News from the science and technology of humans.

More Americans and Europeans are going to India for cheaper and faster surgery. Foreign patients there are expected to rise 15 percent each year.

The director of the National Institutes of Health conceded that stem-cell lines excluded from federal funding by President Bush would help answer some medical questions. This essentially contradicts the White House line.

We may have found the earliest evidence of human compassion. A 1.8-million-year-old skull indicates its aged owner survived without teeth for two years, possibly because others found soft food for him or softened up tough food for him. The explanation is speculative.

Food makers are studying chemicals to make you think you're eating salt and sugar when you aren't. The chemicals trick your taste receptors. Good news: The companies would then reduce salt and sugar content. Bad news: They won't list the new chemicals on ingredients labels.

The U.S. is remotely piloting more than 700 drones over Iraq. The military plans to spend billions for more. They're "tracking insurgents, foiling roadside bombings, protecting convoys and launching missile attacks."

Companies are fighting obesity by drugging the brain. One experimental drug blocks a pleasure receptor; another signals the brain to stop eating.

Researchers used brain scans to detect how much you trust another person. The scans show blood flow in a specific part of the brain.

Proteins can edit mutational errors in human DNA. This is a more precise alternative to gene transplants. Scientists claim the technique's 20 percent success rate is "probably adequate to elicit a cure if the technique were to be used on an actual patient."