Accessibility links
Science The latest health and science news. Updates on medicine, healthy living, nutrition, drugs, diet, and advances in science and technology. Subscribe to the Health & Science podcast.

Science

Wednesday

Environment

Houston Tops L.A. for Most Carbon Emissions

The Texas town edged out notoriously toxic Los Angeles for the crown of America's biggest polluter. Offering his take on how Houston produced 18 million tons of carbon dioxide is Houston Chronicle writer Tim Fleck.

Houston Tops L.A. for Most Carbon Emissions

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90060615/90060561" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Law

Prepare for Amsterdam Without Magic 'Shrooms

The Dutch parliament is proposing a ban on the sale of hallucinogenic mushrooms. Lawmakers are being misled when they cite dangerous behavior induced by 'shrooms, according to Charles Overby, who runs Mushroom Galaxy.

Prepare for Amsterdam Without Magic 'Shrooms

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90060603/90060557" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

National

Disease Deadly To Bats Spreads In Northeast U.S.

A deadly disease that has ravaged bat populations in the Northeast is spreading faster than expected, according to federal researchers, who have confirmed fresh outbreaks of "white-nose syndrome" in Connecticut and eastern Vermont.

Disease Deadly To Bats Spreads In Northeast U.S.

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89852947/90060865" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Tuesday

Creating a Methane-Free Cow

Cows produce methane — a big contributor to global warming. In Australia, Dr. Athol Klieve noticed that another herbivore — the kangaroo — doesn't have a methane problem. He's betting that his kangaroo research could help solve cow's gas problem.

Creating a Methane-Free Cow

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90031367/90031347" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Driveway Moments

Dan Gottlieb, 'Learning from the Heart'

Fresh Air

He's helped many people through painful passages in their lives. And he's faced his own: Since a near-fatal auto accident in 1979, he's been paralyzed from the chest down. Gottlieb has had nearly three decades to come to terms with the changed circumstances of his body — but now, he fears, that body may be growing tired.

Dan Gottlieb, 'Learning from the Heart'

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90033157/90033714" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Radiolab

Minty E. Coli And Other Bioengineering Feats

Scientists all over the world are matter-of-factly amending, changing and rearranging living creatures for all kinds of reasons, some silly, some profound. Take the case of the MIT team that made the icky-smelling bacteria E. coli and gave it a wintergreen-scented twist.

Minty E. Coli And Other Bioengineering Feats

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/90014997/90024879" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Monday

Solutions

Anglican Leader Brings Climate to the Pulpit

One Anglican cleric thinks churches can do more to help the Earth, and he's trying to convince ministries around the world to start preaching a change in the way people live.

Anglican Leader Brings Climate to the Pulpit

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89947582/90011493" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Profiles

Young Indians Abroad Return to Help Better Country

Young Indians who grew up in Britain, Australia and America are working elbow-to-elbow on India's environmental projects. The collaboration is not without challenges, but along the way the participants are building an identity that crosses cultural borders.

Young Indians Abroad Return to Help Better Country

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89942270/89990556" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Profiles

World Traveler Learns Climate Complexities

Juan Hoffmaister has spent the past 10 months traveling the globe to visit areas most threatened by climate change. But the trip has complicated his view on how to cope with the changes.

World Traveler Learns Climate Complexities

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89820356/89967094" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Sunday

Technology

Learning from the Virtual You

How you appear in the virtual world could affect your behavior in real life, according to researchers at Stanford University. We examine how people interact psychologically with their virtual-reality selves.

Learning from the Virtual You

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89984937/89984921" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Friday

Pierre Sheds Wet Suit for Real Penguin Suit

After beginning to go bald in 2006, a penguin in San Francisco was fitted with a wet suit — and started to re-grow his feathers. Pam Schaller, a senior aquatic biologist at the California Academy of Sciences, shares Pierre's remarkable story.

Pierre Sheds Wet Suit for Real Penguin Suit

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89951043/89953747" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Books

How Do You Explain Mommy's Nose Job?

Dr. Michael Alexander Salzhauer has written the book My Beautiful Mommy to help children understand a parent's cosmetic surgery. When parents say nothing, he says, children become very confused. But are 5-year-olds ready to hear about tummy tucks?

How Do You Explain Mommy's Nose Job?

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89941792/89941806" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Research News

T. Rex Protein Evidence Links Dinosaurs to Birds

Analysis of proteins found in a scrap of collagen from a 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex leg bone provides strong evidence for the idea that dinosaurs are the ancestors of modern-day birds. Paleontologist Mary Higby Schweitzer talks about the finding and what it means for our understanding of evolution.

T. Rex Protein Evidence Links Dinosaurs to Birds

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89942780/89942769" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Environment

Pine Forests Destroyed by Beetle Takeover

Canadian forests are being hit hard by an outbreak of the mountain pine beetle. Though the beetles are small — less than 1/3 of an inch long — they're hungry, and bore through the wood of a variety of pine tree species. Ecologists are worried that the death of so many trees will have a significant impact on the carbon balance in North America.

Pine Forests Destroyed by Beetle Takeover

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89942771/89942767" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

PETA Offers Incentive for Test-Tube Meat Research

Animal rights group PETA is offering a $1 million prize for the development of commercially-viable "test-tube meat" — real meat grown through a lab process, not from a live animal. To win, the lab-grown meat must have a taste and texture indistinguishable from real chicken flesh.

PETA Offers Incentive for Test-Tube Meat Research

Listen
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/89942776/89942768" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript