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Soon, this island will become a cultural treasure.

Trending Today

San Francisco Is Creating Its Own Governors Island

Treasure Island will turn into a major cultural destination under new, multi-billion dollar plan

Cool Finds

Rare Two-Headed Porpoise Found in North Sea

Only nine other cases of conjoined cetacean twins have ever been documented

Ainu people wearing traditional clothes at the Ainu Museum, City of Shiraoi, Hokkaido, Japan.

Australia to Return Remains of Japan’s Indigenous Ainu People

In the early 20th century, an anthropologist excavated the remains and sent them overseas

Presumably laughing at a LOLcats meme.

Cool Finds

Why the Library of Congress Thinks Your Favorite Meme Is Worth Preserving

Webcomics and Web Cultures Archives are documenting online culture

Nesting space is at a premium as humans tear down natural habitats.

New Research

The Early Birds Might Be Crowding Out the Bees

As humans expand, nesting space contracts—and competition heats up

Cool Finds

Endangered Balkan Lynx Kitten Photographed for the First Time in a Decade

There are less than 50 of these critically endangered cats left in the wild

Although scientific discoveries about blood started happening in the seventeeth century, blood transfusions are (mostly) a twentieth-century thing.

350 Years Ago, A Doctor Performed the First Human Blood Transfusion. A Sheep Was Involved

Early scientists thought that the perceived qualities of an animal—a lamb’s purity, for instance—could be transmitted to humans in blood form

One concern about wind turbines is that they are noisy, but the Department of Energy notes that at a distance of 750 feet, they make about as much noise as a household fridge.

Two Myths and One Truth About Wind Turbines

From the cost of turbines to one U.S. senator’s suggestion that “wind is a finite resource”

The American Lobster, 'Homarus americanus,' found on the northern area of the Atlantic coast of America.

Climate Change, and Cod, Are Causing One Heck of a Lobster Boom in Maine

The complex relationships between humans, lobster, and cod are creating boom times—for now

This moving bowl will soon commemorate German reunification in Berlin.

Trending Today

Germany Moves Forward with Controversial Monument to Reunification

The German Memorial to Freedom and Unity has a fraught history

Icy conditions kept BAYSYS ships from making their way to the research site.

Trending Today

Climate Change Cuts Climate Change Study Short

Ironic? Yes. But it could be a new reality for scientists

Library of Congress Names Tracy K. Smith As New Poet Laureate

Smith previously won a Pulitzer Prize for her work, which is by turns philosophical, fantastical and deeply personal

Trending Today

Art Installation Recreates the Smell of Cities Around the World

The Pollution Pod project emphasizes the unequal air quality divide between rich and poor cities

Thank Andrey Markov for your smartphone's predictive text feature—and also somewhat sillier uses.

Three Very Modern Uses For A Nineteenth-Century Text Generator

Andrey Markov was trying to understand poems with math when he created a whole new field of probability studies

Catalonia

First House Designed by Antoni Gaudí to Open as a Museum

The vibrant Casa Vicens was an early hallmark of Gaudí’s unique style

New Research

Jupiter Could Be the Solar System’s Oldest Resident

The early former may have set up just the right conditions for Earth to take shape

A Bear and Her Cubs Took Over Vlad the Impaler’s Castle

Romania’s Poenari Castle was shut down to visitors after authorities had “close encounters” with the creatures

In the war years, Greyhounds were crowded with travelers, leading planners to look at a new technology: helicopters.

In a Fit of 1940s Optimism, Greyhound Proposed a Fleet of Helicopter Buses

“Greyhound Skyways” would have turned major cities into bustling helicopter hubs

This flatworm fragment went to space and became a double-headed worm.

New Research

What Space-Faring Flatworms Can Teach Us About Human Health

Their experiment had some weird results—and could one day help humans thrive in microgravity and back here on Earth

Pasteur took blood samples from a cow, a sheep and a horse who had died of anthrax.

How Sheep’s Blood Helped Disprove This Wacky Nineteenth-Century Theory of Illness

Scientists didn’t understand that bacteria caused disease, but then enter Louis Pasteur

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