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Patsy Brannon, Professor of Nutrition, Cornell University explains what vitamins do and which are most important.

Participation is down in races to raise money for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure charity. Some Komen supporters remain skeptical about the group, even though a decision to cut funding for Planned Parenthood was reversed quickly.

Producer Ravida Din discusses the film “Pink Ribbons, Inc.,” with AnneMarie Ciccarella, of Breast Cancer Action, and Samantha King, Associate Professor, School of Kinesiology & Health Studies/Cultural Studies Program at Queen's University in Canada and author of the book Pink Ribbons, Inc.: Breast Cancer and the Politics of Philanthropy, on which the film is based. They discuss the pink ribbon campaigns for breast cancer and how the breast cancer movement has moved from activism to consumerism. “Pink Ribbons, Inc.” opens June 1 at IFC Center.

Antibiotic-free food went mainstream after Chipotle's founder advertised free-range pork on the menu. Now many big players in food service are getting into the act, creating a few supply chain hiccups.

In January 2003, The Lancet — one of the world's oldest and most respected medical journals — published an article championing the combination of two drugs (ACE inhibitors and ARBs) in treating certain types of kidney disease. But then an investigation concluded that the data in the study had been collected in a way that made it scientifically unsound. The Lancet printed a retraction, but thousands of patients still receive these drugs in combination.

Old people do have a unique smell. Researchers found that volunteers could reliably distinguish the body odor of the elderly from a whiff of the young or middle-aged. And, it turned out, the aroma from younger men smelled the worst.

The FDA ruled that changing the name high fructose corn syrup to "corn sugar" would cause confusion. Makers of corn syrup say their product has unfairly received a bad rap and had asked the agency to allow the change almost two years ago.

Families that qualify for free and reduced school lunches can struggle to feed kids out of their own pockets all summer. But many kids can't - or won't - come to school for free summer meals. So some administrators are loading lunches on colorful, hip food trucks and bringing the meals to the kids.

The amount of radiation found in Pacific bluefin tuna spawned near Fukushima does not threaten our health, despite today's suggestive headlines. What a new study shows is that scientists can rely on tiny amounts of radiation to track animals across great distances.

In the Obama household, there are some rules at mealtime. The Obamas eat brown rice instead of white, limit dessert to a few times during the week, and pack lots of vegetables into dinner.

Meat processors blame social media and their own lack of transparency for the "pink slime" storm. . But will consumers ever trust the industry when it comes to understanding how the food processing system works?

Food writer Peter Kaminsky and nutrition and public policy expert Marion Nestle talk about how to have healthy eating habits without sacrificing the fun and pleasure in food. In Culinary Intelligence: The Art of Eating Healthy (and Really Well) Kaminsky tells how he lost 35 pounds and kept them off and he shows how to think before eating, choose good ingredients, understand how flavor works, and make the effort to cook. Marion Nestle’s latest book is Why Calories Count: From Science to Politics (California Studies in Food and Culture).

Obesity is one of the most pressing concerns in contemporary American life, and a new study finds that it affects the country's homeless population as much as it does the general population. Andrea De Mink, the founder and executive of an Indianapolis-based homelessness organization The PourHouse, strives to provide her patrons with the healthiest food possible in order to combat this rising concern, and Barbara DiPietro, the policy director of the National Health Care for the Homeless Council, explains why this research is largely unsurprising.

According to a new study, 42 percent of American adults will be obese by the year 2030. And all this week, The Takeaway looks at that prediction with people we might not normally think of as obesity specialists. Today, the conversation continues with Michael Moyer, senior editor at Scientific American. Moyer believes that in order to combat America’s obesity epidemic, the answer isn’t mere math equations.

 

Is fracking making people sick? The question has ignited a national debate. A proposed study in northern Pennsylvania could help resolve the issue. By mining more than 10 years' worth of patient records, researchers hope to better understand the potential impact of hydraulic fracturing on health.

Paul Zak tells us about oxytocin, a chemical messenger that accounts for why some people are generous, trustworthy, and faithful and others aren’t. His book The Moral Molecule: The Source of Love and Prosperity looks at decades of research on what oxytocin is and how it works.  

A new study predicts that 42 percent of American adults will be obese — a category beyond overweight — by the year 2030. We talk to Keith Davis, owner of Goliath Coffins, who is working to accomodate America's bigger, more obese future by making caskets for the morbidly obese.

Robin Hesketh, professor in the department of Biochemistry at the University of Cambridge, gives a history the science of cancer and the medical advances made over the decades. In Betrayed by Nature: The War on Cancer, he leads a tour of human biology to show what happens to the body when the disease develops and how it’s treated.

The Food and Drug Administration is considering a petition that could benefit Hispanic women by allowing the addition of folic acid, or folate, to the corn flour — a staple in many Latino foods — to help reduce birth defects.

Gretchen Reynolds writes the "Phys Ed" column for the New York Times and is the author of The First 20 Minutes: Surprising Science Reveals How We Can: Exercise Better, Train Smarter, Live Longer. She joins us to discuss what science is proving and disproving when it comes to exercise.