Evolution has equipped us with ingenious stress responses (flight or fight), to maximise our chances of survival against life threatening threats. An adrenaline rush prompted by our brain during threats increases our blood pressure, heart rate and blood sugar levels enabling us to remain alert and respond to threat. Cortisol, a stress hormone released by the brain keeps these levels high as long as the perceived threat persists.

Most of us have seen diabetics take insulin injections. Wasim Akram was an insulin dependent diabetic, and at the same time, a threatening fast bowler.

Insulin is a protein produced in our bodies by the pancreas. In earlier days, insulin was extracted from the pancreas of cattle, in a tedious process that yielded just a few micrograms per pancreas.

Clean drinking water is an essential prerequisite for good health. In a country like India, where 21% of communicable diseases spread through unsafe water, and more than 500 children under the age of five die each day from diarrhoea, the accessibility to clean drinking water is paramount. Researchers from the CSIR-Indian Institute of Toxicology Research, have developed a frugal water purification system, Oneer, to help overcome our water woes.

Have you ever stepped outside and looked up at the sky on a clear, summer day and noticed something swimming in your field of vision? Little transparent worms or blobs that seem to disappear whenever you try and get a closer look at them, only to reappear as soon as you shift your glance. These are ‘floaters’, or as the scientific community calls them- ‘muscae volitantes’, which is Latin for ‘hovering flies’.