SpaceX plans to launch two paying passengers on a tourist trip around the moon next year using a spaceship under development for NASA astronauts and a heavy-lift rocket yet to be flown, the launch company announced on Monday. The launch of the first privately funded tourist flight beyond the orbit …

By using a common bacteria, scientists have figured out a way to potentially sterilize disease-carrying mosquitoes.  That could make it possible to control the mosquito that spreads Zika and Dengue. Wolbachia is a common bacteria that has the ability to infect up to 70 percent of the world’s insect species. …

The World Health Organization is calling for the urgent development of new antibiotics to fight growing bacterial resistance. For the first time, the U.N. agency has drawn up a list of 12 families of bacteria that pose the greatest threat to human health. The list is divided into three categories …

South Africa is one of five countries to conduct the first major clinical trial that attempts to prevent heart disease and stroke among HIV-positive patients, who are at higher risk of these conditions. The Randomized Trial to Prevent Vascular Events in HIV, known as REPRIEVE, is enrolling participants in what …

Students are growing their own organic food at Latin America’s first sustainable public school, just outside Uruguay’s capital, Montevideo. Made of recycled items and powered by clean energy, the school teaches children how to live in harmony with nature. Faith Lapidus reports. …

The Clean Air Act, introduced in 1963, empowers the federal government to control air pollution. It has cleaned up the air we breathe, and controlled acid rain and ozone depletion. In 2007, the Bush Administration began using it to regulate U.S. emissions that contribute to climate change. What is the …

Jeff Regan was born with underdeveloped optic nerves and spent most of his life in a blur. Then four years ago, he donned an unwieldy headset made by a Toronto company called eSight. Suddenly, Regan could read a newspaper while eating breakfast and make out the faces of his co-workers …

NASA is weighing the risk of adding astronauts to the first flight of its new megarocket, designed to eventually send crews to Mars. The space agency’s human exploration chief said Friday that his boss and the Trump administration asked for the feasibility study. The objective is to see what it …

Republicans in the U.S. Congress are working to overhaul the nation’s health care laws in their effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, considered by some to be one of former President Barack Obama’s most significant legislative achievements. U.S. media outlets reported details Friday of potential replacements for …

In dry northern regions, the melting from winter snowpack is crucial for filling reservoirs, irrigating crops and providing drinking water. In northern Colorado, communities get 80 percent of their water from snowpack, so knowing the water content of snow helps them plan ahead. But, unlike other weather data about rainfall …

Data about snow is hard to gather from space. NASA weather scientists report that currently, worldwide estimates of the water stored in snow may be off by 30 to 50 percent. That’s why NASA’s launching an ambitious project to create a new “snow satellite.”  The first steps start not in satellites, …

Deaths caused by heroin overdoses in the United States quadrupled between 2010 and 2015, according to a new report. The National Center for Health Statistics says there were 12,989 overdose deaths involving heroin in 2015. In 2010, the number was 3,036. In percentages, heroin caused 8 percent of drug overdose …

The U.S. was declared measles-free 15 years ago, thanks to the development of a reliable vaccine against that virus, but many American doctors now are worried that could change, because so many parents are opposed to having their children inoculated against disease. VOA’s Carol Pearson has more. …

Leprosy, despite its horrible reputation, is a very curable disease. But there are still more than 200,000 cases reported every year, most of them in India, Indonesia, Brazil, and parts of Africa. To fully understand the disease, doctors and archaeologists are examining the skeletons of people who had the disease …

A small study in 16 people with severe anorexia has found that implanting stimulation electrodes into the brains of patients could ease their anxiety and help them gain weight. Researchers found that in extreme cases of the eating disorder, the technique, known as deep brain stimulation (DBS), swiftly helped many …

The Justice Department will step up enforcement of federal law against recreational marijuana, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Thursday, offering the Trump administration’s strongest indication to date of a looming crackdown on the drug, even as a solid majority of Americans believe it should be legal. “I do believe …

A new study showed that two antibiotics secreted by helpful skin bacteria kept harmful skin microbes at bay. The finding suggests people with skin infections may someday be able to treat them by applying a cream that contains antibiotics from “good” bacteria living on their skin.  Skin is covered in …

Astrobiologists seeking to understand where life might be found on Mars, and what form it might take, are finding that the Atacama desert in Chile, the driest in the world, may hold some important clues. Since a 2003 study that examined microbial life in the ‘Mars-like soils’ of the Atacama, …

More than 300 million people, or more than four percent of the global population, were living with depression in 2015 – an 18-percent increase over a 10-year period.    New figures released Thursday by the World Health Organization show that depression was increasing worldwide and now was the leading cause …

NASA’s Jupiter-circling spacecraft is stuck making long laps around the gas giant because of sticky valves. It currently takes Juno 53 days to fly around the solar system’s biggest planet. That’s almost four times longer than the intended 14-day orbit. After repeated delays, NASA decided late last week to scrap …

Nearly 10 years after a “doomsday” seed vault opened on an Arctic island, some 50,000 new samples from seed collections around the world have been deposited in the world’s largest repository built to safeguard against wars or natural disasters wiping out global food crops. The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, the …

An international team of astronomers, using an array of ground and space telescopes, has discovered an astonishing seven Earth-sized planets in a system just 40 light years away. Water, water everywhere The seven planets, according to a press release, “all have masses less than or similar to the Earth.” According …

There is some good news for cat lovers. Turns out those reports that people who grew up with cats have a higher risk of mental illness are not true. Writing in the journal Psychological Medicine, researchers from University College London say a common parasite associated with cats, Toxoplasma Gondii, which …

Whether it’s brake fluid in Nigerian teething syrup, melamine in Chinese baby formula, or talcum powder in Kenyan antibiotics, contaminated food and medicine is a deadly problem. But a group of scientists, led by Notre Dame chemistry professor Marya Lieberman, hopes to eliminate the problem for millions of people in …

South Korean women will be the first in the world to have an average life expectancy of 91 years, a new study predicts. Imperial College London and the World Health Organization analyzed lifespans in 35 industrialized countries. The study found all would see people living longer in 2030, and the …