-Old Medical Mindset

The humoral system dominated medicine since the Ancient Greeks—but it was no match for these New World beverages

New Research

Glue Made of Mussel Slime Could Prevent Scarring

The glue, infused with a version of the protein decorin, healed wounds in rats, giving them skin with hair follicles and oil glands instead of scar tissue

A woman wears a mask to protect against air pollution in Anyang. New research shows that Northeastern China could get more polluted when there is lest dust in the air.

New Research

Dust May Help, Not Harm, Air Pollution in China

When it comes to some of Earth’s smoggiest cities, less dust isn’t necessarily better

Ultrasonic “tractor beam”

Five Ways Ultrasound Is Changing Medicine, Martian Exploration and Even Your Phone

If you thought ultrasound was only for prenatal care, think again

A nurse suits up in Liberia before entering an Ebola red zone in 2015. Now, a single case of Ebola has been confirmed in Congo by the World Health Organization.

Trending Today

Ebola Returns to the Democratic Republic of Congo

A single death has been confirmed—now public health officials must keep an outbreak from becoming an epidemic

A researchers examines some of the graves unearthed in 2013

Trending Today

Thousands of Bodies Rest Under the University of Mississippi Medical Center Campus

The University hopes to remove the bodies and build a memorial and laboratory to study the former insane asylum patients

Frances Oldham Kelsey, a pharmacologist with the Food & Drug Administration, helped prevent a generation of children born with congenital deformities in the United States.

Women Who Shaped History

The Woman Who Stood Between America and a Generation of ‘Thalidomide Babies’

How the United States escaped a national tragedy in the 1960s

Drinking fountain on the Halifax County Courthouse (North Carolina) in April 1938.

New Research

Racism Harms Children’s Health, Survey Finds

Racism may not be a disease, exactly. But a growing body of research finds that it has lasting physical and mental effects on its victims

This memorial to the victims of Nazi Germany's "euthanasia" program was erected in Berlin in 2000.

Trending Today

German Scientists Will Study Brain Samples of Nazi Victims

A research society is still coming to grips with its past—and learning more about how the Third Reich targeted people with disabilities

Environmental chemists are developing a method that could suck toxic metals out of marine environments.

How Electrified Steel Could Suck Toxic Metals From the Ocean

After a century of strip mining and deforestation, New Caldonia researchers are working to de-contaminate marine waters

Fruit bats are thought to be the natural host for the Ebola virus. Groups like USAID PREDICT regularly monitor such diseases in wildlife to prevent the jump from animal to humans.

The Next Pandemic

Can Saving Animals Prevent the Next Deadly Pandemic?

A global disease monitoring network is banking on the idea that healthier wildlife means healthier humans

During World War I, a critical shaving tool caused critical illness in hundreds of people.

World War I: 100 Years Later

How Shaving Brushes Gave World War I Soldiers Anthrax

A new paper looks back on an old epidemic—and raises fresh questions about antique shaving brushes

Unlikely savior: The remarkable properties of spaghnum moss help preserve long-dead bodies, sequester carbon and even heal wounds.

World War I: 100 Years Later

How Humble Moss Healed the Wounds of Thousands in World War I

The same extraordinary properties that make this plant an “ecosystem engineer” also helped save human lives

New Research

Dog Genome Project Reveals Secrets of Canine Family Tree

Researchers have been barking up the same tree for over 20 years

The Innovative Spirit fy17

In an Emergency, You’ll Want This Hi-Tech First Aid Kit

Ram Fish, founder and CEO of 19Labs, talks about developing his clinic-in-a-box

Ensilicated proteins

Innovation for Good

Keeping Vaccines Safe in Tiny “Cages”

By encasing vaccines in silica, researchers could eliminate the need to refrigerate them during transportation

Hemingway led a life of adventure and, sometimes, violence. The author is shown here holding a tommy gun aboard the Pilar in 1935.

Multiple Concussions May Have Sped Hemingway’s Demise, a Psychiatrist Argues

The troubled author may have suffered from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, the disease that plagues modern football players

A baby in Ghana rests underneath a mosquito net. Ghana will become one of three African countries to pilot the new malaria vaccine in 2018.

Trending Today

Hundreds of Thousands of Babies Will Receive World’s First Malaria Vaccine

The pilot program will focus on Kenya, Ghana and Malawi—countries at the center of the global malaria crisis

This map of London shows it around the time of John Gaunt's work.

People Have Been Using Big Data Since the 1600s

A humble hatmaker was among the first to compile data on how Londoners lived—and died

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