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Ó³»­´«Ã½ institute member James Collins demystifies how antibiotics work, laying a path toward smarter, more effective use of existing bacteria-fighting drugs

The widespread use of antibiotics marked a major turning point in medical history. Bacterial infections that once disfigured or killed their hosts could be neutralized simply, swiftly, and, for the most part, safely.

About 45,000 years ago, in the midst of the last ice age, modern humans began arriving in what we now call Europe. They stayed even as temperatures fell and great glaciers crept to their maximum coverage between 25,000 and 19,000 years ago.

Archaeologists have unearthed traces of these hunter-gatherer cultures in bones, tools, cave paintings and other artifacts. That record, however, can only hint at how members of different populations were related to one another and to present-day people.