How could you destroy someone with their own words, if their words present no evidence of wrongdoing?  It actually is amazingly simple, and illustrates the danger of limitless access to personal emails through public records requests.  In this post I will show how two writers for a PLoS One Blog* blatantly misrepresent content obtained through such a request. This is how scandals are manufactured from nothing.

Based on the furor currently engulfing the US, you might imagine that the use of fetal tissue is illegal. But in fact the collection and use of cells obtained from a human fetus following miscarriage or abortion has a long history in medical science.

The FDA, following the advice of their advisory panel, voted yesterday to approve Addyi, aka "Female Viagra," or "Pink Viagra." Good move? Bad? Keep reading...

Gang slayings move in a systematic pattern over time, spreading from one vulnerable area to the next like a disease, according to a paper by Michigan State University criminologists and public health researchers. That means there is a threshold where herd immunity takes effect, just like vaccines, but letting too many people opt out risks the whole community.

There were 2,363 gang-related killings in the United States in 2012, the highest number in at least six years, according to the latest available estimates from the Department of Justice. Gang membership also increased, to 850,000 in 2012 from 788,000 in 2007.

Insulin does not control weight loss.

Kevin Hall performs both theoretical and experimental studies in human metabolism at the NIDDK of NIH. This week, he and colleagues published an article in Cell Metabolism entitled, "Calorie for Calorie, Dietary Fat Restriction Results in More Body Fat Loss than Carbohydrate Restriction in People with Obesity."

I think it's going to piss some people off.

For this reason, I decided to get my facts straight before writing about the study. Dr. Hall gave me some time on the phone earlier today. But before I get to his explanations, let me set up why, in diet research circles, this study is likely to have a large impact.

This is just a fun question someone asked on Quora. It leads into a few interesting topics. First the ISS just isn't heavy enough for a satellite to enter into a true gravitational orbit around it. But, in theory at least, you can put a satellite into a temporary  orbit that looks from the point of view of the ISS as if it is in orbit around it.

For a while. It's not kept in place by any gravitational attraction to the ISS, so it is sort of an illusory orbit you could say in a way - but perhaps it is interesting.

By Joel Shurkin, Inside Science — Wine grapes specially bred for extreme temperatures may have a future, despite any laughs connoisseurs might have at the thought of wine labels extolling the virtues of the terroir of Deadwood or Fargo.

A grape-breeding project that already has pumped more than $400 million into northern states’ economies and created as many as 13,000 jobs is trying to grow wine grapes where summers are short and winters brutal. Scientists who are breeding the grapes say the wine is improving every year.

If you care about the environment, you should eat the steak and throw out the salad, according to University of Missouri researchers who say that the type of food wasted has a significant impact on the environment. 

Approximately 31 percent of food produced in the U.S., or 133 billion pounds of food worth $162 billion, was wasted in 2011 according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).