Your parents likely taught you how to wash your hands, but doing it right in today’s society is harder than ever. Sinks in public spaces often limit the amount of water you can use and, what’s more, the water is usually cold. Microbiology doctoral candidate Michelle Sconce Massaquoi of the University of Oregon tells us what we really need to do to keep our hands clean so we can stay healthy, especially during the holiday travel season.

Children’s author, Philip Pullman, returns to the theme of tackling religion as an oppressive institution in “La Belle Sauvage,” the first volume of the recently released “The Book of Dust” series. But, as children’s literature scholar Marek Oziewicz writes, “on another level…the novel continues Pullman’s quest for explaining human consciousness. Put simply, if we have souls, what exactly are they?”