Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Health & Medicine
Early mRNA research that led to COVID-19 vaccines wins 2023 medicine Nobel Prize
Biochemists Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman devised mRNA modifications to make vaccines that trigger good immune responses instead of harmful ones.
- Health & Medicine
How a deadly fungus is so good at sticking to skin and other surfaces
One of Candida auris’ scary superpowers is its stick-to-itiveness. Unlike other fungi, the pathogen uses electrical charges to glom onto things.
- Health & Medicine
Here’s how much coronavirus people infected with COVID-19 may exhale
Just breathing naturally can lead people with COVID-19 to emit dozens of copies of viral RNA a minute and that can persist for eight days, a study finds.
- Health & Medicine
Mouth taping may be a trending sleep hack, but the science behind it is slim
Mouth taping is big on social media, but few studies have evaluated it. Some evidence suggests that sealing the lips shut may help people with sleep apnea.
- Health & Medicine
How brain implants are treating depression
This six-part series follows people whose lives have been changed by an experimental treatment called deep brain stimulation.
- Neuroscience
Today’s depression treatments don’t help everyone
In the second story in the series, deep brain stimulation is a last resort for some people with depression.
- Health & Medicine
The science behind deep brain stimulation for depression
The third part of the series explores the promising brain areas to target for deep brain stimulation for depression.
- Neuroscience
What’s it like to live with deep brain stimulation for depression?
The fourth article in the series explores the physical and emotional challenges of experimental brain implants for depression.
- Health & Medicine
There’s a stigma around brain implants and other depression treatments
The fifth article in the series asks why people are so uncomfortable with changing the brain.
- Neuroscience
What’s the future of deep brain stimulation for depression?
The final story of the series describes efforts to simplify and improve brain implants for severe depression.
- Anthropology
Interlocking logs may be evidence of the oldest known wooden structure
Roughly 480,000-year-old wooden find from Zambia suggests early hominids were more skilled at structuring their environments than scientists realized.
- Health & Medicine
Why sewage may hold the key to tracking diseases far beyond COVID-19
COVID-19, mpox and many other pathogens are detectable in wastewater, but public health officials are still figuring out how best to use those data.
