As a girl, Elaine Fuchs borrowed her mother’s old strainers and mixing bowls to collect polliwogs, an activity she credits for her present-day career as a biologist.
Urban areas around the world are places of hidden biodiversity that need to be protected and encouraged through smart urban design, said an authority in green city design.
Want to know what will make you happy? Then ask a total stranger — or so says a new study from Harvard University, which shows that another person’s experience is often more informative than your own best guess.
The birth control pill, which revolutionized contraception and sparked a cultural reassessment of the purpose of sex and the sanctity of life, was developed by a Harvard fertility doctor who believed people should have children early in life — and as many as they could afford.
Five Harvard researchers are among 50 young scientists nationwide who will have their work supported for the next six years by a new initiative from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI).
Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) researchers have for the first time identified in mice a cellular mechanism that directs stem cells to their ultimate destination in the body.
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), an affiliate of Harvard Medical School, has been named one of the top 100 hospitals in the United States. The award is based in overall organizational performance, according to the annual study released Monday (March 30) by the health care business of Thomson Reuters. BIDMC was the only Massachusetts hospital named in the survey.
A new study has identified a potential strategy for removing the abnormal protein that causes Huntington’s disease (HD) from brain cells, which could slow the progression of the devastating neurological…
Formerly depressed women show patterns of brain activity when they are criticized by their mothers that are distinctly different from the patterns shown by never-depressed controls, according to a new…
As childhood obesity continues its 30-year advance from occasional curiosity to cultural epidemic, health care providers are struggling to find out why — and the reasons are many. Increasingly sedentary…
The beneficial effects of anti-angiogenesis drugs in the treatment of the deadly brain tumors called glioblastomas appear to result primarily from reduction of edema – the swelling of brain tissue…
A large-scale effort to identify genetic markers of breast cancer has uncovered two common genetic variants that increase risk of the disease in women of European ancestry. The paper, published…
There is broad consensus that electronic health records (EHR) have the potential to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of health care providers. Yet, to date, there has been no reliable…
Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) researchers have for the first time identified in mice a cellular mechanism that directs stem cells to their ultimate destination in the body. The finding…
President Barack Obama announced today his intent to nominate Howard Koh, the Harvey V. Fineberg Professor of the Practice of Public Health at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), to…
Measuring brain waves in response to hearing a variety of tones appears to be a useful way to begin understanding the underlying genetic abnormalities associated with schizophrenia, says a study…
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced today (March 20) the selection of David Blumenthal as the Obama administration’s choice for national coordinator for health information technology. …
Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers are investigating a new way to block reproduction of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) — targeting not the virus itself but the human genes the virus exploits in its life cycle. In the March 19 Cell Host & Microbe, they report finding nearly 100 genes that support the replication of HCV and show that blocking several of them can suppress viral replication in cultured cells.
The Harvard Initiative for Global Health (HIGH) has begun a fellowship program with the aim of identifying and helping train bright young developing-world health professionals in remote regions of the world with the greatest global health challenges.
Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers are investigating a new way to block reproduction of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) — targeting not the virus itself but the human genes the…
Defibrillators are commonly recommended to patients with heart failure to prevent sudden cardiac death, but beyond having heart failure, there is a lack of criteria to identify the appropriate patients…
Many households harbor a threat to young children that safety regulations, surprisingly, have overlooked: glass-topped tables and tables with glass panels. A review by Children’s Hospital Boston, in collaboration with…
Truck crashes are a significant public health hazard, causing thousands of deaths and injuries each year, with driver fatigue and sleepiness being major causes. A new study by Harvard researchers…
Russell Mittermeier, renowned wildlife biologist and president of Conservation International, has been selected to receive the 12th annual Roger Tory Peterson Medal presented by the Harvard Museum of Natural History (HMNH). Mittermeier will deliver the Roger Tory Peterson Memorial Lecture on April 5.
The rise of agriculture 10,000 years ago meant the end of the hunter-gatherer lifestyle for which human beings had been optimized by millions of years of evolution and the beginning of an era where culture encourages habits unhealthy for us and for the world around, with uncertain evolutionary outcomes.
Harvard scientists have cleared a key hurdle in the creation of synthetic life, assembling a cell’s critical protein-making machinery in an advance that has practical, industrial applications and that enhances our basic understanding of life’s workings.
Offering a novel clue about the basic biology of pancreatic cancer, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have confirmed a decades-old discovery of a link between blood type and the risk of developing the disease.
All across Cambridge and Boston, researchers gathered just before noon on March 9, 2009, for President Barack Obama’s announcement that the federal funding ban on stem cell research would be lifted.
There may be something to the adage about growing older and wiser. A lot, in fact, according to the new book by Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, “The Third Chapter: Passion, Risk, and Adventure in the 25 Years After 50,” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009). The work explores the trend of learning and development for adults who are in their “third chapter” of life, or, as Lawrence-Lightfoot puts it, “the generative space that follows adulthood and middle age.”
Offering a novel clue about the basic biology of pancreatic cancer, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have confirmed a decades-old discovery of a link between blood type and the risk…
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