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Science / Our Planet

Sahara Conservation Fund ecological monitoring member Habib Ali (next to vehicle) engaging in typical day-to-day monitoring of reintroduced oryx.

Smithsonian Voices

Continuing Conservation in a Planet on Lockdown

Capacity building and local community involvement are key to continuing conservation during the current pandemic

Bat ticks (Ornithodoros) under a microscope. These parasites primarily feed on bats and were collected from bats roosting beneath a Mayan Temple in Belize. Very little is known about these ticks and many species are unknown to science.

Smithsonian Voices

Why We Need to Save the Parasites

Extinction will have lasting and far-reaching consequences for biodiversity, and subsequently for humans

A scene of the wreckage left behind by a hurricane that swept through the Florida Keys in 1935.

How Hurricanes Have Shaped the Course of U.S. History

A new book examines the 500-year record of devastating storms affecting the nation’s trajectory

Joshua Bell is the curator of globalization at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. He is working on a new exhibit about the global history of cellphones.

Smithsonian Voices

Meet the Scientist Studying How Cell Phones Change Societies

“Smartphones embody globalization,” says the Smithsonian cultural anthropologist Josh Bell

Quantum physicist Amruta Gadge became the first to create a Bose-Einstein Condensate—the exotic, elusive fifth state of matter—remotely.

Covid-19

Five Scientific Achievements That Happened During Coronavirus Lockdown

Quarantine did not stop these innovators from discovering new species, creating the elusive fifth state of matter remotely, and more

A home burns as the Camp Fire moves through the area on November 8, 2018 in Paradise, California.

Covid-19

How COVID-19 Will Change the Way We Fight Wildfires

Prepare for the return of the Smokey Bear method as social distancing prevents firefighters from using more modern strategies

Smithsonian Geologist Liz Cottrell answers your questions in the National Museum of Natural History’s YouTube series, “The Doctor Is In.”

Smithsonian Voices

Do Volcanoes Spew a Cooler Lava?

Smithsonian geologist Liz Cottrell has answers to your questions on black lava and the Earth’s molten outer core in the “Dr Is In” video series

As the ocean continues to warm, scientists look to the past for answers on how to manage today’s environmental problems.

Smithsonian Voices

This Climate Detective Reconstructs What the Ocean Was Like Millions of Years Ago

Yet, the biggest concern, says Smithsonian curator Brian Huber, is how rapidly the ocean has changed in the past few decades

The first #BlackBirdersWeek celebrates Black birders and nature enthusiasts while inspiring more conservation-curious to join their community.

Smithsonian Voices

Meet the Organizers of #BlackBirdersWeek

Many of us had shared experiences of racism while being black outdoors, say Ashley Gary, Sheridan Alford, Chelsea Connor and Joseph Saunders

As erosion reshapes England’s Jurassic Coast, ancient fossils are revealed.

Virtual Travel

Why the Jurassic Coast Is One of the Best Fossil-Collecting Sites on Earth

Along a famed stretch of English coastline, amateurs and professionals collect 200-million-year-old treasures before they are reclaimed by the waves

Smithsonian Geologist Liz Cottrell answers your questions in the second season of the National Museum of Natural History’s YouTube series, “The Dr. Is In.”

Smithsonian Voices

What Is Hotter Than the Sun?

Get the facts from Smithsonian geologist Liz Cottrell in the latest episode of “The Doctor Is In.”

Your questions answered by Smithsonian Geologist Liz Cottrell in season two of "The Dr. Is In."

Smithsonian Voices

Smithsonian Volcano Expert Answers Questions on Topics Ranging From Yellowstone’s ‘Big One’ to Skunk Pee

Geologist Liz Cottrell answers your questions in the second season of the National Museum of Natural History’s YouTube series, ‘The Dr. Is In’

“Footprints give us information about anatomy and group dynamics that you just can’t get from bones,” says the Smithsonian's Briana Pobiner.

Ancient Toes and Soles of Fossilized Footprints Now 3-D Digitized for the Ages

New research suggests that for the prehistoric foragers that walked this path, labor was divided between men and women

Mount St. Helens in 2018

Smithsonian Voices

Forty Years After Mount St. Helens, Scientists Make Tiny Eruptions to Study Volcanoes

Meet the Smithsonian scientist who makes and studies tiny volcanic eruptions

How can the right kind of farming protect our soils and our climate? Find out in Carbon Cowboys. © 2020, carbon nation.

Smithsonian Voices

Saving Our Planet Starts With the Soil

A new documentary ‘carbon cowboys’ by Peter Byck brings to light a host of farmers promoting soil health as a great business plan

Smithsonian researchers studied 67 forest plots in a section of the Blue Ridge Mountains. They found that hemlock woolly adelgid had decimated hemlock populations.

Decades of Tree Data Reveal Forests Under Attack

Smithsonian researchers with ForestGEO found that invasive species are linked to roughly one in four tree deaths in a section of the Blue Ridge Mountains

At the age of 16, Titouan Bernicot, a young conservationist and artist, realized that the coral reefs in French Polynesia were dying and resolved to do something to help. He founded The Coral Gardeners, a non-profit that educates the public about the importance of coral reefs.

Smithsonian Voices

Framing Hope Through a Photographer’s Lens

Marine biologist Cristina Mittermeier discovered that visual storytelling, rather than data sets, allowed her to be a better advocate for the ocean

In the past ten years, we’ve found fossils that widen both the geographic and time range of several early human species.

Smithsonian Voices

These Are the Decade’s Biggest Discoveries in Human Evolution

Celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Smithsonian’s “David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins” with some of the biggest discoveries in human evolution

Catch Bill Weir's new show, The Road to Change: America's Climate Crisis, Saturday April 25, 2020 on CNN at 10PM ET.

Smithsonian Voices

CNN’s Bill Weir Offers Solutions for How to Talk Climate Change in a Contentious World

Smithsonian’s Earth Optimism Summit features CNN’s Chief Climate Correspondent Bill Weir

"Our planet faces the challenge of a lifetime," says Bunch. "Let’s work together to imbue our future with all the hope and healing we have to offer.

Planet Positive

In a World Facing Grim Challenges, Hope Still Reigns Supreme

Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III says: ‘It’s time to put our heads down, and work’

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