Health & Medicine

  1. Health & Medicine

    Bad synergy

    Hookworm and other parasite infections work in concert to heighten risk of anemia in children. The problem may be especially bad for school-aged children, whose learning ability is often compromised by anemia.

    By Nathan Seppa
  2. Health & Medicine

    Microbes clean up mercury

    Researchers think a microbe could clean up mercury-laced Native American artifacts.

    By Rachel Ehrenberg
  3. Health & Medicine

    A Faulty Eye Witness: Hallucinations

    Treatment for Oliver Sacks' cancer damaged an eye and triggered something he never expected: his brain to display things that simply didn’t exist.

    By Janet Raloff
  4. Health & Medicine

    A Faulty Eye Witness, Part I

    Oliver Sacks shared observations from his latest journal on how losing sight in one eye changed a man's life. Sacks had intimate knowledge of every detail – because he’s the patient.

    By Janet Raloff
  5. Health & Medicine

    High doses

    Emergency room patients are exposed to high doses of radiation from CT scans and other nuclear medicine.

    By Tia Ghose
  6. Health & Medicine

    Reading minds … or at least brain scans

    By analyzing brain activity, computers can tell what word is on your mind.

    By Tia Ghose
  7. Health & Medicine

    Monkey think, robotic monkey arm do

    In a step toward someday making brain-controlled prosthetic arms for people, scientists have trained monkeys to control a robotic arm with their thoughts. Click on the image to read the story and see the video.

    By Patrick Barry
  8. Chemistry

    Kavli Awardees Named

    Norwegian Academy awards three novel and hefty prizes to three teams of scientists.

    By Janet Raloff
  9. Health & Medicine

    Gut feeling

    A bacterial compound can reverse intestinal disease in a mouse, providing the first example of a microbial product “networking” with the mammalian immune system to quell inflammation.

    By Nathan Seppa
  10. Health & Medicine

    Lead’s legacy

    High levels of lead in the blood during childhood are associated with smaller brains and with an increased risk for violent criminal behavior, report two new studies.

    By Rachel Ehrenberg
  11. Health & Medicine

    Stunning reversal

    A man’s irregular heartbeat returns to normal after he is shocked with a Taser, the first report of such an effect.

    By Nathan Seppa
  12. Health & Medicine

    Tracking obesity

    New data suggest that childhood obesity in the United States may have leveled off between 1999 and 2006.

    By Nathan Seppa