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Articles

Mouth (for L’Oréal), New York, 1986; printed 1992.

How Irving Penn Turned Fashion Photography Into a Fine Art

A new show at the Smithsonian American Art Museum looks back at a photo giant who blurred the lines

Hemingway enters New York Harbor with his second wife, Pauline Pfeiffer, aboard the ocean liner Paris on April 3, 1934. He described her as “clever and entertaining and full of desire.”

Hemingway in Love

In a new memoir, one of Hemingway’s closest friends reveals how the great writer grappled with the love affair that changed his life and shaped his art

Salgado has documented many indigenous tribes and their traditions. Here, men are decorated with feathers and paint for a reahu funerary ceremony.

Sebastião Salgado Has Seen the Forest, Now He’s Seeing the Trees

He documented human suffering around the world. But now, back in his native Brazil, the renowned photographer is healing the devastated landscape

The World’s Oldest Papyrus and What It Can Tell Us About the Great Pyramids

Ancient Egyptians leveraged a massive shipping, mining and farming economy to propel their civilization forward

American South

The Twisted History of the Gateway Arch

With its origins as a memorial to Thomas Jefferson’s vision of Western Expansion, the Arch has become a St. Louis icon

How Powerful Is a Volcanic Eruption and More Questions From Our Readers

You asked, we answered

Think Big

The Theory of Relativity, Then and Now

Albert Einstein’s breakthrough from a century ago was out of this world. Now it seems surprisingly down-to-earth

Scaled back so no two books share a page, the library still has 10 to the power of 4,677 books.

This Digital Library Contains Every Phrase That Could Ever Be Uttered

Inspired by an essay by Jorge Luis Borges, computer programmer Jonathan Basile has created a “Library” of Babel

Microbial clouds give new meaning to the term "personal space."

New Research

You Produce a Microbial Cloud That Can Act Like an Invisible Fingerprint

The unique cloud follows you wherever you go—and could ID you in a crowd

Innovative Spirit Health Care

Six Ways Electrical Brain Stimulation Could Be Used in the Future

Scientists are exploring how mild electrical shocks can treat, and perhaps even change, brains

A 19th-century illustration published by Alphonse Milne-Edwards.

How America Fell in Love With the Giant Panda

A French missionary, Teddy Roosevelt’s sons, and a widowed socialite all factor into the tale of how the nation fell in love with the rare beast

Twins Ida and Irene practice swimming in a learn-to-swim program on Eydhafushi, an island in the Maldives.

Age of Humans

Third-Graders in the Maldives Discover the Beauty Beneath Their Seas

Many tourists have experienced the Maldives’ beauty. Most Maldivians haven’t, because they don’t know how to swim

The design for Margaret Crane's prototype home pregnancy test kit was inspired by a transparent plastic paperclip container.

The Innovative Spirit

The Unknown Designer of the First Home Pregnancy Test Is Finally Getting Her Due

Margaret Crane says it was a simple idea, but it met with enormous push back

Children at the Free School Under the Bridge, an outdoor, donation-supported school under a highway overpass, learn about not just reading and math, but climate change and the ozone layer.

Age of Humans

How India Is Teaching 300 Million Kids to Be Environmentalists

In an enormous undertaking, schoolchildren nationwide are learning about climate change and the environment

Peter Pidcoe (here) and Thubi Kolobe invented a Self-Initiated Prone Progressive Crawler, to help motor-challenged babies learn to inch themselves around.

The Innovative Spirit

This Skateboard-Like Device Helps At-Risk Infants Learn to Crawl

An innovative physical therapy device boosts babies’ movement efforts and helps their brains make critical connections

Colorado’s ‘The Shining’ Hotel Is Finally Getting That Hedge Maze

No axes allowed

The cello plays notes that correspond to changing temperatures in the equatorial zone.

Age of Humans

This Song Is Composed From 133 Years of Climate Change Data

Daniel Crawford, a senior at the University of Minnesota, has written music for a string quartet that traces rising temperatures since the 1880s

Audience members in the VIP section, including Miss Indian New Mexico Nicole Johnny, 25, center, look on during the butchering competition.

Inside This Year’s Miss Navajo Pageant

Rest assured, this competition is far from just a beauty contest

Turkey’s ‘Fairy Chimneys’ Were Millions of Years in the Making

Nature built them, but humans made them their own

The Broad houses the contemporary art collection of philanthropists Eli and Edythe Broad. The collection is valued at nearly two billion dollars.

The Big Names of Art (and a Bit of the Unexpected) Debut at the Broad Museum in L.A.

Housing one of the greatest collections of contemporary art in the world, this new landmark is ready for its close-up

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