Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Articles

Smart Startup

Could This App Replace Your Doctor?

Babylon connects users with doctors for instant virtual consultations, and will soon use artificial intelligence for diagnosing illnesses

Portrait of composer Barbara Strozzi (1581-1644)

These Women Composers Should Be Household Names Like Bach or Mozart

Denied the same opportunities as their male counterparts, women like Lili Boulanger and Clara Schumann found ways to get their work in front of audiences

In 1968, the Beatles ventured to the foothills of the Himalaya for a spiritual retreat.

Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly: India

How the Indian City of Rishikesh Influenced the Beatles’ White Album

A meditation retreat in 1968 offered the British rock group heightened awareness and peace of mind

Spared From the Holocaust by His Countrymen, a Jewish Refugee Hopes That Denmark Can Regain Its Humanity

Leo Goldberger will never forget how his fellow Danes kept him safe, but the reaction to today’s refugee crisis gives him pause about his former homeland

An artist's rendering shows what a Tully Monster might have looked like 300 million years ago.

New Research

What Is a Tully Monster? Scientists Finally Think They Know

The oddball fossil that puzzled experts for almost 60 years is probably an ancient fish akin to today’s bloodsucking lampreys

Meghan Fellows sprays flame on a patch of lesser celandine, an invasive weed, while volunteer Jim Anderson looks on. If "flaming" the plants (heating them up but not burning them) kills them reliably, the technique may replace pesticides in vulnerable stream environments.

Age of Humans

A New Weapon in the War on Weeds: Flamethrowers

Long used in agriculture, land managers are now wondering whether cooking weeds to death is better than pesticides

The steep walls of the Uncompahgre Gorge dwarf a climber after a long day on the cliffs.

How Do You Create the World’s Biggest Ice Climbing Park?

With nearly 200 different routes and 17,000 vertical feet of terrain, Ouray Ice Park is a haven for ice climbers and the “ice farmers” who bring it to life

A nonvenomous Texas rat snake coils up in a defensive posture.

New Research

To Scientists’ Surprise, Even Nonvenomous Snakes Can Strike at Ridiculous Speeds

The Texas rat snake was just as much of a speed demon as deadly vipers, challenging long-held notions about snake adaptations

Measuring human skulls in physical anthropology

When Museums Rushed to Fill Their Rooms With Bones

In part fed by discredited and racist theories about race, scientists and amateurs alike looked to human remains to learn more about themselves

The museum has generated controversy over gentrification of Rio de Janeiro ahead of the 2016 Olympics.

Age of Humans

Imagining an Alarming Future at Brazil’s Museum of Tomorrow

The ambitious museum looks at where humankind is headed—and asks how they’ll live in a post-climate-change world

Future of Energy

Five Technologies That Would Heat or Cool People and Not Entire Buildings

Research groups are developing robots, fabrics and furniture that could lead to energy savings

The highly regular spacing of fairy circles in Australia becomes visible in dense vegetation. The grasses in the foreground of the image are patchy as they rebounding from fire.

New Research

Mysterious Fairy Circles Have Been Found in Western Australia

Once thought to exist only in Namibia, circles spotted 6,200 miles away are helping sort out how these odd features form

A reconstruction of the horse-sized tyrannosaur Timurlengia euotica, named for the charismatic Central Asian ruler Tamerlane, shows the species' long, slender legs, large head and teeth built sharp like a steak knife.

The Discovery of a Tiny Tyrannosaur Adds New Insight Into the Origins of T. Rex

The horse-sized dino species had smarts and a keen sense of smell, setting the stage for the evolution of the enormous predator

Houses on the New Jersey shore sit in ruins in July 2013, roughly eight months after Hurricane Sandy made landfall in the area.

New Research

Twitter May Be Faster Than FEMA Models for Tracking Disaster Damage

Real-time online activity could provide speedier assessments as disaster unfolds than tools currently used by the government agency

A woman sits amid the ruins of the Great Stone Church, which collapsed in an 1812 earthquake, at Mission San Juan Capistrano.

Journey to the Center of Earth

San Andreas May Have Had Help Triggering a Historic Earthquake

New evidence about a devastating quake in 1812 hints that the San Jacinto fault may be a bigger seismic risk than anyone thought

Mini-organs grow around the tiny scaffolds (lower left). The magnified image (right) shows the hair-thin channels that serve as blood vessels.

How a Tiny, “Beating” Human Heart Was Created in a Lab

The device, filled with human heart cells, could dramatically reduce the time it takes to test new drugs and end testing on animals

Landscape of Change uses data lines reflecting sea level rise, glacier volume decline, increasing global temperatures and the increasing use of fossil fuels.

Art Meets Science

These Watercolor Paintings Actually Include Climate Change Data

Jill Pelto, an artist and scientist, incorporates graphs of rising sea levels and soaring temperatures in her artwork

"Hurlyburly" is artist Orly Genger's latest site-specific art installation using woven lobster rope.

This Massive Installation in an Austin Park Is Made of Over a Million Feet of Recycled Lobster Rope

“Hurlyburly” is artist Orly Genger’s latest woven creation

Bristol Old Vic artistic director Tom Morris with the thunder run.

Cool Finds

A New Production of “King Lear” Features 18th-Century Special Effects

The Bristol Old Vic’s thunder run hasn’t been used since 1942

Journey to the Center of Earth

What Are You Flying Over? This App Will Tell You

Flyover Country uses maps and geology databases to identify features of the landscape as a plane flies over them, no Wifi necessary

Page 458 of 1285