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Can Chemistry Make Healthy Foods More Appealing?

Making healthy foods like tomatoes more palatable may increase our desire to eat these foods while decreasing our gravitation towards sugary snacks

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Robot Vanna, Trashy Presidents and Steak as Health Food: Samsung Sells Tomorrow

Advertisers love to use futurism as a way to position their products as forward-thinking

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The Renwick, the Grand Dame of Washington, Is Slated for Rehab

The historic 1859 art gallery, which has served many other purposes in its lifetime will undergo a two-year renovation

Male Paraphidippus aurantius (a species of jumping spider), by Thomas Shahan

Locking Eyes With Spiders and Insects

Macrophotographer Thomas Shahan takes portraits of spiders and insects in the hopes of turning your revulsion of the creatures into reverence

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Vilcabamba: Paradise Going Bad?

Life in this legendary town in Ecuador’s Valley of Longevity may be too good—and too long—to be true

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Will the Next Lake-Effect Snowstorm be Severe? Ask Mountains Far Far Away

Scientists use computer simulations to test how geographic features help create intense snowstorms that blanket cities near lake shores with snow

Birds were a popular part of Japanese art during the Edo period. Eagle hanging scroll by Kishi Ganku, ca. 1802.

Birds and Bards: Beautiful Japanese Images from the Edo Period

Everything from parrots to gossipy novels influenced art in Japan between 1603 to 1868

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Sneak Peek: Medical Marvels and Historical Oddities from the Collections

From Florida’s infamous hanging chads and the magnifying glass used to inspect them to vanity eyeballs, American History curators brought the goods for 2013’s Tweet Up

A military robot washes dishes in “The Jetsons” (1963)

Automating Hard or Hardly Automating? George Jetson and the Manual Labor of Tomorrow

And you think you’re having a bad work week, just think about the robots

Jazz artist Michael “Bags” Davis pays tribute to trumpet legend Kenny Dorham (above, performing in Toronto in 1954) at Thursday night’s Take Five! jazz performance at the American Art Museum.

Events February 19-21: Native Voices, a Modern Silent Film and Trumpet Jazz

This week, watch films by American Indian youths, see Academy Award-winner “The Artist” and snap your fingers to some world-class jazz

Woman’s Institute of Domestic Arts & Sciences, 1925-1926

The History of the Flapper, Part 3: The Rectangular Silhouette

Finally, women could breathe deeply when the waist-nipping corset went out of style

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No Salt, No Problem: One Woman’s Life-or-Death Quest to Make “Bland” Food Delicious

The more salt we eat, the more we crave. This new approach to less-salty cooking might help you step off the treadmill

A photo sometimes said to depict members of Chiloé’s murderous society of warlocks—founded, so they claimed, in 1786 and destroyed by the great trial of 1880-81.

Into the Cave of Chile’s Witches

Did members of a powerful society of warlocks actually murder their enemies and kidnap children?

Artist's conception of asteroid 2012 DA14 passing through the Earth-moon system on Feb. 15, 2013.

What Can We Do About Big Rocks From Space?

Last week’s close encounters with space rocks have raised concerns about how we deal with dangerous asteroids. Here’s how we would try to knock them off course.

The Opte Project creates visualizations of the 14 billion pages that make up the network of the web.

Any Two Pages on the Web Are Connected By 19 Clicks or Less

There are more than 14 billion pages on the web, but they are linked by hyperconnected nodes, like Hollywood actors connected through Kevin Bacon

What really happens at the White House? Lots and lots of trivia!

Know Your Presidents? Stabbings, Pet Raccoons, Cat Fights and Other Presidential Lore

Do you know which president liked to skinny dip in the Potomac or who had the first pet cat in the White House?

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Parched Middle East Faces Severe Water Crisis

Drought and over-pumping has led to groundwater losses in the Middle East that equal almost the entire volume of the Dead Sea, a new study shows.

Title slate from the 1978 short film “Libra” by World Research Inc

Libra: The 21st Century (Libertarian) Space Colony

The government can’t get their hands on you when you’re floating above Earth

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A Smithsonian Expert Breaks Down the Science of Meteors

Meteor scientist Cari Corrigan says that the type of destruction wrought by today’s meteor explosion over Russia is exceedingly rare

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From Virginia to Missouri to the Smithsonian: Jefferson’s Tombstone Has a Long Story

At the institution for a year of repairs, the president’s gravemarker calls the University of Missouri campus home

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