Laxatives are commonly used to relieve constipation, especially when changes in diet, exercise, and hydration don’t help. But ...

Osmotic laxatives draw water into the bowel because they are hypertonic, essentially flushing the colon. Examples of osmotic laxatives include milk of magnesia (which also softens stools), sodium ...

When she was a PhD student, Carolina Tropini, a biophysicist and current postdoc in Justin Sonnenburg’s lab at Stanford University, noticed that some bacteria responded to osmotic shock—that is, rapid ...