How Not to Die

Over 6,500 waterfowl—mostly ducks—have died in Canyon County, Idaho, stricken by avian cholera. The outbreak started in February, and before it's over, it may not only be Idaho's largest outbreak, but one of the largest in the country. Avian cholera is caused by infection wit ...more

There are times when leadership is tested. This is one of those times. As government and business leaders around the world are grappling with the unfolding coronavirus pandemic, the real-time responses to the crisis from many leaders have been great and, at times, less-than-op ...more

After years of telling patients to finish any prescribed course of antibiotics completely, a group of researchers in the UK say it is no longer necessary, and could even be harmful if we want to preserve the antibiotics we can still use. You read correctly, in an analysis pub ...more

Six people have died from fungal infections in Pittsburgh hospitals since 2014—that fact is indisputable. The rest of the situation is much vaguer. A lawsuit has been filed against the hospitals on behalf of some of the deceased patients, alleging that moldy hospital linens ar ...more

What's in a sneeze? Quite a lot—dirt, mucus, and infectious germs—it seems. And sneezing the right way can reduce the germs you share with neighbors. It's just a sneeze right? Everybody sneezes. So if you share a few germs when you are sick (or not sick), it's not such a terr ...more

The Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL were built by different manufacturers. This is pretty common knowledge among Android fans at this point — Google's smaller Pixel 2 was built by HTC, while the larger Pixel 2 XL was built by LG. What would the Pixel 2 XL look like if HTC had followed ...more

There's an adage that says "Every plan, no matter how great, goes out the window as soon as you're punched in the face." While our lives are (hopefully) not violent, that saying can easily translate to our daily living. That punch in the face can come in various forms, mainly ...more

Will the predicted apocalyptic date—December 21st, 2012—really be the end of the world? In this ongoing five-part series, we examine what would happen if zombies, nuclear weapons, cyber wars, earthquakes, or aliens actually destroyed our planet—and how you might survive. End ...more

|Choose Your View: Quick Bullet Points | Detailed Descriptions Android's newest major update is a special one — it's the tenth full version of the world's most commonly used operating system. The latest release, dubbed simply Android 10 (codename Android Q), was first showcas ...more

A new study shows the Zika virus is present in saliva — but it may not be enough to make you sick. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes there is "no evidence that Zika can be transmitted through saliva during deep kissing." Given the results of research publis ...more

If print is a dying media, you might as well destroy books in the most beautiful way possible. Guy Laramée is a Montreal-based interdisciplinary artist who turns old books, such as the Encyclopedia Brittanica, into intricately-carved works of art using mostly a sand blaster a ...more

With the holidays right around the corner, it's easy to miss a big software update on your iPhone, and by that, I mean iOS 15.2, which was pushed out Monday, Dec. 13. There's a surprising amount of new features and changes in the updated firmware, and there are a few big ones ...more

Cancer cells do a pretty good job of flying under the radar of our immune system. They don't raise the alarm bells signaling they are a foreign invader the way viruses do. That might be something scientists can change, though. A team of researchers has built non-infectious ar ...more

While Lyme disease can be disabling, the wrong treatment for the infection can be fatal. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate that the bacteria that causes Lyme disease infects about 30,000 people each year. Transmitted by the blacklegged tick, Ixodes ...more

Well, well, well. Uber, we knew you were investing a ton of money into creating self-driving taxis and flying cars, but what we didn't know is that you were already testing out your driverless vehicles on the streets of New York City. Just kidding! I mean, I know Uber isn't ...more

Have the sniffles? Yes. Does your head hurt? Yes. Coughing? Yes. Could you have influenza? Yes. How do you know the difference? With these symptoms, you could also have a cold. In the US right now, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that flu season is ...more

Where in the world did it come from? All of a sudden, one day, someone had an infection with flesh-eating bacteria. It captured headlines and worldwide attention because it was such a severe, strange, uncontrollable, and really disgusting condition. We still might not know wh ...more

A recent pathogen outbreak in Illinois is just one of many outbreaks of an underappreciated, but serious, viral infection passed from rodents to humans. These hantaviruses have been cropping up more frequently in the last decade or so, giving us more reason to clean out our du ...more

While not cuddly to most, bats are shy, skilled flyers that fill an important role in their environments. A new study reveals a deadly disease decimating North American bat populations has stepped up its attack on vulnerable bat populations in the summer months. Pseudogymnoas ...more

An older man dies of Zika. A younger man who cares for him catches Zika — but doctors cannot pinpoint how the disease was transmitted. While proximity to the patient is sufficient explanation for the rest of us, for microbe hunters, it is a medical mystery. Why? Zika is not kn ...more

