Pharmaceuticals

There is no effective treatment for the rare genetic disorder fragile X syndrome, so two parents created a foundation to fund research. But they found there's no easy road to a cure.

Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Margaret Hamburg says she'll leave the job at the end of March after six years in the spotlight and controversies over Plan B emergency contraception.

By making E. coli dependent on an artificial amino acid, scientists hope to show that engineered organisms can be safer and more useful for industrial processes like drug production.

Capital punishment and lethal injection were in the news quite a bit in 2014. Unable to secure certain drugs, states began using new ones, and that caused a number of executions to go awry.

Inmates in the U.S. have a high rate of infection with chronic hepatitis C — up to 35 percent or more by some estimates. New drugs introduced this year can cure the disease quickly, but at a cost.