Not all medicines are meant to be taken with food. In fact, some medicines work better if you take them on an empty stomach. It’s all rather complicated, but it’s important to get it right. Is It Bad to Take Pills On an Empty Stomach?Some medications, including NSAIDs, corticosteroids, certain antibiotics, and medicines that lower blood sugar, need to be taken with food for various reasons.NSAIDsOne reason for taking medications with food is to protect the stomach. Some drugs, such as NSAID ...read more

Supernovas are such massive violent explosions that they can create and change the very nature of elements, scattering them into the universe to be absorbed by new planets, stars, and even life itself.That all sounds great — unless it happens in your cosmic backyard. If our own Sun were to go supernova, it would certainly take Earth along with it.But could our Sun ever go supernova? The easy answer is no, because it lacks either of the two main conditions that can cause a supernova.“Our Sun ...read more

Shakespeare said, “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet,” however, he had probably never heard of a fried egg jellyfish or a penis snake. Whether it’s the depths of the sea, the rivers of Brazil, or the trees of New Zealand, there are animals abound with frightening, silly, and downright unusual names. Of all the species surviving and thriving on our great planet, here are six animals with strange names.1. Pink Fairy Armadillo (Chlamyphorus truncatus)[embedded content]Pink fairy a ...read more

Admit it: After you blow your nose or aggressively clear your throat, you might steal a glimpse at what your body just discharged — maybe not every time, but every once in a while. Just a quick peek. There’s nothing weird about that. You’re simply checking that everything looks right. At a time of year (and an era in history) when people are particularly concerned about respiratory health, it only makes sense to occasionally inspect your output, as it were, to be sure things are working no ...read more

A feral kitten in Omaha, Nebraska, tested positive for rabies in November 2023. It died of the raccoon variant of the virus, which is typically found only in the Appalachian Mountains. Detecting this variant hundreds of miles away in the Midwest raised concerns about a potential outbreak and launched a public health task force to vaccinate all raccoons in the area.While the case was likely contained, a better understanding of how rabies is transmitted can help prevent future outbreaks. Researc ...read more

Jet black, hair-like feathers. Vivid blue heads adorned with a spongy crest. Most strikingly, a pair of leathery looking feet, armed with a 12 centimeter talon.This is the cassowary, one of the largest and also most dangerous birds in the world. Though it looks like it walked right out of prehistory, it roams the land Down Under. It’s got a killer reputation – quite literally, as cassowaries are among the few bird species that boasts human fatalities on their rosters.But how dangerous is the ...read more

Schizophrenia can produce persistent delusions, hallucinations, and disorganized thinking. The precise cause is unknown but seems to involve a combination of genetics and environmental risk factors. One environmental factor may be an infectious agent, such as the common parasite Toxoplasma gondii, which causes toxoplasmosis. Since cats can transmit Toxoplasma to humans, scientists have been investigating whether there is a link between cat ownership and schizophrenia. Many studies have tried to ...read more

About 225 million years ago, at the very dawn of mammalian existence, the creatures that humans and all other extant mammals would descend from were diminutive creatures about the size of a shrew.This handicap on size placed them squarely on the dinner plate of dinosaurs, and many other larger creatures that lived on our planet at the time. It may also be the reason that their ancestors, including humans, don’t live longer than we do.“The hypothesis is that mammals spent 100 million years du ...read more

At one time, traveling to space seemed impossible. But now, hundreds of people have left Earth’s atmosphere and drifted in outer space. While there is still much to explore, thanks to researchers and astronauts, some cosmic mysteries have been uncovered. For example, we know that one of the many differences between Earth and outer space is the amount of gravity. According to NASA, there is only a small amount of gravity in space, unlike Earth, where the force consistently pulls us downward an ...read more

Dick Coffee attended 781 consecutive University of Alabama football games. Meg Roh surfed through illness, storms and nightfall to maintain a seven-year daily surfing streak. Jon Sutherland ran at least 1 mile every day for over 52 years.An activity streak has the power to compel behavior, and marketers have taken note. Marketing researchers Jackie Silverman and Alixandra Barasch recently documented 101 unique instances, including Snapchat, Candy Crush Saga, Wordle and the Duolingo lang ...read more