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Not a movie still: Fire rages on a flooded street following the 1994 Northridge earthquake in California.

What Will Really Happen When San Andreas Unleashes the Big One?

A major earthquake will cause plenty of destruction along the West Coast, but it won’t look like it does in the movies

April DiGeo ponders how to spell her word in "Spellbound."

Thirteen Years Later, Did Spellbound Show Us the Power or the Myth of the American Dream?

We caught up with the kids, now full-fledged adults, from the acclaimed documentary to investigate how social class shapes success in America

Ask Smithsonian: What Happens When You Get a Concussion?

It’s scary what we don’t know about the lasting effects after a knock to the noggin

More exotic items are kept on permanent display.

American South

The Nation’s Stash of Lost Luggage Finds a New Life in This Alabama Town

Buy yourself a new wardrobe, iPad or other oddities at the Unclaimed Baggage Center

The SE200 kit, which includes the chlorinator, salt and measuring tools.

The Developing World Could Be One Step Closer to Quick, Easy Water Treatment With This New Device

Outdoor retailer MSR and global health non-profit PATH have teamed up to create on-demand chlorine to fight waterborne illness in Africa

New Research

Investigating the Case of the Earliest Known Murder Victim

A 430,000-year-old skull discovered in a Spanish cave bears evidence of deliberate, lethal blunt force trauma

Maze-like landscaping has cut the decibel level of the ambient noise at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport in half.

This Crazy Land Art Deflects Noise From Amsterdam’s Airport

To drown out flight noise, the Amsterdam Airport turned to large-scale landscaping

Urban Explorations

Seven Works of Art to Visit That Use Discarded Junk to Create Masterpieces

One person’s trash is another person’s artistic inspiration

Speechless (Women of Allah), 1996

Iranian Exile Shirin Neshat’s New Exhibition Expresses the Power of Art to Shape Political Discourse

An exhibition of the artist’s work at the Hirshhorn is an allegorical narrative framed against historical and political realities

Aquascutum, stemming from Latin for "water" and "shield," was a leading trenchcoat manufacturer.

World War I: 100 Years Later

The Classy Rise of the Trench Coat

World War I brought with it a broad array of societal changes, including men’s fashion

A champagne toast for all leads into a gourmet meal.

Smithsonian Journeys Travel Quarterly: Paris

Eat Like a Parisian in a Parisian Apartment

An Internet-based service allows visitors an authentic taste of food, friendship and culture

The Galileo spacecraft's view of the crazy cracks and brown gunk on Europa.

These Instruments Will Help NASA Figure Out If Life Can Thrive on Europa

The space agency has announced the suite of experiments that will fly on a mission to the icy moon of Jupiter

Industrial designer Shin Kuo thinks everyone in a building should be able to live in the penthouse for a time.

Six Architectural Ideas That Could Change the Way We Live in Cities

Whether in response to polluted air or shrinking space, architects keep coming up with novel approaches to reshaping urban life

EcoLogicStudio's 430-square-foot gazebo, called the Urban Algae Folly, is on display at the Expo 2015 world's fair in Milan.

Will Buildings of the Future Be Cloaked In Algae?

Built by a London architecture firm, a new gazebo has a living “skin” that produces oxygen and absorbs considerable amounts of carbon dioxide

A rendering of the USS Nautilus, the world's first atomic submarine. The real Nautilus is now open to the public, docked in Connecticut so that visitors can walk around inside and explore the torpedoes and living quarters.

Urban Explorations

Step Inside a Famous Submarine

Where to visit historic subs this summer—or ride in a modern one

Make New Memories But Keep the Old, With a Little Help From Electrodes

Matthew Walker thinks there may be a way to simulate deep sleep—vital for memory—by sending a low current to a person’s brain

Yasuní National Park with the sun just under the horizon.

This Park in Ecuador is One of the Most Biodiverse Places on Earth

Yasuní National Park in the Amazon rainforest may have more species of life than anywhere else in the world

This second hatchling is even more notable for the emergency efforts that the animal keepers took to keep it alive.

UPDATE: Second Critically Endangered Tortoise Hatches from a Cracked Egg

To get the critically endangered Madagascar spider tortoises to breed successfully took both tenacity and a whole lot of luck

Did This Map Guide Columbus?

Researchers decipher a mystifying 15th-century document

Anthropocene

Scientists Discover Sudden Melting in the Antarctic

Warmer waters are eating away at protective ice shelves, letting glaciers flow into the sea

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