Crystals And Catalysts

I wasn’t planning on writing an article on the coronavirus, as there’s a lot of information out there to read, and my fellow science communicators are doing their job and more to educate everyone on the severity of COVID-19 and how to prevent it (i.e. WASH YOUR HANDS!). But from a conversation with a friend, I found a topic that I feel is important to share with everyone and that’s how the coronavirus is treated. 

Click info-graphic to enlarge Winter is coming to an end and last Friday was officially the first day of spring  (but if you're in England you probably didn't notice a difference; maybe the odd daffodil here and there but the weather is pretty much the same). So with the changes in weather comes cold & flu season, where it seems as if everyone's got a cold, and taking sick-days off school/work.  Two scientists at the University of Helsinki:  Harri Hemilä from Helsinki, Finland and Elizabeth Chalker from Sydney, Australia decided to study whether there are differences in the effect of zinc lozenges on different common-cold symptoms. Harri Hemilä from Helsinki, Finland and Elizabeth Chalker from Sydney, Australia decided to investigate whether there are differences in the effect of zinc lozenges on different common-cold symptoms.  What are Zinc Lozenges? Zinc lozenges contain zinc acetate, when you suck on a zinc lozenge, zinc acetate br...

Can you really catch a cold when it’s cold outside? It turns out that actually staying warm can be useful and our mums were right in telling us to wrap up and keep warm and to wear a jacket when we go out.

What is the flu? Influenza or “flu” for short is a virus. Viruses contain either RNA or DNA but never both in one viral cell. They work by entering human cells via adsorption and exploiting the functions of the nucleus, in the healthy human cell, to replicate the  nucleic acid and place it inside capsules called nucleocapsids   which are then budded off and released out of the cell to go onto infect more healthy cells in the body; a vicious cycle.