Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Health & Medicine
Phytochemical Beauty
Our Food For Thought column recently published two offerings on health-related findings about genistein, a soybean constituent. Ever wonder what that chemical looks like? Or how about capsaicin—the spicy agent in hot chilies being explored as a painkiller, lycopene—the red pigment in watermelons that may protect our skin against harmful ultraviolet rays, or sulforaphane—a trace […]
- Health & Medicine
Brain Seasoning: A common spice could deter Alzheimer’s
A compound in the curry spice turmeric restores the ability of immune system cells to destroy plaques linked to Alzheimer's disease.
- Health & Medicine
Persistent Prions: Soilbound agents are more potent
Prions, deformed proteins that cause brain-destroying diseases such as chronic wasting disease or mad cow disease, are more infectious when bound to soil particles.
- Health & Medicine
AIDS Abated: Genome scans illuminate immune control of HIV
Three genetic variations picked out by powerful whole-genome scans help explain why some people develop AIDS quickly while others keep it at bay.
- Health & Medicine
fryPod: Lightning strikes iPod users
A jogger wearing an iPod music player suffered second-degree ear and neck burns, burst eardrums, and jaw fractures after lightning struck a nearby tree.
- Health & Medicine
Brain stem cells help Parkinson’s monkeys
Transplants of human-brain stem cells triggered signs of improvement in monkeys with a Parkinson's disease–like disorder.
- Humans
Letters from the July 21, 2007, issue of Science News
Quantum leak? Perhaps there need not be “degrees of quantumness” (“Degrees of Quantumness: Shades of gray in particle-wave duality,” SN: 5/12/07, p. 292). As the beams pass increasingly closer to the surface, the plate will induce a small (but increasingly larger) spread of energies (hence wavelengths) in the electrons within the beam, possibly explaining the […]
- Humans
From the July 10, 1937, issue
Photographing the earliest developmental stages of opossum eggs, a 'heavy electron' in cosmic rays, and teaching chimpanzees to use sign language.
- Health & Medicine
Smoke This: Parkinson’s is rarer among tobacco users
Life-long smoking cuts the chance of getting Parkinson's disease by about half.
- Health & Medicine
Tumor Suicide: Gene therapy makes cancer cells self-destruct
Microscopic bubbles of fat that deliver a suicide gene to tumor cells show success in treating pancreatic cancer in mice.
- Health & Medicine
Hepatitis B drug creates HIV resistance
A hepatitis B drug spurs resistance to HIV drugs in people infected with both diseases.
- Health & Medicine
Mouse method turns skin cells to stem cells
Reprogrammed mouse skin cells that act as stem cells may offer an alternative for research involving embryos.
