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Articles

Revelers two-step at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.

How Do You Dance to Jazz?

The attendees at this year’s New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival taught our music writer a step or two

The rolled electronic mesh is injected through a glass needle into a water-based solution.

New Research

A Flexible Circuit Has Been Injected Into Living Brains

Tested on mice, the rolled mesh fits inside a syringe and unfurls to monitor brain activity

Bermuda

There’s Only One Way to Make a Dark ‘n’ Stormy Without Breaking the Law

The cocktail has a surprising, and litigious history

The washable knitwear c. 1950s suit by Claire McCardell resides in the collections of the National Museum of American History.

What a 1950s Fashion Maven Might Teach Us About What To Wear

When it was time to suit up for work, politics or social engagements, Claire McCardell’s fans embraced her chic, but comfortable style

Ask Smithsonian 2017

Does Dieting Actually Make Your Stomach Shrink?

Not exactly, says science—stretchiness and psychology seem to play bigger roles than size in determining how much a person can eat

A view from the cell wall of the Shanghai Natural History Museum, looking down on the north tectonic wall made of stone.

The New Shanghai Natural History Museum is Ancient, Modern and Uniquely Chinese

The nautilus-shaped building draws on Chinese traditions and 21st century design to house amazing specimens found nowhere else

Filthy Lucre, 2013-2014, by Darren Waterston, MASS MoCA installation

Urban Explorations

Whistler’s Peacock Room is Reimagined in a State of Oozing and Broken Decay

In Filthy Lucre, a new installation at the Sackler Gallery, artist Darren Waterston deconstructs Whistler’s masterpiece

Pyrex celebrates its 100th anniversary this year.

How Pyrex Reinvented Glass For a New Age

One hundred years after the birth of the brand, the Corning Museum of Glass pays homage to America’s favorite dish

Seven Inspiring Innovations In Education From Around the Globe

American schools, start taking notes! There may be some things to learn from these successful programs

Capsules of limestone-producing bacteria are embedded in the concrete.

With This Self-Healing Concrete, Buildings Repair Themselves

A concrete developed by Dutch scientists and embedded with limestone-producing bacteria is ready to hit the market

The NOAA ship R/V Roger Revelle collects climate data in the Antarctic in 2008.

Anthropocene

There Is No Global Warming Hiatus After All

Improved data and better analysis methods find no slowdown in the pace of global temperature rise, NOAA scientists report

An artistic reconstruction of the Regaliceratops peterhewsi, the newly discovered Triceratops cousin with a built-in crown.

New Research

The ‘Hellboy’ Dinosaur, a New Cousin of Triceratops, Is Fossil Royalty

The horned dinosaur wears a built-in crown and offers evidence of many more undiscovered species in North America

The nose knows.

New Research

Mouse Noses Can Bypass the Brain to Make Females Blind to Males

Hormones direct the nose to signal when potential mates are about—and when to erase their scent

The 1856 British Guiana One-Cent Magenta, with its three-masted sailing ship, carries the postal clerk Edmond D. Wight's initials to deter counterfeiters.

Urban Explorations

The Remarkable Story of the World’s Rarest Stamp

The rarely seen, one-of-a-kind 1856 British Guiana One-Cent Magenta, which recently sold for a whopping $9.5 million, gets its public debut

A paternoster elevator can be thrilling, or just scary.

Ride This Bizarre, Old-School Elevator Before They All Shut Down

The paternoster elevators of Europe are weird, a bit scary and getting harder and harder to find. For now, there are still a few you can ride

BioTech students prepare a solution for orchids.

Can Young Botanists at a Magnet School Play a Vital Role in Protecting an Urban Ecosystem?

Miami’s BioTech, the country’s first ever botany-focused magnet high school, is teaching kids real-world plant science

An artist's rendering of the Pluto system seen from the surface of one of its moons.

New Research

Weird Orbital Behaviors Offer Clues to the Origins of Pluto’s Moons

Solving the mystery of these satellites could help astronomers understand “Tatooine” exoplanets that orbit binary stars

Peter Dinklage by Jesse Frohman, 2003

Who Crafts the Image in Celebrity Portraiture?

Is it real or is it celebrity branding? A portrait exhibition of iconic celebs considers the question of who holds the upper hand—the artist or the star

The Plain of Jars in northeast Laos may be related to burial rituals dating back 2,000 years—but the site still proves a mystery to archeologists.

Ancient Urns or Drinking Vessels for Giants? Behind the Mysterious Plain of Jars in Laos

A grassy area studded with hulking, 2,000-year-old jars provides a surreal sight as well as an archeological puzzle

Cellulose nanofibril (CNF) chips made from wood could lead to flexible, biodegradable electronics that leach far less potentially toxic chemicals into the environment.

These New Computer Chips Are Made From Wood

A new technique replaces the bulk of smartphone-friendly microchips with a transparent, flexible material made from wood pulp

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