ScienceDaily: Living Well News

Imagine your car starting the moment you get in because it recognizes the jacket you're wearing. Consider the value of a hospital gown that continuously measures and transmits a patient's vital signs. These are just two applications made possible by a new 'body area network'-enabling fabric.

A new study suggests that the brain differentiates very similar environments -- such as two stores from the same supermarket chain -- as if they were even more different than two places that are nothing alike.

Drinking coffee or tea may be associated with a lower risk of stroke and dementia, according to a new study. Drinking coffee was also associated with a lower risk of post-stroke dementia.

Video clips are only modestly more persuasive to audiences than the written word is, according to researchers who conducted an experiment about political misinformation.

A study comparing the impact of diet versus drugs on the inner workings of our cells has found nutrition has a much stronger impact.

Can we infer someone's cultural group from their laugher, even when we do not know what they are laughing at? And what kind of laughter do we find most positive? A new study shows that our laughter gives us away. The study included Dutch and Japanese producers of laughter and listeners. Listeners could detect whether a laughing person is from their own or another cultural group by only hearing a brief laughter segment. Spontaneous laughter was rated as most positive by both groups.