Saad Bhamla, an assistant professor in the School of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, and his research group hoped for an opportunity to study a cicada's fluid excretion.

Dr. Bhamla said there was quite a lot of room for future research in the area of drip or flush excretions.

That may not seem like a big deal to us, but it was startling in creatures that seem to have no control over their excretions.

For more than three decades, thiazide diuretics, a common medication used for high blood pressure, have been the standard of care for kidney stone prevention because they reduce the excretion of urinary calcium.

Victor Estrada’s loose, abstract paintings are vaguely scatological, the excretions of oil paint creating playful, self-contained landscapes of organic imagination confined within the four edges of a canvas.