Biologists are quietly rewriting what it means to be alive, and the human body has become one of their strangest frontiers.

In a breakthrough for the advanced study of gut health, scientists have developed a 3D microscopic version of the human intestines condensed into a small chip about half the size of a five-cent coin.

MSU researchers discovered that microbes begin shaping the brain while still in the womb, influencing neurons in a region critical for stress and social behavior. Their findings suggest modern birth ...