The same slow nail growth that won a doctor a posthumous Ig Nobel Prize this year is now at the center of a serious cancer question. Researchers at the University of Calgary report that toenail clippings can act as a multiyear record of radon exposure, and the signal lingered even in people who had fixed their homes years earlier.
The team is now testing whether nails could someday help flag people at higher risk of lung cancer who do not qualify for screening, including many who never smoked.
