Forget artificial sweeteners. Researchers are now developing new forms of real sugar, to deliver sweetness with fewer calories. But tricking our biology is no easy feat. Every workday, at ten o’clock, at noon, and at three in the afternoon, Eran Baniel receives an alert on his...
In March, scientists in the United Kingdom started to notice an unexpected phenomenon. Alongside a fever, dry cough, and general malaise, Covid-19 patients were also reporting a sudden and alarming symptom: They couldn’t smell anything. Anecdotal evidence shared on medical message boards from physicians in...
An increasing number of patients are reporting awful scents that aren’t present. On a perfect August night, Carol Pitz, a career consultant from Chanhassen, Minnesota, was looking forward to her 25th wedding anniversary dinner, especially because she and her family had spent much of the spring...
Students are back on campus with classes resuming today at Penn State. The university will be conducting random testing for COVID-19 and has taken a number of precautions to keep the virus from spreading. Penn State students are being asked to pay attention to their noses....
If all goes according to plan, Pennsylvania State University students who opt for an on-campus experience this fall will start in-person classes on Monday under the banner of a “Mask Up or Pack Up” campaign. By returning to campus, students are agreeing to wear masks, adhere...
When Carthage College students begin returning to campus in Kenosha, Wisconsin, next week, two very non-traditional welcome back gifts will await them: a thermometer, and a scratch-and-sniff smell test card. Temperature checks as a way to quickly provide a gauge for a common symptom of the...
In early March, Peter Quagge began experiencing COVID-19 symptoms, such as chills and a low-grade fever. As he cut pieces of raw chicken to cook for dinner one night, he noticed he couldn’t smell the meat. “Must be really fresh,” he remembers thinking. But the...
Like many people, I grew up savoring the smell of baking bread and simmering stews. When I started cooking, I learned to rely on scent—the first carbonic hint of a char, the ranked notes of a properly prepared spice blend. The more I thought critically...
At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic—just before the peak of rabid stockpiling, when toilet paper attained currency-level value—I placed an order from one of the few online sellers still offering hand sanitizer. It was an online retailer specializing in bulk apothecary supplies, and I...
Workplaces do it. Newly reopened public libraries do it. LAX does it. Some restaurants, bars, and retail stores started doing it when governors let them serve customers again: Use temperature checks — almost always with “non-contact infrared thermometers” — to identify people who might have,...
