Health

The future of fertility, from artificial wombs to AI-assisted IVF

A look back at the history of infertility treatments and ahead to the tech that could change everything we thought we knew about reproduction.

Kristin Houser

Overlay of hands and abstract patterns in purple and blue tones, symbolizing hope for Parkinson's cure.

Drugs

The exciting research that may cure Parkinson’s

GeneCode is developing a drug it hopes won’t just alleviate Parkinson’s symptoms but also protect and restore patient’s neural health.

Kevin Dickinson

A child sitting on a couch in a dimly lit room, holding and looking intently at a tablet, as if testing the Goldilocks hypothesis for the perfect screen brightness.

Mental Health

Beyond screen time: Rethinking kids’ tech use with the “Goldilocks hypothesis”

The “Goldilocks hypothesis” asks parents to think beyond screen time and consider the habits that teens build around technology use.

Kevin Dickinson

Medicine

New pancreatic cancer treatment penetrates tough tumors

For a new pancreatic cancer treatment, researchers attached a chemotherapy drug to an antibody that targets a molecule on the outside of cancer cells.

Kristin Houser

DeepMind AI cracks the code of protein structures

A protein’s structure is crucial to its function. Predicting how a protein will fold was a challenge decades in the making — and answered by DeepMind.

B. David Zarley

CRISPR

CRISPR used to edit HIV cure into monkey embryos

A mutation of the CCR5 gene can cure HIV — and thanks to CRISPR, scientists may soon be able to study it in animal models.

Kristin Houser

Coronavirus

The quest for a “warm” COVID-19 vaccine

Developers are on the hunt for a warm COVID-19 vaccine, one that could be distributed in places where a reliable cold chain isn’t available.

Kristin Houser

At-home breast cancer screening, powered by AI

An award-winning at-home breast cancer screening device, called the Blue Box, could one day replace uncomfortable mammograms.

Kristin Houser

Public Health

Congo just used vaccines to beat Ebola. What they learned could stop COVID, too.

Congo’s recent success delivering frigid Ebola vaccines to remote areas may provide invaluable experience for a COVID-19 vaccine cold chain.

B. David Zarley

Medicine

Cancer immunotherapy “baits” the immune system into attacking hidden lung tumors

When cancer spreads, it often ends up in the lungs. ImmunoBait can ride a red blood cell in mice to deliver cancer immunotherapy where they live.

B. David Zarley

Virology

We can now see a virus invasion in real-time

Understanding how a virus infects and replicates in a cell is crucial to stopping them. Now, researchers can see an infection in real-time.

B. David Zarley

Coronavirus

The hep C cure may also fight COVID-19

SARS-CoV-2 uses a number of key proteins to infect us, including its main protease. New research has found hepatitis C drugs can bind this protein.

B. David Zarley

Mental Health

Stopping nightmare disorder with a prescription-only watch

A prescription-only watch that treats nightmare disorder is the latest in a growing subset of health technologies called prescription digital therapeutics.

Kristin Houser

Sections

Series & Columns

Freethink

We focus on solutions: the smartest people, the biggest ideas, and the most ground breaking technology shaping our future.