Underwater core samples, like these from the coast of England, often contain coded historical messages.Wessex Archaeology via Flickr“Out of sight, out of mind” is the usual attitude…

In November of last year, Jan Scheuermann did something she never thought she would do again: She fed herself a piece of chocolate. For the last decade Scheuermann, 54, has been a…

Earlier today three US-based researchers shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their research on vesicles, special structures that ferry all kinds of molecules around…

Before noon in the Soconusco region of southern Chiapas, down by the border where Mexico meets Guatemala, the lush, green terrain is rife with bodies in motion. It is an area abutting…

Entomologist Richard Karban knows how to get sagebrush talking. To start the conversation, he poses as a grasshopper or a chewing beetle—he uses scissors to cut leaves on one of…

Back in 2000, before MRSA—Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus—had become a household word, Nobel Laureate Joshua Lederberg wrote in the journal Science that “the future…

Some cancer therapies focus the attention of the immune system like a spotlight over Hollywood.Everett Collection / ShutterstockIn early May, 1891, William Coley, a New York surgeon,…

Fame is something that sticks to someone or something, a quality earned or gained for no reason at all. It is also a force of connection. A famous person or thing forms a hub in a…

 Long before we’re born, each person is a genetic snowflake. Wilson Bentley (public domain)When you think of fame, you probably picture Hollywood A-listers, big-time political players,…

When talking about our health, we tend to refer breezily to “the immune system,” as if it were as simple as an electric fence keeping out invaders. And there’s certainly an electric…