Slate
Ultra-processed food panic: Are protein bars and white bread to blame for America’s obesity problem?
It’s understandable if you’re tempted to throw out your protein bars and pouches of baby food and commit to a ...
Green advocates claim ‘precision-breeding’ is a Trojan horse marketing technique to get ‘dangerous’ CRISPR crops approved. What do the facts say?
In the United States, you'll be able to taste modified mushrooms that do not blacken when cut. In Japan, tomatoes produce fewer ...
Almost everything you thought you knew about ‘long-hauler’ COVID is being revised
Long COVID comes Into the light: We’re finally starting to see the truth about the vexing condition. It’s not what ...
Not so keen on decaf coffee? Gene-editing may make a near-perfect cup
Coffea Eugenioides plant, the genetic parent to Coffea Arabica, was almost extinct until recently. Arabica is the earthy, full-bodied, chocolatey coffee that most of ...
How DNA analysis led to the key breakthrough in the Idaho student murder case
How police actually cracked the Idaho killings Case: Investigators used forensic genealogy to zero in on suspect Bryan Kohberger ...
COVID was way deadlier in Red State Republicans than for Democrats. What’s the role of anti-vaccine rhetoric?
Despite early wide-scale access to COVID-19 vaccines, the U.S. has outstripped its peer countries when it comes to the all-important ...
It’s the 25th anniversary of dystopian genetics movie Gattaca. Do scientists think it has survived the test of time?
This October marks the 25th anniversary of the film’s release. Ever since, the word Gattaca—made up of the letters that ...
What we know about how animals think, see and feel
The history of our observations of our fellow creatures is a series of corrected mistakes and solved mysteries as we’ve ...
Is melatonin a safe and risk-free sleep aid — as many doctors contend? Think twice
Melatonin poisoning in kids is on the rise, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. From 2012 to ...
COVID human trials controversy: Were the potentially deadly risks worth the benefits?
In February 2021, scientists at Imperial College London gained approval to conduct an [human challenge trial, or] HCT of COVID-19 ...
Here’s the story of Barbara Ann Richards, a pioneer for the trans movement — in the 1940s
On July 1, 1941, a 29-year-old interior decorator walked into a Los Angeles courthouse and filed a request that vanishingly ...
Podcast: Why do people donate kidneys to strangers? Is altruism an evolved human trait?
Penny Lane gave up months of wages and weeks of her life to have her kidney cut out and given ...
Today’s anti-vaccination protests have roots in a long-running and often lurid American ‘medical freedom movement’
In the 1820s and 1830s, acolytes of New Hampshire autodidact Samuel Thomson fought the imposition of medical licensure requirements, arguing ...
Treating manic depression and mental illness is the ‘final frontier’ of CRISPR gene therapy
Since the 1980s, scientists have been searching for the genetic root of manic-depression, to better understand it and treat it, ...
Tune out the media noise: Vaccine mandates are mostly being embraced — and they’re working
Apparently some editors have decided it’s just a fine idea to blast out the tidbit that Americans are quitting their ...
‘Simple and ugly’: Reddit group named after Republican COVID denier Herman Cain grimly catalogues those who died after mocking seriousness of the coronavirus
HermanCainAward, one of the fastest-growing subreddits on Reddit.com, is exactly what it sounds like: an archive of those who have ...
How do religious COVID vaccine exemptions work — and how do you prevent people from abusing them?
The idea of a religious exemption as a concept has a long and complicated history in the U.S., but it ...
Musician Nicki Minaj hesitates to get a COVID vaccine because it ‘caused a friend of a friend to become impotent’. Let’s review the evidence
Nicki Minaj turned a lot of heads [September 13] when she told her 22 million followers on Twitter that she ...
‘Last and only hope’: With global banana crop under siege from fungal disease, CRISPR may be only remaining solution
The banana as we know it is in trouble. Emerging reports suggest the fruit’s deadliest disease has been spotted in ...
Brains make the difference: Here’s the root of human self-reflection and self awareness
Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from Know Thyself: The Science of Self-Awareness by Stephen M. Fleming. What is it ...
‘Stop conflating all biotechnology with genetic engineering’: The case for more refined USDA regulations
Policymakers had known for years that the U.S. regulation of crop biotechnology was out of date, and by 2016, discussions ...
Beyond GM crops: Climate-friendly sheep and biofactory goats expand horizons of genetic engineering
If GMO plants now occupy 11% of cultivated areas in the world, only one genetically modified animal is currently authorized ...
Podcast: Science writer Michael Specter on what you should know about the coronavirus, food security and GMOs
Science writer, New Yorker contributor and author of the book Denialism Michael Specter joins Felix Salmon on the Slate Money ...
Promises and pitfalls of treating aging like a disease
Over the years, the movement to classify aging as a disease has gained momentum not only from longevity enthusiasts but ...
Viewpoint: China’s coronavirus is getting all the attention, but this year’s flu season is more frightening
What we appear to be having this year is a flu-the-trickster season. And while that new coronavirus is getting a lot of attention, ...
Was Darwin wrong about ‘survival of the fittest’? Collaboration may be just as natural as competition
To put it simply, we have let Darwinism set the horizon of possibility for human behavior. Competition has become a ...
‘Genome doping’: Gene-edited babies could change the world of athletics
With the taboo on human gene editing in the process of being shattered, children whose genomes have been modified before ...
Viewpoint: Legal crusade against Bayer’s Roundup herbicide threatens fish and wildlife
You’ve seen the ads flooding television and social media: “Have you been exposed to weed killer Roundup? If you have ...