Articles by Daniel Grushkin

The Japanese canopy plant's impressive DNA may confer novel evolutionary strategies.

A newly minted PhD finds a 150-billion-base-pair-long DNA molecule in a plant.

Actor Alan Alda teaches a new generation of researchers how to communicate with the public

As London suffered one of its worst cholera outbreaks, in the summer of 1853, John Snow took it upon himself to prove that the disease was transmitted through drinking water.

A molecular gastronomer and environmental artist team up to make diners reconsider the source of their food and the impacts of their eating habits

Cloudy, Chance of Cough With a new mapping tool, Ontario is the only place where people can track disease epidemics in real time—telling them when to skip daycare, perhaps, or take other steps to stay disease free. By Daniel Grushkin If a weather map can prevent you from getting rained on in a storm, can a map of infectious diseases in your neighborhood prevent you from getting sick in an epidemic? Scientists in Kingston, Ontario, think so. Thanks to

Ethnicity, At Its Heart Sonia Anand helped pioneer the largest study of heart risks worldwide—and couldn't believe what she found. By Daniel Grushkin Sonia Anand was perplexed. In 1997, the epidemiologist and MD at McMaster University found that when South Asians move to Canada, their risk of heart attack mysteriously spikes. Though heart disease is the number-one killer worldwide, the rate is 4 percent in rural India. When South Asians live

By Daniel Grushkin Tiny tubers A cassava grown under CO2 levels projected for the next century (right) yielded 80% less food than a tuber grown under current conditions. Courtesy of Plant Biol, published online August 6, 2009 When Ros Gleadow opened the airlock to the greenhouse at The Australian National University, she stepped into the atmosphere of the future. The air was thick with carbon dioxide—700 parts per million, to be precise—

By Daniel Grushkin Am I a biohazard? Foreign genes expressed in glowing E. coli, the result of the evening’s DIYbio experiment. Courtesy of Ellen Jorgensen Brooklyn, New York, April 21, 19:00 hours: Molecular biologist Ellen Jorgensen and I spread a plastic tarp over my cherry table and parquet floor. Then, one by one, we set vials and pipettes down, preparing a lab in my living room. We had dubbed it DNA and P

By Daniel Grushkin Like life To get to know the Biomimicry Guild is to learn its biology-inspired lingo: Its members aren't a group—they're a "meme." They don't reject ideas—they have an "immune response." And when they inaugurate a conference, like they did this winter at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, they don't clap. They caw, hoot, tweet and gobble. Picture 50 architects, designers, and scientists from companies like I

Sea Robocop By Daniel Grushkin Kilroy at work Courtesy of Bryan Garner / WPTV Something strange has been happening in the marine grasses that shelter over 4000 kinds of species in the Indian River Lagoon, located on the east coast of Florida. Dolphins have developed crusts of fungus on their fins (60 died this past year). Turtles have sprouted tumors, and blooms of dinoflagellates—called red tides—have cropped up, turning the w

Seventeen years ago, a pair of climbers in the Italian Alps stumbled on a leathery corpse hunched in a pool of melting ice. At first they thought the body was fresh, but the copper ax, wooden bow and quiver of 14 arrows spoke of a man from another time. The iceman, affectionately dubbed Ötzi, was the oldest frozen body (5,300 years) ever found. It would take almost