Prescriptions for Pfizer’s blockbuster drug Paxlovid have skyrocketed in recent weeks. That’s good news for many COVID-19 patients, as the pill has been proven to reduce severe disease from SARS-CoV-2 infections. But a bevy of new lab studies shows the coronavirus can mutate in ways that make it less susceptible to the drug, by far the most widely used of the two oral antiviral drugs...
When the U.S. government released a much-anticipated report on UFOs a year ago, many were perplexed that it couldn’t explain 143 of the 144 sightings it examined. (In the single closed case, the report concluded the mystery object was a large, deflating balloon.) "Where are the aliens?" cracked one headline. The truth was still out there. So was...
The burst of flavor from summer’s first sweet corn and the proud stance of a show dog both testify to the power of domestication. But so does the microbial alchemy that turns milk into cheese, grain into bread, and soy into miso. Like the ancestors of the corn and the dog, the fungi and bacteria that drive these transformations were modified for human use. And their genomes have...
Where and when dogs arose is one of the biggest mysteries of domestication . To solve it, researchers have tried everything from analyzing ancient dog bones to sequencing modern dog DNA—all with inconclusive results. Now, researchers have tried a new tack: figuring out where the ancient wolves that gave rise to dogs lived. The new study doesn’t close the case, but it...
Whether we’ve got the flu or have had too much to drink, most of us have experienced nausea. Unlike other universal sensations such as hunger and thirst, however, scientists still don’t understand the biology behind the feeling—or how to stop it. A new study in mice identifies a possible key player: specialized brain cells that communicate with the gut to turn off the feeling of...