Development of games prevents cognitive decline in elderly people. The study involved a control group and a third group of people who learned to play video games.

A new study by scientists from the Smithsonian, the Panamanian government and the US Environmental Protection Agency, among other institutions, concludes that conserving old-growth tropical rainforest is 'highly recommended' to prevent new outbreaks of viral and parasitic mosquito-borne diseases.

A longstanding obstacle to the market for bovine embryos is about to be removed. Researchers have described a hitherto unknown mechanism of lipid accumulation in oocytes that limits the success of in vitro production of bovine embryos.

Thanks to a secret vaccine ingredient as well as a net of worldwide researchers and successful vaccination campaigns, smallpox was finally eradicated in 1977. A new study entitled 'Revisiting Jenner's mysteries, the role of the Beaugency lymph in the evolutionary path of ancient smallpox vaccines' and published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, provides an in-depth investigation of the mysteries associated with the development of smallpox vaccine and is a rich and interesting account of how the vaccine lymph was spread worldwide.

Smithsonian scientists use sonar to estimate Antillean Manatee populations in the murky waters of Panama's internationally protected San San Pond Sak wetlands.