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The design for Margaret Crane's prototype home pregnancy test kit was inspired by a transparent plastic paperclip container.

The Innovative Spirit

The Unknown Designer of the First Home Pregnancy Test Is Finally Getting Her Due

Margaret Crane says it was a simple idea, but it met with enormous push back

Peter Pidcoe (here) and Thubi Kolobe invented a Self-Initiated Prone Progressive Crawler, to help motor-challenged babies learn to inch themselves around.

The Innovative Spirit

This Skateboard-Like Device Helps At-Risk Infants Learn to Crawl

An innovative physical therapy device boosts babies’ movement efforts and helps their brains make critical connections

Alice Roosevelt and Nicholas Longworth disembark in Manila

Global Diplomacy Was in Theodore Roosevelt’s Hands, But His Daughter Stole the Show

Alice Roosevelt’s 1905 journey to Japan, Korea and China is documented in rare photographs held by the Freer and Sackler Galleries

Martha McDonald performs in the 2014 work The Lost Garden at The Woodlands in Philadelphia.

What Artist Martha McDonald Might Teach Us About a Nation Divided

This fall, a one-woman show staged in one of Washington, D.C.’s most historic buildings will recall the sorrow of the Civil War

Keepers weighed the panda cub Sept. 14, when Mei Xiang left her den. He weighed 1.9 pounds.

The National Zoo Wants Your Cutest Panda Cam Photos

Can’t get enough of the panda cam? You’re not alone.

The Dana Tai Soon Burgess Dance Company premiers its newest work, "We choose to go to the moon," at the Kennedy Center on September 19 and 20, 2015.

A Dancer and a Scientist Deliver a New Take on the Moon Walk

When modern dance collides with science and space history, the result can be a great leap forward

Priscilla of Boston, 1973

From Sublime to Wacky, Nothing Says Fashion Forward Like a Collection of Historic Bridal Gowns

An unforgettable—but not timeless—walk down the aisle from the archives of the now defunct Priscilla of Boston’s Bridal Shop

Charles Lindbergh was the innovator and designer of the perfusion pump.

The Innovative Spirit

To Save His Dying Sister-In-Law, Charles Lindbergh Invented a Medical Device

The famous aviator’s biography is incomplete without the story of how the aviator worked to perfect his glass-chambered perfusion pump

The Star Trek starship Enterprise model on display in the Smithsonian Arts and Industries building in 1975.

Trekkies Needed for USS Enterprise Restoration Project

The National Air and Space Museum asks “Star Trek” fans for pre-1976 images or film of the original studio model of the USS Enterprise

How does skin heal? You'll never look at a scab the same way again.

Ask Smithsonian

Ask Smithsonian: How Does Skin Heal?

The skin is an organ system that is unique to each individual, so not everyone heals the same way

Obama’s move to rename the U.S.'s highest peak was supported by Native and non-Native Alaskans alike.

Commentary

Denali and America’s Long History of Using (or Not Using) Indian Names

In restoring the Athabaskan name to the country’s highest mountain, President Obama is among those who have wrestled with the issue

Emmett Till was murdered in Money, Mississippi, for allegedly flirting with a white woman.

Breaking Ground

Emmett Till’s Open Casket Funeral Reignited the Civil Rights Movement

Mamie Till Mobley’s decision for her slain son’s ceremony was a major moment in Civil Rights history.

Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner's address book, circa 1950-1956

What’s Inside Jackson Pollock’s Address Book?

A new exhibition reveals the intimate details inside the “little black books” of some of America’s great artists

His eyes are still closed, which is normal. Cubs’ eyes generally open when they are 6 to 8 weeks old.

Panda Cub Is Growing Cuter and a Little More Black and White (Video)

The National Zoo releases another video of the ten-day-old cub

The fossils, encased in rock and sediment, were collected from marine rocks that date to around six million years ago before the Isthmus of Panama formed and a seaway connected the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

New Species of Ancient Dolphin Shows How the Animals Moved From Seas to Rivers

The newly discovered fossil gives scientists a fresh glimpse into the evolution of ocean life

At Indiana University, a team of scientists used this Roche 454 to sequence the 350 million base pairs of Theobroma cacao, the plant that gives us chocolate.

The World of Chocolate

The Big, Refrigerator-Sized Machine That Saved Chocolate

When cacao production was threatened by disease, the Mars candy company launched a global initiative to sequence the plant’s genome

The male panda cub (upper right) is now 4.9 ounces, having gained almost a full ounce in the last 72 hours. The cub was sired by Tian Tian by artificial insemination.

It’s a Boy! The Panda Cub Was Fathered by the National Zoo’s Tian Tian (Video)

Zoo scientists say that their newly developed genetic test determined the sex of the panda

"Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter." A soldier finds his final resting place, July 1863.

Why Can’t We Turn Our Eyes Away From the Grotesque and Macabre?

Alexander Gardner’s photographs of Civil War corpses were among the first to play to the uncomfortable attraction humans have for shocking images

Does this look infected?

Life May Have Spread Through the Galaxy Like a Plague

If alien life is distributed in a pattern that mirrors epidemics, it could be strong support for the theory of panspermia

The smaller of the two twin panda cubs has died.

Updated: One of the National Zoo’s Panda Cubs Has Died

The Zoo announced on August 26 that the smaller of its newborn twin panda cubs has died

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