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New Research

Astronomers Find the Smallest Star Yet

The faint orb is just a smidgen bigger than Saturn and around 2,000 to 3,000 times dimmer than our own sun

Kermit the frog (left) and puppeteer Steve Whitmire (right) speak at a Commic-Con panel this year in San Diego.

Kermit the Frog Gets a New Voice for the First Time in 27 Years

Steve Whitmire, who voiced Kermit since Jim Henson’s death in 1990, has departed from the Muppets

John Dee was an accomplished mathematician, but he also said he owned a stone (in his right hand) that was given to him by angels. In Elizabethan England, that wasn't all that odd.

John Dee’s Life Shows Science’s Magical Roots

His life shows a time when science and magic intersected–even for scientists

An artistic rendering of Juno approaching the Great Red Spot while orbiting Jupiter

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Stunning Images Capture First Close-Up With Jupiter’s Great Red Spot

Take a peek at the solar system’s largest storm

This grand-prize-winning image captures a touching moment between a parent gentoo penguin and its and chick.

Art Meets Science

Diverse Splendor of Birds on Display in Audubon Photo Competition

100 of the top submissions can now be viewed online

Two views of the curvy "Venus of Hohle Fels."

Trending Today

World’s Oldest Figurative Art is Now an Official World Treasure

The new Unesco world heritage site spans six caves located in the Swabian Alps in Germany

A NASA research plane photographed the widening crack on Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf on November 10, 2016.

Trending Today

Delaware-Sized Iceberg Breaks Off Antarctica

‘Whopper’ of an iceberg weighs more than one trillion metric tons—and has been threatening to make the break for years

It looks a bit like a blimp–unsurprising, since Fuller meant it to fly.

Buckminster Fuller Was Good at Ideas, Terrible at Car Design

Fuller held more than 30 patents during his life, but many of his ideas didn’t make it off the page–or not for long

Completed in 1939, the Fiat Tagliero service station is one of the city's many Art Deco structures.

Asmara, the Capital of Eritrea, Named World Heritage Site

Eritrean officials lobbied for the designation in a bid to reform their country’s isolationist image

Mutineers walk in on a chaplain "with a smoking pistol in his hand" in the Arthur Conan Doyle short story "The Adventure of the Gloria Scott."

Thank Sherlock Holmes for the Phrase ‘Smoking Gun’

From its origins to modern day, the favorite cliché of detectives and journalists everywhere refuses to kick the bucket

Police remove peaceful protestors from a sit-in at the U.S. Capitol in 1965.

Martin Luther King and Gandhi Weren’t the Only Ones Inspired By Thoreau’s ‘Civil Disobedience’

Thoreau’s essay became a cornerstone of 20th-century protest

Josiah Wedgwood, of Wedgwood pottery fame, was also a staunch abolitionist and designed this medallion to further the cause.

This Anti-Slavery Jewelry Shows the Social Concerns (and the Technology) of Its Time

The ‘Wedgwood Slave Medallion’ was the first modern piece of protest jewelry

Researchers tested the fungus that grew in this isolated habitat as four people lived in it for a month.

Space-Bound Humans Bring Fungus Aboard—And the Stowaways Could Cause Trouble

Microscopic life is everywhere, but it could be dangerous for future astronauts bound for Mars

One of the tablets found at the fort

Cool Finds

Cache of Roman Messages Found Near Hadrian’s Wall

The 25 well-preserved wooden tablets include a soldier’s request for time off

The Lenox Madeira

Cool Finds

New Jersey Museum Discovers Stash of Madeira from 1796

Liberty Hall Museum owns the wine and will decide if anyone will be allowed to sample the Revolutionary libation

Vatican Vetoes Gluten-Free Communion Wafers

It’s a sticky issue for Catholics with celiac disease or other gluten sensitivities

The Declaration of Independence in its first known newspaper printing on July 6, 1776.

Watch How (Slowly) News of the Declaration of Independence Spread in Real Time

Before social media, TV, radio and even telegraphs, news of America’s independence took a long time to reach some Americans

The women faced temperatures of almost -50 degrees Fahrenheit, blasting winds and ever-changing ice conditions.

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The Amazing Story of the First All-Women North Pole Expedition

Answering an ad in a newspaper, 20 amateur explorers attempted to ski from Arctic Canada to the top of the world

The first page of 'Measure For Measure' in the First Folio of 1623. Set in Vienna and full of less-than-proper characters, this play proved the most challenging to bowdlerize.

The Bowdlers Wanted to Clean Up Shakespeare, Not Become a Byword for Censorship

Thomas and Henrietta Bowdler started out with relatively noble intentions

This island has been a boy's club for hundreds of years.

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This Island Can Only Be Visited by Men

Okinoshima is officially an Unesco world heritage site—but tradition bans women from its shores

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