A quick surge of dopamine shifts mice into a dreamy stage of sleep. In the rodents’ brains, the chemical messenger triggers rapid-eye-movement sleep, or REM, researchers report in the March…
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How to interpret the CDC’s new mask guidelines
One moment, Campbell County in Wyoming’s northeastern corner was an area of high levels of transmission of the coronavirus, a scenario in which the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and…
Fecal transplant pills helped some peanut allergy sufferers in a small trial
PHOENIX — Pills loaded with bacteria from other people’s poop might help adults who are highly allergic to peanuts safely eat the nuts in small amounts. In a small clinical…
Marie Maynard Daly was a trailblazing biochemist, but her full story may be lost
Marie Maynard Daly is known as the first African American woman to receive a Ph.D. in chemistry, earned in 1947 from Columbia University. It’s a superlative often repeated in the…
‘Fresh Banana Leaves’ shows how Western conservation has harmed Indigenous people
Fresh Banana Leaves Jessica Hernandez North Atlantic Books, $17.95 During the civil war in El Salvador that began in the 1970s, an injured Victor Hernandez hid from falling bombs beneath…
Africa’s fynbos plants hold their ground with the world’s thinnest roots
Some plant roots draw a line in the sand — literally. In South Africa, you can move between cool, green forest and sunbaked shrubland in a single stride. These narrow…
How omicron’s mutations make it the most infectious coronavirus variant yet
In November, a new coronavirus variant took the world by storm. Omicron has since caused an unprecedented wave of infections, striking about 90 million people in just 10 weeks. That’s…
Why kitchen sponges are the perfect home for bacteria
Ask bacteria where they’d like to live, and they’ll answer: a kitchen sponge, please. Sponges are microbe paradises, capable of housing 54 billion bacteria per cubic centimeter. In addition to…
A UN report shows climate change’s escalating toll on people and nature
Neither adaptation by humankind nor mitigation alone is enough to reduce the risk from climate impacts, hundreds of the world’s scientists say. Nothing less than a concerted, global effort to…
