Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Articles

Small island nations such as Tuvalu in the South Pacific face a wide range of threats from climate change, including rising seas that will inundate the land.

Five Frightening Observations From the Latest International Climate Change Report

Adaptation cannot save us from all the negative impacts of pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere

"The Murder of Caesar" by Karl von Piloty, 1865.

Explore Julius Caesar’s Rome

From his former neighborhood to the place where he met his demise, check out these spots associated with Rome’s most famous leader

A view of the installation of the ATLAS portion of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

Art Meets Science

Art and Science Collide in the Discovery of the Higgs Boson

Particle Fever, a documentary about the physicists who found the “God particle,” suggests doing science isn’t that different from making art

A West Indian manatee calf nurses from its mother.

American South

14 Fun Facts About Manatees

These roly-poly herbivores just may be the teddy bears of the sea. But keep an eye out when boating; they don’t move so fast.

View of St. Peter's Basilica from La Pergola.

Mario Batali: The Best Restaurant in Rome

Take a peak inside Rome’s La Pergola

Steve Perlman hopes his invention, the pCell, will transform how we transmit data from our smartphones.

Tech Watch

Checking The Claim: A Wireless Network That Streams A Thousand Times Faster?

As wireless data networks face more congestion, will entrepreneur Steve Perlman’s latest idea be the ultimate fix?

The Paris Catacombs.

Beneath Paris’ City Streets, There’s an Empire of Death Waiting for Tourists

More than 200 miles of tunnels sit just under the City of Lights—some lined to the ceiling with skulls and bones

Cardoons in the garden of Villa Augustus, Dordrecht.

What the Heck Do I Do With

What the Heck Do I Do With a Cardoon?

The labor-intensive crop is absolutely worth the effort

Engineers and entrepreneurs want to make it possible for two people to converse in different languages, while a small device spits out translations in real time.

Tech Watch

Kissing Language Barriers Goodbye

Google is paving the way for the universal voice translator, formerly a thing of science fiction. But will they actually help us communicate?

Scientists made synthetic version of a chromosome found in brewer's yeast, pictured above, a fungus commonly used to make beer.

New Research

Scientists Build a Yeast Chromosome From Scratch. Next Up? Designer Genomes

Creating synthetic organisms with specially-tailored genomes is a long way off, but the first synthetic eukaryotic chromosome is a big step forward

The Seldom Scene's album, "Long Time. . . Seldom Scene," the band's first recording since 2007, features a mix of classic fan favorites, a litany of guest stars and one brand-new song.

Seldom Scene, Often Heard: A Bluegrass Band Returns to its Roots With a New Album

The current members of the legendary Washington, D.C.-based bluegrass band celebrate four decades of making music

Honorable Mention. Sand Babel: Solar-Powered 3D Printed Tower.

Free From the Rules of Physics and Practicality, 20 Architects Radically Reimagine the Skyscraper

These high-rise designs are sci-fi visions of the future

An Arizona State University student's toothpaste tube prototype forces every last bit to come out by folding down like an accordion.

A Toothpaste Tube That Gets Every Last Bit Out

Tired of wasting leftover toothpaste, a student invents a new origami-inspired design that leaves nothing behind

New to the collections: John Coltrane's 1965 Mark VI tenor saxophone

A Sax Supreme: John Coltrane’s Legendary Instrument Joins the Collections of the American History Museum

Ravi Coltrane, son of jazz musicians John and Alice Coltrane, donates one of his father’s three saxophones

None

Adorable Children Around the World Pose With Their Favorite Toys

In photographer Gabriele Galimberti’s new book, kids stand amongst their most prized possessions

Five Health Benefits of Standing Desks

Spending more of your day standing could reduce the risk of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer

Mercury Bar in Detroit

How a Revitalized Food Scene is Giving Detroit a Boost in Morale and Economic Strength

Author Bill Loomis talks about his new book and Motown’s ever-evolving gastronomic cityscape

Zebrafish embryo

Art Meets Science

A Scan of a Mechanical Heart Pump Fitted in a Live Human and Other Eerily Beautiful Scientific Images

From a photo of a tick biting flesh to a closeup of a kidney stone, the 18 winners of the 2014 Wellcome Image Awards highlight objects we don’t usually see

"Peasant girls." Young Russian women offer berries to visitors in a rural area along the Sheksna River near the small town of Kirillov.

Color Photographs of Imperial Russia Reveal a World Lost to History

At Paris’ Zadkine Museum, explore vibrant photos of the pre-Soviet Russian Empire

There's more going on here than you might suspect.

New Research

Never Underestimate a Goat; It’s Not As Stupid As It Looks

Goats are not just cute and somewhat comical, but also surprisingly intelligent, new research finds

Page 620 of 1324