I've said for years that the best way to avoid weight gain and diabetes is to stay away from white foods, such as white flour, sugar, white rice, and even potatoes. It's generally good advice, but if the thought of giving up some favorite foods is hard, I have good news. You can have your potatoes and eat them too — if you eat the purple ones!

If a traditional remedy doesn't actually kill bacteria, it's probably just an old wives' tale — right? Not so fast, says Cassandra Quave, an ethnobotanist at Emory University. Quave focuses on investigating traditional remedies used by people in Southern Italy and other areas of the Mediterranean. And some of her research may be paying off in a big way.

Ok, let's see if you think there's a problem with this. A drug company comes up with a drug and submits the data on the drug to the FDA. It reviews the data and refuses to approve the drug because it doesn't work very well and has too many side effects. So the drug company resubmits it a second time. Same results. So far so good.