Science and Innovation

Coronavirus cases continue to surge in Arizona, while summer weather and the upcoming Fourth of July weekend tempt residents to travel and visit with family and friends. Public health experts say staying safe during the pandemic means staying home as much as possible and managing your “social bubble,” the people who you live with or frequently contact. In KNAU’s weekly update on the science of COVID-19, Melissa Sevigny speaks with infectious disease expert Paul Keim about his personal guidelines for socializing in the pandemic.  

When rattlesnakes warn you to back off, they hold their tails upright to help the rattling sound travel further. And visually reinforce that ‘stay away’ message by showing the striped part of their tails.

Arizona is one of two dozen U.S. states where coronavirus cases have been on the rise for the past week. Governor Doug Ducey points to increased testing as the cause, but local health experts say hospitalizations are increasing, too. In KNAU’s weekly update on the science of COVID-19, Melissa Sevigny speaks with University of Arizona epidemiologist Dr. Purnima Madhivanan about what’s driving those numbers, who it’s affecting, and why.

For a beautiful, thriving garden, it’s all about the birds and the bees — and the bats and the butterflies too. Nearly all flowers and most crop plants need animals to carry their pollen from one plant to another for fertilization.

Antibodies are an immune response that linger in the blood of people who’ve recovered from a disease. That’s also how vaccines work—they teach the body how to produce those antibodies so it’s ready the next time the disease comes around. There’s no vaccine for COVID-19 yet, but scientists have developed blood tests that can identify antibodies against coronavirus. In KNAU’s weekly update on the science of COIVD-19, Melissa Sevigny spoke with infectious disease expert Dr. Paul Keim about why these antibody tests matter for public health, and what it means when the results say someone is “sero-positive.”