Health & Medicine

  1. Microbes

    Explainer: What you can do to fight antibiotic resistance

    Doctors and scientists are not the only people who can help preserve the effectiveness of life-saving antibiotics. Even patients have a role to play, as these tips show.

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  2. Microbes

    The HIV cure — that wasn’t

    Immediate and aggressive drug treatment of a baby born with HIV appeared to have cured the girl. In fact, a follow-up shows, she still has the disease.

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  3. Microbes

    Superbugs: A silent health emergency

    Have antibiotics become too popular? Overusing these medicines fuels resistant germs that pose a global health threat.

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  4. Microbes

    Explainer: Where antibiotics came from

    A mold proved the source of the first known antibiotic: penicillin. But chemical dyes would lead to the first antibiotics used in treating people.

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  5. Health & Medicine

    Sunlight makes pleasure chemical in the body

    A day on the beach might deliver more than a tan (or sunburn). It may also release potent brain chemicals that leave people with a pleasurable feeling.

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  6. Animals

    Cool Jobs: A whale of a time

    Studying blue whales, spinner dolphins and other cetaceans demands clever ways to unveil the out-of-sight behaviors of these marine denizens.

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  7. Genetics

    Owww! The science of pain

    No one likes pain, but it keeps us alive. That’s why scientists want to learn how best to coexist with this complicated and still somewhat mysterious sensation.

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  8. Earth

    Nifty science

    Inspired research put select high school seniors on the path to the 2014 Intel Science Talent Search finals.

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  9. Health & Medicine

    Beautiful nails may harbor germs

    Two students wondered why they weren’t allowed to wear fake nails as nursing assistants. They decided to use science to probe why. What they found sent them to the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair.

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  10. Health & Medicine

    For better weight control, fiber up!

    Certain types of fiber suppress appetite, at least in mice. Found in fruits, vegetables, oats and barley, this fiber breaks down in the gut to release acetate. That travels to the brain, where the chemical prompts the release of hunger-fighting hormones.

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  11. Health & Medicine

    Infected cutting boards

    Germs can hitchhike into the kitchen on meat and many types of produce. A new study finds that some of those germs are particularly nasty. They are immune to the one or more of the drugs doctors would prescribe to wipe out the infection.

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  12. Brain

    Ghosts in your head

    Many people see, feel and hear things that aren’t really there — despite how much their brain tries to convince them otherwise.

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