Today female doctors are not a rarity. But that wasn’t always so. And that brings us to the fascinating case of Dr. James Barry, a military surgeon in the British Army who qualified for his medical...
The first British settlement in North America was established in 1607 and was named Jamestown, after King James I. It was a little tobacco growing colony located on the east coast, in the region...
I remember the first time I ever smelled the fragrance of a skunk. I thought someone had let off a stink bomb. You see, even back then I was a lot more familiar with emissions from test tubes...
Mea culpa. I plead guilty to the crime I often accuse others of committing, namely not checking facts properly! Curiously, I would not have discovered my error had I not been doing some proper fact...
Some memories remain indelibly etched in one’s mind. Like cheering in the Montreal Forum during the 1976 Olympics as Nadia Comaneci earned the first-ever perfect score in gymnastics. The total of...
Today we have a pretty good grasp of what causes illness. We know about infections, carcinogens, pollution, genetics, anatomical abnormalities and the consequences of a poor diet. We also have...
March 31st was National Bunsen Burner Day. Bunsen (1811-1899) should be remembered. After all, the “Bunsen Burner” is a typical symbol of chemistry. But there is more to Bunsen than just a burner....
The experiment, James Simpson decided, would go ahead even though the rabbits had died. And that decision was destined to have such a huge impact on medicine that more than 100,000 grateful Scots...
First synthesized by Lazar Edeleanu in Germany in 1887, amphetamine remained quietly under the radar until it came to the attention of chemist Gordon Alles in 1929. Alles was looking for an asthma...