Smart News

Is your book overdue? Help may be in sight.

Cool Finds

This Library System Is Willing to Forgive Your Fine…Just This Once

Library scofflaws take note: Amnesty programs are gaining steam throughout the U.S.

A human embryo at the four-cell stage.

New Research

British Scientists Get Permission to Genetically Modify Human Embryos for Research

The scientists plan to use genetic engineering techniques to study infertility

A Lady-in-Waiting of France strums her instrument on this card from The Courtly Household Cards (Das Hofämterspiel), created in c. 1450.

Cool Finds

Lavishly Illustrated Medieval Playing Cards Flouted the Church and Law

Secular and religious officials alike frowned on card playing in Europe's Middle Ages

The moon rises over the Sahara Desert. New research links a rising moon to lower humidity and a decreased chance of rain.

New Research

The Moon's Tidal Forces May Affect How Much It Rains

The higher the moon, the lower the chance of rain

Cool Finds

GoPro-Armed Vultures Capture Lima’s Trash Problems

By sniffing out illegal dumps, the watchful buzzards will hopefully inspire action to clean up the city's streets

Specialty serveware from the collection of Charles "Chuck" Williams, founder of Williams-Sonoma.

Cool Finds

Williams-Sonoma’s Founder Is Getting His Own Museum

The museum will feature the 4,000-plus pieces of cookware that the kitchenware impresario donated upon his death

Cool Finds

44 Years Ago, Shirley Chisholm Became the First Black Woman to Run For President

Chisholm saw her campaign as a necessary "catalyst for change"

Slogans like the one on this propaganda poster for Mao Zedong, "Urgently Forge Ahead and Bravely Advance with Great Leader Chairman Mao,” take on a new smell now that it’s revealed that Stalin may have studied his poop.

Trending Today

Stalin May Have Studied Mao’s Poop in a Secret Lab

Get a whiff of this stranger-than-fiction story of political paranoia and Soviet science

Cool Finds

The First Person of Native American Descent Was Elected to the U.S. Senate 109 Years Ago Today

Charles Curtis, who would go on to become Herbert Hoover's vice president, left behind a problematic legacy

A beached sperm whale on January 13, in Wangerooge, Germany

Trending Today

At Least 17 Sperm Whales Washed Up on North Sea Shores

The cause of the cetacean tragedy is still a mystery

An engraving showing the Pequot War

Cool Finds

Colonial America Depended on the Enslavement of Indigenous People

The role of enslaving Native Americans in early American history is often overlooked

New Research

Cats May Have Been Domesticated Twice

But only one ended up as the house cat

Earth as seen on July 6, 2015 from a distance of one million miles by a NASA scientific camera aboard the Deep Space Climate Observatory spacecraft.

Trending Today

The Curious History of The International Flat Earth Society

The recent resurgence of this ancient idea reminds us that flat Earth believers have a long history

Cool Finds

Step Inside a Dalí Painting at This Virtual Reality Exhibit

Surrealism meets real life in an exploration of a Dalí masterwork

Precinct officials count paper ballots for Mitt Romney in the 2012 Iowa caucuses.

Trending Today

Five Things to Know About the Iowa Caucuses

The Hawkeye State knows its way around political chaos

Who wouldn't want to let these adorable critters pass through?

Cool Finds

British People Are Building Highways for Hedgehogs Through Their Yards

Hedgehog populations in England have declined since the 1970s due urban and suburban development

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un laughs during a factory tour in January 2016. North Korea tied with Somalia for "most corrupt" in a 2105 index of global corruption perceptions.

Trending Today

Here Are the World's Most Corrupt Countries

Corruption is everywhere, but some nations are more corrupt than others

OSU archaeologist Loren Davis alongside the bones uncovered underneath the end zone.

Trending Today

Construction Crews Discover Mammoth Bones Beneath an Oregon Football Stadium

10,000-year-old bones were hiding just ten feet beneath the endzone

Omo hanging with her herd

Cool Finds

Rare White Giraffe Survived Her First Year

The 15-month old calf has so far survived possible predation from lions, leopards, hyenas and human poachers

A ground view of the proposed design for "The Weight of Sacrifice," which will serve as the new national World War I memorial.

Trending Today

This Is the Winning Design for the New World War I Memorial

One hundred years later, WWI will finally get a large-scale memorial in Washington, D.C.

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