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Outer Space, our solar system and Earth’s geography, geology and human environmentDiscover Smithsonian articles by place—including Earth, the solar system and outer space.
The Building Blocks of Life May Have Come From Outer Space
Did meteorites seed Earth the building blocks of life?
February 2013 |
By Ker Than
Air Pollution Has Been a Problem Since the Days of Ancient Rome
By testing ice cores in Greenland, scientists can look back at environmental data from millennia past
February 2013 |
By Joseph Stromberg
How to Save a Dying Language
Geoffrey Khan is racing to document Aramaic, the language of Jesus, before its native speakers vanish
February 2013 |
By Ariel Sabar
The Komodo Dragon is an All-Purpose Killing Machine
A visit to one of Indonesia’s most popular tourist destinations could be your last
February 2013 |
By Brendan Borrell
Welcome to America’s Dinosaur Playground
Countless bones and a billion years of geological action make Dinosaur National Monument the go-to park for fossil finds
February 2013 |
By Mary Roach
The House Where Darwin Lived
Home to the naturalist for 40 years, the estate near London was always evolving
February 2013 |
By Rebecca Stott
Lost and Found Again: Photos of African-Americans on the Plains
What would otherwise be a local-interest story became a snapshot of history integral to the American experience
February 2013 |
By Joseph Stromberg
Five Great Places to See Evidence of First Americans
Encounter the fossils and other remnants of the lives left behind by the continent’s original settlers
February 2013 |
By Guy Gugliotta
How Long Can Turtles Stay Underwater and Other Questions From Our Readers
You asked? We answered
February 2013 |
By Smithsonian magazine
New Research Disproves Prehistoric Killer-Comet Theory (Again)
Maybe the problem here is that other prevailing theories of the Clovis’ decline are just super boring by comparison
January 31, 2013 |
By Lauren Kirchner
A New Disease, a New Reason to Hate And Fear Ticks
A worrisome new tick-borne disease, similar to Lyme disease but caused by a different microbe, turned up in 18 patients in southern New England
January 31, 2013 |
By Rachel Nuwer
New X-Ray Technology To Reveal Secrets Beneath a Rembrandt Masterpiece
By 1984, conservators had discovered that there was, indeed, another figure hidden beneath the Old Man in Military Costume, but they haven't been able to see who it is
January 31, 2013 |
By Lauren Kirchner
Riding a Hundred-Foot Wave, Surfer Breaks His Own World Record
Garrett McNamara said he felt awe, joy and excitement as the massive wall of water approached - but no fear
January 31, 2013 |
By Rachel Nuwer
China’s Air Pollution Is So Bad That One Entrepreneur Is Selling Fresh Air in Cans
It’s a bleak state of affairs indeed when a Mel Brooks schtickfest from the '80s actually predicts the future
January 31, 2013 |
By Lauren Kirchner
Americans Buy So Many Wings, They’re Now the Most Expensive Part of the Chicken
Each February, the nation's thirst for chicken wings hits the roof, making the delicate wing the most expensive bit of the bird
January 31, 2013 |
By Rose Eveleth
How to Tour Louis Armstrong’s New Orleans
Jazz is synonymous with the Big Easy, and there’s no bigger name in the history of the genre than Satchmo
January 31, 2013 |
By Nina Fedrizzi
U.S. Military Wants to Recruit the Smartest Dogs by Scanning Their Brains
The theory is that, by scanning a dog’s level of neural response to various stimuli, including handler cues, the researchers will be able to identify the dogs that will be the quickest learners and therefore the easiest to train
January 30, 2013 |
By Lauren Kirchner
Some Microbes Are So Resilient They Can Ride Hurricanes
By comparison, other lifeforms such as fungal spores and pollen don’t thrive nearly as well as the microbes, the survey found.
January 30, 2013 |
By Lauren Kirchner
People Have Been Eating Curry for 4,500 Years
Thanks to new research methods and a pile of (very old) dirty dishes, archaeologists have discovered the very ancient origins of a globally popular cuisine.
January 30, 2013 |
By Lauren Kirchner
