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How Long Can Turtles Stay Underwater and Other Questions From Our Readers

You asked? We answered

Doc Watson and Clarence Ashley: The Original Folkways Recordings, 1960-1962

Listen to Doc Watson Picking Away at his Banjo

A new release from Smithsonian Folkways highlights the talent of a bluegrass master

Going back to the roots of English grammar to uncover its many myths

Most of What You Think You Know About Grammar Is Wrong

And ending sentences with a preposition is nothing worth worrying about

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A Nike Shoe, Now a Part of the Smithsonian

The Flyknit racer is currently in the collections of the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum

The watercolor above is an East African myth: Juok the Creator (shown twice) molding Egyptians from reddish brown clay and Southern Sudanese from the black earth. MacMillan says this image came faster than any of the others, "I literally did the entire thing in an hour and a half, just at home with no prior planning or sketching."

An Illustrated Guide to the World’s Creation Myths

Each culture has its own version of how the universe began. Artist Noah MacMillan brings this “visual vocabulary” to life

Lincoln sat at the back of the train in disguise to escape his assassins.

The Civil War

The Unsuccessful Plot to Kill Abraham Lincoln

On the eve of his first inauguration, President Lincoln snuck into Washington at night, evading the would-be assassins who waited for him in Baltimore

“I think one country with nuclear weapons is one too many.” – Mohamed Elbaradei

CSI: Tennessee—Enter the World of Nuclear Forensics

Scientists are busy tracking the sources of stolen uranium in the hopes of deterring crime—and prevent the weapons getting into the wrong hands

A New Disease, a New Reason to Hate And Fear Ticks

A worrisome new tick-borne disease, similar to Lyme disease but caused by a different microbe, turned up in 18 patients in southern New England

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VIDEO: See a Thought Move Through a Living Fish’s Brain

By using genetic modification and a florescent-sensitive probe, Japanese scientists captured a zebrafish’s thought in real-time

World-famous poet and civil rights activist Maya Angelou talks about her life at the American Indian Museum on Friday.

Events February 1-3: Maya Angelou, Black History Month Festivities and a Teen Poetry Slam

Meet world-renowned Civil Rights poet Maya Angelou, celebrate Black History Month and watch Washington D.C.’s most articulate teens battle in rhyme

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Virtual Superhuman Powers Translate into Real Life Helpfulness

Thinking like a superhero in virtual reality may induce people to be more helpful in real life

Americans Buy So Many Wings, They’re Now the Most Expensive Part of the Chicken

Each February, the nation’s thirst for chicken wings hits the roof, making the delicate wing the most expensive bit of the bird

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How to Tour Louis Armstrong’s New Orleans

Jazz is synonymous with the Big Easy, and there’s no bigger name in the history of the genre than Satchmo

The utterly strange-looking star-nosed mole sees the world with one of the most sensitive touch organs in the animal kingdom.

How the Star-Nosed Mole ‘Sees’ With Its Ultra-Sensitive Snout

The utterly strange-looking creature sees the world with one of the most sensitive touch organs in the animal kingdom

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These Machines Will Be Able to Detect Smells Your Own Nose Cannot

We’re getting closer to the day when your smartphone knows you have a cold before you do

Doug E. Fresh (shown above, performing at the Legends of Hip Hop Tour in February 2011) was a beatboxing pioneer in the 1980s.

Beatboxing, as Seen Through Scientific Images

To see how certain sound effects are humanly possible, a team of University of Southern California researchers took MRI scans of a beatboxer in action

About 15 miles north of Quito, a yellow line representing the Equator runs up a long, regal walkway to the base of the Mitad del Mundo monument, built in 1979. The thing is, they built the structure several hundred feet south of the true Equator.

Much Ado About Nothing at the Equator

Just north of Quito stands a grand and glowing tribute to one of Ecuador’s proudest features: the Equator. The problem is, it was built in the wrong place

Making guacamole

How Did Avocados Become the Official Super Bowl Food?

Did you know this off-season penchant for guacamole is an industry creation?

A Liberty Head nickel from 1883

1913 Nickel Could Sell for More Than $2 Million

The coin is one of only five 1913 Liberty Head nickels known to exist, though this one has an illicit, serendipitous back story

Walter Cronkite gives a tour of the home office of 2001 on his show The 21st Century (1967)

3D-TV, Automated Cooking and Robot Housemaids: Walter Cronkite Tours the Home of 2001

In 1967, the most trusted man in America investigated the home of the 21st century

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