MATT FUCHS

My nine-year-old skips, jumps, flails his arms, jumps some more, kicks, skip-jumps, stops by to punch me in the leg, and continues. He drifts through the house to the energetic pop rock of his favorite band, Imagine Dragons. He’s mouthing the words, but his “dancing” takes no cues from the music’s rhythm. He prefers to romp spontaneously. He’s mouthing the words, but his “dancing” takes no cues from the music’s rhythm. He prefers to romp spontaneously. Many people enjoy life

John Faulkner, 76, was becoming emotionally withdrawn before he arrived at Central Parke Assisted Living and Memory Care, the community where he lives in Mason, Ohio. He had once been an avid traveler, but cognitive decline ended that, and he became socially isolated. By the time Mr. Faulkner arrived at Central Parke, he would sit alone in his room for hours, according to Esther Mwilu, who organizes activities for the community. His treatment plan for dementia-related anxiety

Various chemicals, from those in plastics to food additives, have made headlines lately for their potential roles in triggering diseases. Pesticides are unique among chemicals, though, says Melissa Perry, an environmental epidemiologist and dean of George Mason’s College of Public Health. “They’re deliberately manufactured to kill things.” By poisoning weeds, pesticides clear the way for farmers’ crops to thrive. But their deadly design may undermine human health, too. A rece

A few years back, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez started noticing the extreme brightness of car headlights in rural Washington, where she lives—and felt bombarded. “You come around a curve and get these headlights smack in your face,” she says. “They make you lose reaction time. It’s a real safety risk.” As a U.S. Representative, she’s working to change federal regulations to limit how bright headlights can be. Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez—who is also co-founder of an auto repair shop in

At the Longevity Investors Conference last October in Switzerland, speakers described breakthrough therapies being developed to manipulate genes for longer lifespans. Swag bags bestowed pill bottles promising super longevity, stirring hopes for centuries of youth. Then Charles Brenner took the stage. The biochemist from City of Hope National Medical Center, in Los Angeles, addressed these ideas and treatments one by one, picking them apart, explaining that they’re based on fa

When George Thurston leaves his cottage in the woods of Waccabuc, N.Y. , to head for work, a pollution monitor clipped to his belt--called an AirBeam--shows pristine air quality. As he takes the train through the suburbs, the device's digits rise, meaning more pollution. By the time he gets to his office in Manhattan, they're even higher. I t's important to know your exposure profile to protect against everyday risk," says Thurston, professor of medicine and population hea

What makes for a good life? Such a simple question, yet we don't have great answers. Most of us try to figure it out as we go along, and many end up feeling like they never got to the bottom of it. Shouldn't something so important be approached with more scientific rigor? In 1938, Harvard researchers began a study to fill this gap. Since then, they’ve followed hundreds of people over the course of their lives, hoping to identify which factors are key to long-term satisfaction

Last Thursday, scientists at Columbia University published a new study finding that cutting down on calories could lead to longer lives....

The Friday Five covers five stories in research that you may have missed this week. There are plenty of controversies and troubling ethical issues in science – and we get into many of them in our online magazine – but this news roundup focuses on scientific creativity and progress to give you a therapeutic dose of inspiration headed into the weekend. Listen to this episode here. It features interviews with Dr. Christopher Martens, director of the Delaware Center for Cogntive

Tom Oxley is building what he calls a “natural highway into the brain” that lets people use their minds to control their phones and their computers. The device, called the Stentrode, could improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of people living with spinal cord paralysis, ALS and other neuro degenerative diseases. I talked with Dr. Oxley for today’s podcast . [ This episode features a discussion originally recorded for the MSoS podcast.] A fascinating thing about the Sten