Contributor

B. David Zarley

Senior Staff Writer

Contact

b.david@freethink.com

B. David Zarley is a senior staff writer for Freethink, where he covers health and medicine, including infectious disease, psychedelic research, mental health, and the brain. A graduate of SUNY Fredonia, his work has also appeared in The Atlantic, The Verge, Jezebel, Frieze, Sports Illustrated, VICE, Paste Magazine, and numerous other publications. He lives in Chicago and can be reached via Signal by request. Send him story ideas!

How Stripe is using GPT-4 to fight fraud

Stripe has incorporated OpenAI’s large language model GPT-4 into their business.

B. David Zarley

Medicine

First ever therapy for rare genetic disorder now approved

The FDA has approved the first drug for Rett syndrome, a genetic neurodevelopmental disorder, which disproportionately affects women and girls.

B. David Zarley

Clean Energy

Making electricity from wastewater

Researchers have developed a “sandwich-like” membrane that removes pollutants while generating power.

B. David Zarley

You can run this text-generating AI on your own devices, no giant servers needed

By fine-tuning a large language model, Stanford researchers have created a text-generating AI you can run for a fraction of the price.

B. David Zarley

7 creative ways people are already using GPT-4

Users are already demonstrating the wide array of uses the new AI tool may have.

B. David Zarley

Outer Space

Canadian students discover EpiPens will turn toxic in space

Canadian students launched EpiPen solution into suborbital space, and what came back was no longer life-saving medicine.

B. David Zarley

aerial view of airport with plane taxiing

Transportation

New warning system will make airports safer

The FAA has installed a new warning system to prevent planes from landing on taxiways at 43 major airports.

B. David Zarley

Coronavirus

Volunteers were purposefully infected with COVID-19. Was it worth it?

It has been a year since the first COVID human challenge data was published. What did we learn, and can HCTs prepare us for the future?

B. David Zarley

Agriculture

Watch: Scientists breed flame-resistant cotton, without added chemicals

USDA researchers have developed self-extinguishing cotton lines, potentially cutting down on the need for flame retardants in the future.

B. David Zarley

Medicine

New kind of pill cut “bad” cholesterol up to 60% in clinical trial

In a phase 2 trial, a daily oral medication reduced LDL cholesterol levels by up to 60%.

B. David Zarley