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As Vanessa Peterson recovered from a frighteningly serious illness, she wondered whether it was linked to air quality. For many communities, she found, pollution is a political issue.

Cultural historian Elsa Richardson explores the stomach’s influence over our emotions, and why trusting your gut is often good advice.

From rare bugs to exorbitantly priced plant parts, find out more about the artistic and medical uses of pigments from the past.

Many condemn skin bleaching in public while secretly lightening their own complexions. To break away from these taboos, we need honest information and open conversation.

Our love of alcohol is like a party that’s lasted nine centuries. But there are signs that the demon drink is losing its appeal.

An intense focus on his own bodily sensations led poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge to self-medicate with narcotics. But this fascination also put Coleridge ahead of the medical sensibilities of his day.

Measuring the heat of these peppers can leave you a little lukewarm.

Kate Summerscale explores the history of our anxieties and compulsions, and the new phobias and manias that are always emerging.

The 18th century saw multiple technical developments in both printing and medicine. Colourful collaborations ensued – to the benefit of growing ranks of medical students.

Rai Waddingham lives with voices other people cannot hear. Here she describes how she has come to accept, understand and calm her voices, and to acknowledge her strength.

In the 1950s, many psychiatrists thought that homosexuality could be reformed. One found that it couldn’t – and his discoveries led to a change in the law.

Eight Black people talk about their relationship with their hair – their hairstyle history, their experiences, and how they decided to have natural hair.

This exhibition explores humanity’s vital connection with freshwater – an essential source of life and pillar of good health for people and planet.