The problem with HIV is that it attacks and kills the very cells of the immune system that are supposed to protect us from infections — white blood cells. But a new technique, developed by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) in La Jolla, California, offers a di ...more

Every year, 100-200 people in the US contract leptospirosis, but usually 50% of the cases occur in Hawaii where outdoor adventurers are exposed to Leptospira bacteria found in freshwater ponds, waterfalls, streams, and mud. That's why it's so alarming that two people in the Br ...more

When shopping for a new smartphone, you'll encounter comparisons and spec sheets that are filled to the brim with values like mAh, GB, and GHz. To the average consumer, however, these values are meaningless, so we end up looking at which device has the specs with the highest a ...more

In the first part of this two-part guide, I covered cutting, grooving, beveling, making holes, and stamping/tooling. I hope you enjoyed that part, because we're pushing the accelerator to the floor and moving ahead at full speed! Covered in this section will be: Burnishing D ...more

In this demonstration I show you how to make card/paper lattice for your cardmaking, scrapbooking and paper projects. The technique I show you is a very basic technique and idel for anyone that does not have a lattice die or for anyone that just wants to add a bit of interest ...more

MIT artificial intelligence researcher Lex Fridman recently asked SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk possibly the best question he's ever been asked: What would he ask a hypothetical AGI system (an AI system with human-level intelligence and understanding) if he only had one q ...more

There is a reason the Amanita phalloides mushroom is called the "Death Cap." It can kill you. Mushrooms are a type of fungi, an organism that produces thread-like mycelia that often produce spores. Spores allow the fungi to reproduce. Molds, lichens, and yeast are all fungi, ...more

Like humans, cats can suffer infections caused by ticks, and too often, the disease is fatal. Learn about tickborne diseases that affect cats and what you can do to protect Fluffy from an untimely demise. Across the US, tickborne diseases are on the rise. With warmer winterti ...more

Jostled in the airport, someone is coughing in line. The air looks empty but it is loaded with microbes that make their way into your body. You get sick. You give it to your family, and that's pretty much it. But what if you were so contagious that you spread it to your entire ...more

A terrifying antibiotic-resistant superbug, one thought to only infect hospital patients, has made its debut in the real world. For the first time ever, the superbug carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) infected six people who hadn't been in or around a hospital in at ...more

Food is both a necessity and a joy. Many people enjoy exploring, cooking, eating, and learning about foods from around the world. But the picture isn't always rosy. A new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), highlights the ways and whereabouts of f ...more

If you've ever used the Find My iPhone and Find My Friends apps in iOS 12 and below, you may be surprised to hear that those apps have joined forces in iOS 13. Now, instead of two separate apps, they're combined into one convenient package. But what does that mean for you and ...more

ATTN: HUMOUR ALERT Jules Verne was an author of immense imagination, who had a profound effect on speculative fiction, whereas Victoria was a stodgy & pampered royal who led a sheltered and traditional existence. Boring, frumpy, grumpy royal! (Photo from The Guardian, UK) We ...more

Death Road to Canada has finally arrived for Android, and it quickly took over our roundup for the best paid action games. Widely regarded as a top contender for the best video game of 2017, it came as no surprise when it easily surpassed all the other games in our list to gra ...more

Twelve-year old Rory Staunton took a dive for a basketball during gym class and came up with a cut on his arm. The school nurse applied a couple of band-aids, without cleaning the cut, and off he went. In approximately three days, hospital physicians told his parents there was ...more

It's time to set your Facebook "Last Will and Testament" straight. Do you want to assign a contact to look over your account, or would you prefer to have all your online memories fade away the minute you die? It's a tough decision, but with a little time, you can set up at lea ...more

There are all kinds of theories—many supported by science—about what causes Alzheimer's disease. Tangles of protein called ß-amyloid (pronounced beta amyloid) plaques are prominently on the list of possible causes or, at least, contributors. An emerging theory of the disease s ...more

The holidays are stressful. Between traveling, family, and dinner, Thanksgiving weekend can feel like weeks. Many families have traditions that make the days long, but some of us would rather curl up somewhere and watch our favorite shows. But all is not lost — our phones do s ...more

One of the hardest, most intimidating parts of making your own Steampunk guns from scratch is the wooden stock of the gun. To be fair, it's probably the hardest part. It requires the most artistry, and is the easiest to mess up. So, I'm going to give you a guide to making you ...more

On June 11, 2016, an Arizona woman died from what appeared to be several infections, including pneumonia. She likely caught at least one of these from her dog. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) were involved in the investigation into events leading up to he ...more

