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• My new story on psychology’s problem with replications | Not Exactly Rocket Science
  I have a new feature out in Nature looking at two big problems within the field of psychology. First, the field is almost entirely dominated by positive results, while negative ones languish unpublished in personal file drawers. Second, there are few incentives to replicate old results and negative replication attempts face a lengthy gauntlet of obstacles. I […]
• Tapeworms in the brain: Fearfully common | The Loom
  We’ve all heard about tapeworms getting into the intestines. That’s bad enough. But sometimes they can also end up in the brain. In my column in the latest issue of Discover, I write about neurocysticercosis, which is shockingly common in some parts of the world, causing an estimated five million cases of epilepsy. Yet neurocysticercosis experts consider the […]
• Dogs Catch Yawns From Their Owners. Does That Mean They Empathize with Us? | 80beats
  One sleepy person can start a bout of contagious yawning that quickly spreads through a room. But a new study suggests the effect may not be limited to the room’s human inhabitants: Dogs can “catch” yawns from people, the study found—especially their owners, hinting that pooches may empathize with familiar people. When listening to recordings of people yawni […]
• The Brain: Hidden Epidemic: 
Tapeworms Living Inside People's Brains | DISCOVER
  Theodore Nash sees only a few dozen patients a year in his clinic at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. That’s pretty small as medical practices go, but what his patients lack in number they make up for in the intensity of their symptoms. Some fall into comas. Some are paralyzed down one side of their body. Others can’t walk a straight […]
• Paranormal Circumstances: One Influential Scientist's Quixotic Mission to Prove ESP Exists | DISCOVER
  On a winter afternoon last March, Daryl Bem stepped out of the psychology department building at Cornell University, dressed in a red parka and a woolen hat to fend off the icy wind. As he walked along the pavement, navigating mounds of snow and taking care not to step onto the slushy street, the well-bundled social psychologist looked like a man who might p […]
• Scanning man’s best friend | The Loom
  We’ve learned a lot about how the brain works from functional magnetic resonance images. I should clarify: we’ve learned a lot about the human brain. Thousands of people have volunteered to lie down inside fMRI scanners and have the activity in their brains monitored as they perform different kinds of mental tasks, or even just do nothing at all. We must res […]
• Discover Interview: The World's Most Celebrated Virus Hunter: Ian Lipkin | DISCOVER
  When Ian Lipkin chose a career in infectious diseases, he envisioned hunting for pathogens in daring treks around the world. Though disappointed to learn that modern-day virus hunters work largely from the lab, he still wound up a pioneer. At the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, then at the University of California, Irvine, and since 2001 as director […]
• Meat-eating plant digests insects using ants | Not Exactly Rocket Science
  Many insects eat plants, but some plants can turn the tables on their would-be diners. The pitcher plants are among several groups that can capture insects and digest their flesh. And one species – the fanged pitcher plant – goes even further. It digests insects with insects. There are around 120 species of pitcher plants and all of them have large leaves th […]
• Do Unhatched Chicks Sleep and Wake In Their Eggs? | 80beats
  You go to sleep at night, you wake up in the morning—the definition of sleep doesn’t seem so complicated. But start asking questions and things start getting thorny: Are dolphins that never stop swimming sleeping? Are migrating birds that “shut down” half their brains sleeping? Is someone under general anesthesia sleeping? And what about babies in the womb? […]
• Dolphins that help humans to catch fish form tighter social networks | Not Exactly Rocket Science
  In the coastal waters of Laguna, Brazil, a shoal of mullet is in serious trouble. Two of the most intelligent species on the planet – humans and bottlenose dolphins – are conspiring to kill them. The dolphins drive the mullet towards the fishermen, who stand waist-deep in water holding nets. The humans cannot see the fish through the turbid water. They must […]