Monon and Ottily Bayer, the daughters of Mr. and Mrs. Otto Bayer of Costamesa, California, pose in a small, "bunk bed" trailer at their campground in the Shasta National Forest. California, August 1953.

Ten Inventive Attempts to Make Camping More Comfortable

Making a stay in the great outdoors more luxe isn’t new—even if glamping and #vanlife are

How Zookeepers Built Karl, the Abyssinian Ground Hornbill, a New 3-D Beak

For this species, a beak is everything and Karl has had his old one re-tooled for hunting and communication

The bacterium Escherichia coli, shown here, moves itself with propeller-like structures called flagella; it is one of the mobile microbes scientists have linked to cargo-carrying structures to form biohybrid microrobots.

How Tiny, Microbe-Propelled Bots Could Deliver Drugs in Our Bodies

Researchers are developing ‘hybrid biological microrobots’ to target cancer and do other work in the body

Hauschka performed at the 35th Munich Filmfest on June 27, 2017, in Munich, Germany.

Hitting the High Notes: A Smithsonian Year of Music

How Composer John Cage Transformed the Piano—With the Help of Some Household Objects

With screws and bolts placed between its strings, the ‘prepared piano’ offers up a wide range of sounds

In Northern California, purple sea urchins are decimating kelp forests. Though the species of urchin causing problems may vary by region, the damage is the same.

Could Eating Sea Urchins Help Revive Kelp Forests?

A Norwegian ‘urchin ranching’ company wants to take the echinoderms from the wild, fatten them up and sell them to restaurants

In December, Your Call technology will be used during the Liberty Bowl.

In This Interactive Football League, Fans Pick the Plays

Your Call Football’s streaming app platform lets fans control the actions of real live players, earning points and winning prizes

This school year, three new Smithsonian lesson plans on the Inka Empire, Native American treaties and the history of 19th-century Cherokee removal became available to K-12 educators.

Inside a New Effort to Change What Schools Teach About Native American History

A new curriculum from the American Indian Museum brings greater depth and understanding to the long-misinterpreted history of indigenous culture

Amble is launching a program next month at Glacier National Park in Montana.

Take a Sabbatical to Help America’s National Parks

The startup Amble offers monthlong programs connecting creative professionals with needy park nonprofits

The Smithsonian has launched the first national-scale, scholarly research and collecting project to gather and preserve the artifacts, documents and voices associated with the beer industry’s craft revolution (above: label, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company).

Food, Glorious Food

Here’s What’s Brewing in the New Smithsonian Beer Collections

After two years of documenting the nation’s craft brewing industry, curator Theresa McCulla makes ready for a public debut

When she learned to play the theremin, Dorit Chrysler was struck by its emotional expressiveness.

A Century Ago, This Eerie-Sounding Instrument Ushered in Electronic Music

Now, the theremin—a strange little invention that translates hand gestures into pitch and volume—could make a comeback

The process of coloring the test objects took between 15 and 40 minutes.

This New Dye Changes Color When Exposed to UV Light

Color-change shoes, jewelry, cars, furniture and more could be possible with this new MIT technology

Visualization of a diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) measurement of a human brain. Depicted are reconstructed fiber tracts that run through the mid-sagittal plane.

The Gut Microbiome Could Speed Up the Progression of Alzheimer’s Disease

The microbes in the gastrointestinal tract influence the immune system and the brain, possibly playing a role in the development of Alzheimer’s

Fishless filets are on the rise.

Move Over Fake Meat, It’s Time for Veggie Seafood

Here are six companies bringing you animal-free fish products, from tomato-based sushi to “Fysh Sauce”

Starlit Stratus rendering, by Sunggi Park

Art Meets Science

These Wild Sculptures Could Bring Sustainable Energy to the Desert

Winners of this year’s Land Art Generator Initiative competition proposed beautiful, power-generating works of public art for Abu Dhabi

Children cross the street in front of a yellow school bus in 1965.

The History of How School Buses Became Yellow

Rural educator Frank Cyr had the vision and pull to force the nation to standardize the color of the ubiquitous vehicle

The remote-controlled 3-D-printed raptor known as RoBird, built by a Dutch firm, swoops and soars.

These High-Tech Scarecrows Will Keep Pesky Creatures Away

From robots to digitized recordings, farmers are upping their game when it comes to protecting their crops

In groundbreaking clinical trials, researchers are trying to treat patients by editing the genetic makeup of cells with a tool called CRISPR.

Four U.S. CRISPR Trials Editing Human DNA to Research New Treatments

Breaking down how the gene editing technology is being used, for the first time in the United States, to treat patients with severe medical conditions

In July 2016, a solar-powered airplane flying over the desert region of Andalusia in Spain photographed breathtaking images of the Gemasolar concentrated solar power plant.

How Engineers of New Energy Technology Are Taking Cues From Nature

From sunflower spirals to schooling fish, renewable energy innovators are uncovering ideas for improving efficiency and output in natural phenomena

When the Slinky was inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame in 2000, more than 250 million had been sold to date.

The Accidental Invention of the Slinky

The idea for the timeless toy sprung to mind when Naval engineer Richard James dropped some coiled wires

Wyss Institute engineers selected works from the collections to illustrate a "new approach to Design Science." The clusters of polyhedrons in the 1954 textile Time Capsule reflects the 1950s sentiment for a brighter future built on scientific progress.

How Biology Inspires Future Technology

Bioengineers at Harvard’s Wyss Institute showcase their ingenious medical, industrial and environmental designs at the Cooper Hewitt

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