Today, thanks to better early detection, there are 63% fewer deaths from heart disease than there were just a few decades ago. Thomas Insel, the director of the National Institute of Mental Health, wonders: Could we do the same for...

Viruses have a bad reputation -- but some of them could one day save your life, says biotech entrepreneur Alexander Belcredi. In this fascinating talk, he introduces us to phages, naturally-occurring viruses that hunt and kill harmful...

The vagina harbors hundreds of different kinds of microorganisms. Candida yeasts are usually present in small quantities and most of the time, these fungi are harmless. But, under certain conditions, Candida yeasts can cause infections....

There’s no denying that fungus is all around us all the time. And not all of it is helpful, but neither is all of it harmful. Here are some of the many functions of fungi.

Around 1917, an unknown illness dubbed "sleeping sickness" caused people to suffer severe sleepiness and delirium. Some even became paralyzed for decades until a temporary cure was discovered in the 1960s. The story of this illness is...

Seth Berkley explains how smart advances in vaccine design, production and distribution are bringing us closer than ever to eliminating a host of global threats -- from AIDS to malaria to flu pandemics.

Penicillin changed everything. Infections that had previously killed were suddenly quickly curable. Yet as Maryn McKenna shares in this sobering talk, we've squandered the advantages afforded us by that and later antibiotics....

Optogenetics may allow us to use light like a remote control for our brains, and treat diseases like retinitis pigmentosa.

Measles, mumps, and polio are things we can prevent with vaccines, but scientists are looking to add a surprising entry to that list: Type 1 diabetes.

As cities adopt greener, more sustainable designs, there's risk of a dangerous and unwelcome tenant moving in: mosquitoes. Researcher Cameron Webb explains what urban planners and the general public need to understand about mosquitoes --...

It may sometimes seem like things are getting worse, but there's lots of reasons to be optimistic about the future. More people have access to toilets and sanitation than ever before. Thanks to public health improvements like this, since...

Hank breaks the news to you about your brain on football, the reality behind the latest moon-base plan, and an epic win -- and fail -- in the animal kingdom.

The world's deadliest animal may be closer than you think.

What controls aging? Biochemist Cynthia Kenyon has found a simple genetic mutation that can double the lifespan of a simple worm, C. elegans. The lessons from that discovery, and others, are pointing to how we might one day significantly...

Hank’s up to his old tricks again as he faces off against SciShow Senior Producer and Host Caitlin Hofmeister. Can she see through his lies and win her patron the prize?

One team of researchers may has found a promising lead in the fight to cure or prevent Alzheimer's. And another team is helping us understand how Hydras regrow their heads.

SciShow News give you the facts about ebola, one of the world’s deadliest diseases that’s making a stand in West Africa.

In this factual talk, geneticist Wendy Chung shares what we know about autism spectrum disorder — for example, that autism has multiple, perhaps interlocking, causes. Looking beyond the worry and concern that can surround a diagnosis,...

We talk a lot about CRISPR and "designer babies" but the science of editing genes is varied and complex. This month, an adult man received billions of gene-editing viruses via an IV in an effort to treat a rare disease.

For most of human history, we have sought to treat and cure diseases. But only in recent decades did it become possible to ensure that a particular disease never threatens humanity again. Julie Garon and Walter A. Orenstein detail how...

This video is about Simpson's paradox, a statistical paradox and ecological fallacy where seemingly contradictory results are implied by a single set of data depending on how it's grouped. The paradox can arise in medical...

Asteroid strikes get all the coverage, but "Medea Hypothesis" author Peter Ward argues that most of Earth's mass extinctions were caused by lowly bacteria. The culprit, a poison called hydrogen sulfide, may have an interesting...

For decades, researcher Mina Bissell pursued a revolutionary idea -- that a cancer cell doesn't automatically become a tumor, but rather, depends on surrounding cells (its microenvironment) for cues on how to develop. She shares the two...

Could an everyday clothing item help protect your health? In this quick talk, TED Fellow Alicia Chong Rodriguez introduces us to a smart bra designed to gather real-time data on biomarkers like heartbeat, breath and temperature. Learn...