Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Science / Mind & Body

Leeuwenhoek's early microscopic observations of rabbit sperm (figs. 1-4) and dog sperm (figs. 5-8).

The Long, Winding Tale of Sperm Science

…and why it’s finally headed in the right direction

Until recently, neuroscientists have considered the method the brain uses to quickly and easily analyzes faces to be a "black box."

New Research

How Your Brain Recognizes All Those Faces

Neurons home in on one section at a time, researchers report

The tentacles of the Portuguese man o' war, (which is technically a siphonophore, a group related to jellyfish), contain harpoon-like cells called nematocysts that deliver painful doses of venom.

Forget What You’ve Heard About the Pee Cure, Here’s How to Really Fix a Jellyfish Sting

Scientists studied what to do and what not to do when stung by a jellyfish. The result? Folk remedies are bad.

Don’t skimp on the SPF

How Sunscreen Protects Your Skin’s DNA

The chemistry behind this protective lotion reflects a modern understanding of the danger of ultraviolet rays

Aubrey de Grey says, “There’s no such thing as aging gracefully.”

Can Human Mortality Really Be Hacked?

Backed by the digital fortunes of Silicon Valley, biotech companies are brazenly setting out to “cure” aging

The soil microbe Bacillus subtilis is ubiquitous, but one rare strain yielded scientific pay dirt.

One Girl’s Mishap Led to the Creation of the Antibiotic Bacitracin

Margaret Treacy was the namesake for a breakthrough medication

Taste receptors for salty, sweet, bitter and sour are found all over the tongue.

The Taste Map of the Tongue You Learned in School Is All Wrong

Modern biology shows that taste receptors aren’t nearly as simple as that cordoned-off model would lead you to believe

Some studies have shown that humans can learn to track scents like canines.

New Research

In Some Ways, Your Sense of Smell Is Actually Better Than a Dog’s

Human noses are especially attuned to picking up odors in bananas, urine and human blood

The Mona Lisa's sparse setting may help visitors better appreciate its beauty, according to a new psychology study.

New Research

Distraction May Make Us Less Able to Appreciate Beauty

Truly experiencing the beauty of an object could require conscious thought, vindicating the ideas of Immanuel Kant

Would you trust nutrition research underwritten by a GMO company?

People Don’t Trust Scientific Research When Companies Are Involved

But sometimes, they should

The stone flakes are flying, but what brain regions are firing?

New Research

How Smart Were Early Humans? “Neuroarchaeology” Offers Some Answers

Brain Imaging Gives Insight Into Early Human Minds

Drinking fountain on the Halifax County Courthouse (North Carolina) in April 1938.

New Research

Racism Harms Children’s Health, Survey Finds

Racism may not be a disease, exactly. But a growing body of research finds that it has lasting physical and mental effects on its victims

Neuroscience is giving new meaning to the phrase "get on my wavelength."

New Research

Students’ Brains Sync Up When They’re in an Engaging Class, Neuroscience Shows

What does it really mean to get our brains on the same wavelength?

From the tiniest to the most massive of poos, physics predicts we should all spend the same amount of time on the john.

New Research

A Grand Unified Theory of Pooping

Why you and an elephant spend the same amount of time on the john

Hemingway led a life of adventure and, sometimes, violence. The author is shown here holding a tommy gun aboard the Pilar in 1935.

Multiple Concussions May Have Sped Hemingway’s Demise, a Psychiatrist Argues

The troubled author may have suffered from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, the disease that plagues modern football players

In 1950, Tollund Man’s discoverers “found a face so fresh they could only suppose they had stumbled on a recent murder.”

Europe’s Famed Bog Bodies Are Starting to Reveal Their Secrets

High-tech tools divulge new information about the mysterious and violent fates met by these corpses

A recipe for an eyesalve from ‘Bald’s Leechbook’

Medieval Medical Books Could Hold the Recipe for New Antibiotics

A team of medievalists and scientists look back to history—including a 1,000-year-old eyesalve recipe—for clues

Why I Take Fake Pills

Surprising new research shows that placebos still work even when you know they’re not real

View of the exhibition Body Worlds Pulse Gunther von Hagens that counts the history of human body in the 21st century at Discovery Times Square in New York in the United States.

Why Are We So Obsessed With Dead Bodies?

Body Worlds taps into a long, fraught history of humans displaying the deceased for “science”

Are orangutans aware that others have different minds than their own?

New Research

Monkeys May Recognize False Beliefs—Knocking Over Yet Another Pillar of Human Cognition

Apes may be aware of the minds of others—yet another remarkable finding about the cognitive abilities of non-human animals

Page 17 of 48