Whether or not a microbe is successful at establishing an infection depends both on the microbe and the host. Scientists from Duke found that a single DNA change can allow Salmonella typhi, the bacteria that causes typhoid fever, to invade cells. That single genetic variation ...more

Nineteen days ago, several hundred people could have been exposed by a traveler with measles in Nova Scotia, Canada. The next day, someone flying from Minnesota to Nebraska may have spread the measles to other passengers. A couple weeks ago, it's possible that a man and his si ...more

Humanity is standing on an infection precipice. As antibacterial resistant grows, we're running out of options, and a recent scary case of total antibiotic resistance is a frighting view of our potential future. In the end, it was septic shock that took the life of a 70-year o ...more

A growing trend for many artists (most recently Kanye West) is to offer exclusive or experimental tracks on music streaming sites like SoundCloud or YouTube before releasing them anywhere else. On rare occasions, some of these great songs never make their way onto an official ...more

If you're having a "Netflix and chill" night, the last thing you want to worry about is finding something to watch—after all, you have better things planned for the night. With so much streaming content now available for cord cutters, settling on just one title to watch can b ...more

Hello everyone. The red ring of death of Xbox 360 has been a huge problem since the beginning of Xbox 360. Many gamers like me have faced this problem and the red ring of death (RROD) is one of the biggest reason behind all the rant on Xbox 360 gaming console. Now, I cannot h ...more

Any living creature will die if deprived of sleep for long enough. The longest documented occurrence of a person not fully sleeping and surviving is only 11 days. There is a rare disease where deep sleep is never achieved, affecting roughly 100 people worldwide. Patients usual ...more

Humans clearly demonstrate altruistic tendencies towards other members of groups with which they identify. One bit of evidence that this is innate comes from studies with oxytocin. Those who inhale the hormone are significantly more likely to sacrifice for the benefit of memb ...more

There's a lot that goes into making a nice crystal radio set, so this is going to have to be broken down into two parts. The first part is the actual making of a functional radio, and the second part is making the whole arrangement look nice. In this part, I'm actually going t ...more

In evolutionary times, we were far more likely to die from starvation than from diseases related to obesity. In those times, when food was available, it was best to stuff oneself. This can be seen in an experiment run by Brian Wansink. Wansink gave a bunch of subjects some s ...more

As a kid, I remember hearing the myth that Twinkies could last forever. The rumor was that they were made from chemical ingredients that caused the Twinkies to stay fresh and edible for years and years. Right along with the cockroach, Twinkies were supposed to be the only surv ...more

I was in college, and my 15-inch Sony Vaio laptop was my prized possession. It was my first PC and probably the most important thing I brought with me to my dorm — it was both how I completed my assignments and my primary source of entertainment. How could it turn its back on ...more

Antibiotic-resistant infections that usually occur only in hospital settings are spreading in communities, increasing hospital stays—and danger—for young children. In a study published in the Journal of the Pediatric infectious Diseases Society, researchers from the School of ...more

Procrastination is an ugly beast. At first, it seems so innocent to spend five minutes checking Reddit or Twitter. You'll get started on work right after. Next thing you know, it's 1 a.m. and that paper is due in seven hours. Before you start another YouTube video, know you do ...more

Even though most phones don't have Oreo yet, Google has released Android 9.0 Pie. It's available on Google's own Pixel devices, and updates should soon be available to partnered devices from Essential, Nokia, Oppo, Sony, Vivo, and Xiaomi. We're already digging into it to highl ...more

Do you know when you're going to die? Your iPhone or iPad does. That's the premise behind Death Mask, an experimental app developed by Or Fleisher and Anastasis Germanidis. The experiment is influenced by death masks, sculptures cast from people's faces that, in some culture ...more

Thanks to ever more powerful smartphones — the iPhone X with its advanced A11 processor and the Galaxy Note 8 powered by Snapdragon's 835 come to mind — the mobile industry is fast closing in on consoles and PCs with regards to gaming. Game developers have been aware of this f ...more

If there's one thing I know, it's that people hate buying mobile games. I'm the same way — no matter how good a game looks, if I have to pay for it, I have to fight the urge to immediately walk away. That's why it's such a big deal when a great game goes on sale. Right now, th ...more

While it might be a little past its prime now, the running gag about Nokia phones never breaking was one of the internet's favorite jokes. "If you buy one," they would say, "you'll never need another phone again." I think if those users could see into the future, they'd change ...more

Have you ever been on a Netflix binge and thought to yourself "man, these characters are so dumb. Why would you go back to the haunted house, Jenny? You know what's in there, and now you're going to die. This whole situation was so easily avoidable, JENNY." If you've ever thou ...more