Sneezes have taken on many meanings throughout human history. Early Christians considered them divine signs or devilish tricks, while the ancient Greeks interpreted them as omens, both good and bad. But modern science has replaced all those superstitions with a physiological explanation: Sneezing is an integral part of the immune system, responsible for kicking out any material that tries to enter the body via the nasal passage. It’s essentially a defense mechanism, guarding against germs and ...read more

Elon Musk recently pronounced that the next Neuralink project will be a “Blindsight” cortical implant to restore vision: “Resolution will be low at first, like early Nintendo graphics, but ultimately may exceed normal human vision.”Unfortunately, this claim rests on the fallacy that neurons in the brain are like pixels on a screen. It’s not surprising that engineers often assume that “more pixels equals better vision.” After all, that is how monitors and phone screens work.In our n ...read more

China achieved a historic feat by bringing back the first-ever sample from the lunar far side in June 2024. It’s moon lander, Chang'e 6, used a robotic scoop and drill to collect approximately 5 pounds (2 kilograms) of rocks and soil. These samples came back to Earth on June 25, 2024.Chang'e 6 built off the accomplishments of two previous Chinese missions: Chang'e 4, which soft-landed on the far side of the Moon and used a rover to explore the surface, and Chang'e 5, which returned samples fro ...read more

Most grade school kids know that they can count tree rings to learn how long they lived. Biologists and forensic scientists count cementum rings (these microscopic structures encircle a tooth's root and vary in shade and thickness by season) in teeth for the same reason. Now, scientists have adapted the technique — but with high-powered X-ray imaging technology — and applied it to fossils hundreds of millions of years old. This method not only can pinpoint how long the fossilized creature li ...read more

One of the world’s great geophysical phenomena is the flow of warm water, and associated weather, from the Gulf of Mexico across the Atlantic towards western Europe. This flow is known as the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Drift and although huge in scale, it is merely a surface feature of a much bigger ocean process.As this current travels north, warm water evaporates, leaving the surface water saltier and denser. Then, as it reaches the Arctic, the water begins to cool and freeze, making ...read more

In 1940, American chemist Roger Adams isolated and identified CBD. Since then,  scientists discovered that CBD is not psychoactive and have investigated CBS’s potential health and medical benefits. In recent years, this natural remedy has become increasingly popular as a sleep treatment. While the exact mechanism of how CBD works is still being studied, it’s likely that it leads to better sleep by addressing conditions that adversely affect sleep. What Is CBD?Cannabidiol, colloquially know ...read more

In 1998, the Internet was in its infancy but growing fast. So, too was a mental health phenomenon called hikikomori — a name for extreme social withdrawal and isolation — that the rise of the Internet may well have helped feed. That same year, Tamaki Saito coined the term from the Japanese “hiki,” which means pulling inward or withdrawing, and “komori,” which means being confined or being inside. Saito first applied it to a patient who had socially withdrawn for six months, then popu ...read more

A new fossil find pushes back both the age and the size of the ancestors of the so-called Hobbits. Bones from the diminutive protohumans named Homo floresiensis were first found in a cave on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003 and dated back about 50,000 years. Researchers now report in Nature Communications finding similar fossils on the island — but at an open-air site 46 miles from the cave — dating back 700,000 years. The findings include the smallest ever human arm bone.“This very ...read more

From the CIA’s secret mind control program, MK Ultra, to the stuttering “Monster” study, American researchers have a long history of engaging in human experiments. The studies have helped us better understand ourselves and why we do certain things. These four experiments did just this and helped us better understand human behavior. However, some of them would be considered unethical today due to either lack of informed consent or the mental and/or emotional damage they caused.1. Cognitive ...read more

Worms wriggling around in your brain — it’s a particularly gruesome image that sounds like it came straight from a B horror movie. But several parasites can and do infect the central nervous system. The most common of these is Taenia solium, aka the pork tapeworm. Gross as it sounds, infection with a pork tapeworm usually doesn’t cause much harm. Tapeworms get into the intestines when people eat undercooked pork that is contaminated with the larvae of the tapeworm. While in the intestinal ...read more