Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Articles

Marine algae blooms like these in the northern Ross Sea are often vast enough to be visible from space.

Future of Conservation

Who Owns Antarctica’s Pristine Oceans?

How humans finally stopped squabbling and protected one of the world’s most pristine marine areas

Male deer grow these impressive face ornaments every year, in a cycle of life, death and itchiness.

New Research

Antlers Are Miraculous Face Organs That Could Benefit Human Health

There’s so much more to deer antlers than fighting and impressing the ladies

Vice President-designate Gerald Ford holds up a copy of Evergreen Review, a magazine which Ford described as obscene. One of Ford's charges against Douglas was that he had allowed an article he had written to be published in Evergreen.

History of Now

The History of American Impeachment

There’s a precedent that it’s not just for presidents

In this June 13, 1917 file photo, U.S. Army General John J. Pershing, center, inspects French troops at Boulogne, France

World War I: 100 Years Later

“I Hope It Is Not Too Late”: How the U.S. Decided to Send Millions of Troops Into World War I

The Allies were desperate for reinforcements, but the U.S. wasn’t quite ready to provide them

Rendering of the Innerbelt National Forest, a "pop-up forest" in Akron, Ohio

An Ohio City is Turning an Unused Highway Into a Pop-Up Forest

Akron, Ohio hopes to fight urban inequality by removing a divisive highway. Other cities across America are looking into doing the same.

Alexander Calder, "Five Rudders," 1964. Lent by the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, Washington University St. Louis. Gift of Mrs. Mark C. Steinberg, 1964. © 2017 Calder Foundation, New York / Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY

11 New Art Exhibits to See This Summer

From Edvard Munch to sonic arcades, these shows are worth putting on your calendar this season

The Treaty of Medicine Creek

Medicine Creek, the Treaty That Set the Stage for Standing Rock

The Fish Wars of the 1960s led to an affirmation of Native American rights

A jawbone from one of the fossils of the earliest Homo sapiens ever found.

New Research

Humans Evolved 100,000 Years Earlier Than We Thought—But Mysteries Remain

Moroccan fossil discovery alters the accepted narrative of when humans evolved and how they spread through Africa

In his 1910 rendering of the Winslow House, Wright seems to mimic Ando Hiroshige’s use of vegetation as a frame.

Frank Lloyd Wright Credited Japan for His All-American Aesthetic

The famed architect was inspired by drawings and works from the Asian nation

Pittsburgh's Oakland neighborhood, which holds many of the universities and healthcare facilities that have driven the city's transformation post-steel.

Pittsburgh Has Surged Post-Steel, but Many in Rusting Region Still Struggle

A historian notes how Pittsburgh’s tech-driven boom hasn’t reached everyone in western Pennsylvania

A baby in the neonatal intensive care unit are often covered in patches and wires for monitoring their vital signs, but new advances mean that soon those wires could be replaced with sensors as thin as a temporary tattoo.

Will These Flexible Skin Patches Replace Wires in Hospitals?

Researchers at Northwestern University have developed “epidermal electronics,” thin flexible patches capable of monitoring vital signs and more.

Mobster Frank Costello testifying before the Kefauver Committee.

History of Now

How Watching Congressional Hearings Became an American Pastime

Decades before Watergate, mobsters helped turn hearings into must-see television

View looking south of the Jebel Irhoud site in Morocco, where the fossils were found

New Research

The Science Behind the Discovery of the Oldest Homo Sapien

We need both genetics and anthropology to solve the mysteries of human origins, says a researcher on the team

Screenshots from the iNaturalist app, which uses "deep learning" to automatically identify what bug—or fish, bird, or mammal—you might be looking at.

AI Plant and Animal Identification Helps Us All Be Citizen Scientists

Apps that use artificial intelligence to allow users to ID unknown specimens are making science more accessible to everyone.

Tatev Monastery in Armenia.

Armenia

Explore Armenia’s Medieval Monasteries in Interactive 360-Degree Panoramas

Navigate through secluded buildings that once housed some of the brightest scholars of the Middle Ages

Leeuwenhoek's early microscopic observations of rabbit sperm (figs. 1-4) and dog sperm (figs. 5-8).

The Long, Winding Tale of Sperm Science

…and why it’s finally headed in the right direction

Page 395 of 1325