Every bathroom is filled with creams, pastes and gels that we use to keep ourselves looking, feeling and smelling fresh. But despite how often we put the those products on (and in!) our bodies, most of us have no idea how they work. To find out exactly...
My girlfriend and I make a salad every Tuesday night, and we’re extremely proud of this—admittedly slightly pathetic—step toward a healthier lifestyle. But the recent outbreak of E. coli tied to tainted romaine lettuce totally ruined our weekly tradition: We always use romaine lettuce as the base...
The final scene of the epic 1958 adventure flick The Vikings goes something like this: The corpse of Prince Einar (Kirk Douglas) is carried onto a longship by four decorated Viking warriors. A shield is placed above his head, the massive striped sail drops into place and...
Benjamin Franklin once said, “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.” But surely this is yet another instance of the Man keeping us down? Growing scientific evidence suggests that some of us are hardwired to be night owls, and we’re...
Last month, a 34-year-old man developed a series of skull-crushing “thunderclap” headaches after eating a Carolina Reaper—the world’s hottest pepper—while participating in a competitive eating event. The extremely hot pepper reportedly motivated blood vessels in his brain to constrict, which was diagnosed as the “unusual” cause of...
We’ve all done the pee dance—when you have to go so badly you can’t help but do a weird little dance to hold it in until you reach the toilet. But does bobbing up and down and gyrating actually minimize that feeling of a soon-to-burst bladder? Dr....
When I was just a young boy, I slammed my thumb in a car door. That fingernail proceeded to fall off about a week later, revealing a brain-like section of skin that both intrigued my boyish self and absolutely terrified every normal adult who had the misfortune...
Most of us wake up in the morning and proceed to wipe away our eye gunk without stopping to think: What is this stuff, where does it come from and why does it mostly only come about when we’re asleep? Dr. Andrea Thau, optometrist and president of...
Serve someone a bucket of fried chicken and they’ll gleefully gnaw on the bones. Serve someone a bucket of raw chicken, and they’ll vomit on your shoes. Needless to say, many of us have an aversion to raw meat, which isn’t unwarranted: Uncooked flesh is riddled with...
When you gotta’ go, you gotta’ go—even if that means squatting in a heavily-used public restroom. During moments like these, some turn to toilet seat covers as a last-ditch effort to protect their behinds from legions of strangers’ germs. But is that thin toilet-seat-shaped sheet of paper...
The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a five-year plan to help countries phase out industrially-produced trans fats from the global food supply, in an attempt to improve public health, and like, save our lives. Their mission is honorable, indeed: They estimate that trans fats are responsible...
Hamburgers, hot dogs—heck, even pork butt. You name the meat and, like magic, a grill set to the perfect temperature will transform it into a mouth-watering hunk of deliciousness. But what’s actually happening to that meat when it hits high heat to make it so tasty? Let’s...