CATEGORIES

Droplet Stoppers

Covid-19 made face masks a crucial part of every outfit, and we’re likely to don them in the future when we feel ill. Fortunately, there’s a style for every need.

Landing a Lifeline

For those whose livelihood depends on the ocean, a covid-spurred interruption in the seafood market might speed progress toward a more sustainable future—for them and for fish.

Headtrip – Your brain on video chat

Dating, Catching up with family, and going to happy hour are best in person.

Tales From the Field – A cold one on mars

Kellie Gerardi, bioastronautics researcher at the International Institute for Austronautical Science

The Needs Of The Few

Designing with the marginalized in mind can improve all of out lives.

sweat suit

YOUR MUSCLES DESERVE BETTER THAN YOUR RATTY OLD WORKOUT GEAR. DECK YOURSELF OUT IN THE RIGHT DUDS AND YOU’LL UPGRADE BOTH YOUR PERFORMANCE AND YOUR STYLE.

listening to trees

MARIANO MORALES, ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENTIST AT THE ARGENTINIAN INSTITUTE OF SNOW SCIENCE, GLACIOLOGY, AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES

home stretch

A HARD WORKOUT SHOULDN’T LEAVE YOU WITH LINGERING PAIN. THE RIGHT RECOVERY TOOLS WILL HELP INCREASE BLOOD FLOW AND FIGHT FATIGUE TO SOOTHE YOUR ACHES.

hungry hungry hippos

IN 1981, NOTORIOUS drug lord Pablo Escobar imported four hippos from Africa to his estate near Medellín, Colombia. After his death in 1993, the herd meandered into the nearby Magdalena River.

spacing out is good for you

A WANDERING MIND REAPS BENE- FITS YOU MIGHT NOT IMAGINE.

in remission

FOR MUCH OF THE 20TH CENTURY, cancer was an unspeakable diagnosis.

DYNAMIC DUO

HUMANS AND EARTH ARE OFTEN AT ODDS, BUT WHEN DISASTER STRIKES, THEY CAN COMBINE THEIR POWERS TO BRING NEW LIFE TO LANDSCAPES.

Hell? Yes!

Endurance athletes and the pleasure of pushing it

Anatomy Of a Laugh

The oldest known joke dates back nearly 4,000 years, and it’s a fart gag. The fact that we’ve been crackin’ wise for so long suggests there’s something innate about the need to laugh.

How Do We Know What Dinosaurs Looked Like?

YOU’VE SEEN ENOUGH MUSEUM models, illustrations, and CGI predators that you’d likely recognize a Tyrannosaurus rex if you saw one.

the original illusions

ILLUSIONS HAVE FASCINATED HUMANS FOR centuries. Before we fully understood the science of sensation and perception, philosophers like Aristotle simply observed the world— and picked up on some weird stuff. According to Vincent Hayward, who studies such phenomena at the Institute for Intelligent Systems and Robotics in Paris, these tricks occur when experience and context make you expect one feeling but perceive another due to abnormal circumstances. Here are three of Aristotle’s earliest observed illusions, explained by modern science.

BIGGEST. DIG. EVER.

One massive rail project, 10 millennia of history, 60-plus excavations, 143 miles of track, and thousands of skeletons. How a crew of British archaeologists will make sense of their…

Could Doing Things The Old-Fashioned Way Make Us Better Modern Scientists?

Today, we imagine lab experiments as part of a separate realm from fine arts like painting or trades like carpentry.

WHY ARE WE NOSTALGIC?

WE’VE ALL FELT THAT JAB TO THE SOUL YOU get from driving by your old high school haunts or hearing a tune you once danced to. But why is that bittersweet sort of reminiscence so universal?

In Search of the Missing Microbe

Most Mongolians are lactose intolerant, and yet their diet relies on dairy. A mysterious world of bacteria could be at play.

A WORLD OF THEIR OWN

The birth of a new trend puts everyday people in control of the data that maps our planet.

What It's Like To Sing On Another Planet

Acousticians sometimes speculate about how conversations might carry on alien worlds. Of course, you’d have no time to chat if you stood in the open air on Mars: Your blood would boil you to death in seconds. But what about those final screams?

How Birds Got Their Groove

NATURE PUTS EVERY CHIRP in its proper place. Avian sounds— flutish trills, alarmlike buzzes, and one-note squawks alike— are immediately absorbed, reflected, and scattered by everything in a bird’s habitat.

Comal, a bustling,

Oaxacan-inspired restaurant in Berkeley, California, has all the ingredients for the kind of ear-splitting ambience that’s become familiar in modern eateries: packed bar, open kitchen, high ceilings, and concrete walls. But when I join a dinner there one spring evening, it’s easy to jump into the margarita-fueled conversation and order up plates of grilled corn, carne asada tacos, and rotisserie chicken with mole.

The Song Of The Immortal Violin

The masterpieces that Antonio Stradivari created three centuries ago will not live forever. One museum hopes digitizing their melodious voice will save them for future generations.

Making It On Mars

If humans want to create a lasting presence on the Red Planet, they’ll have to live off the dirt beneath their feet.

Reading Astronauts' Secret Diaries

What astronaut diaries tell us—and NASA—about the perils and potential of a mission to the red planet

A Mini Medieval Siege Weapon

AROUND THE TURN OF THE 14TH CENTURY, ENGLAND’S KING EDWARD I led his soldiers north to battle Scottish rebels.

Toy Box Overfloweth

YOU BOGARTED YOUR NIECE’S ROBOT DINOSAUR for a solid three hours after her birthday party. Admit it. We won’t judge you. Today’s playthings are some tempting stuff. They’re bigger, stronger, and faster than the foot-powered plastic “cars,” immobile Lego fortresses, and dead-eyed Teddy Ruxpin dolls that came before. Building sets are so lifelike, go-karts so zippy, and robots so intelligent that even adults will find these outsize toys utterly irresistible. Now kindly hold my beer, kid; there’s a Nerf battle that needs my full attention.

Heads In The Cloud

RIGHT NOW, IN A DATA CENTER far, far away, gargantuan cloud servers are providing brainpower to devices as minute as fitness trackers. A baseball-size camera, for example, might seem like little more than simple home surveillance; or an adorable green dinosaur might appear to be just a child’s plaything. In reality, armies of servers undergird these—and countless other— unassuming gadgets. Here are five of the smartest out there.