Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

New Research

New Research

Spinach: The Superfood That Could Help Detect Bombs

Now more than Popeye’s favorite food, carbon nanotubes are turning the leafy green into a bomb detector

Whoever dies with the most friends wins? It's complicated.

New Research

Facebook Might Help You Live Longer, According to Facebook Researchers

It depends on whether online social ties strengthen real-world social ties, which are known to be good for your health

New Research

Chill Ways to Recycle Last Year’s Snow

Let it snow!

The crew of the International Space Station's Expedition 38

New Research

Space Makes Astronauts Grow Taller, But It Also Causes Back Problems

The inches gained during long stays in space don’t stick around once the adventurers return to Earth

A common swift in flight.

New Research

Swifts Spend Nearly a Year on the Wing

The tiny birds spend about ten months of the year in the air almost without a break

New Research

133-Million-Year-Old Pebble Discovered to Be First Fossilized Dinosaur Brain

Found on a beach in England, the small fossil contains blood vessel, cortex and part of the membrane that surrounds the brain

The original Frankenstein didn't create a bride for his creature–and with good scientific reason.

New Research

Scientists Find That Frankenstein’s Monster Could Have Wiped Out Humanity

Thank goodness his creator never finished his proposed girlfriend

New Research

New Patch Could Help Reduce Peanut Allergies

A new study shows that a transdermal patch delivering tiny doses of peanut protein could help allergy sufferers tolerate larger exposure to peanuts

Since diamonds are forever, your data could be, too.

New Research

New Method Could Store Massive Amounts of Data in Diamond Defects

Scientists use lasers to probe the gem’s flaws, creating data storage that could potentially last forever

Scientists are using genetic sequencing to reconstruct how AIDS hit the United States in the 1970s and 1980s.

New Research

Genetic Sleuthing Clears ‘Patient Zero’ of Blame for U.S. AIDS Epidemic

Scientists debunk the myth of the man once thought to have brought the virus to the states

Two natural color images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft show the changing appearance of Saturn's north polar region between 2012 and 2016.

New Research

The Swirling Storm Above Saturn’s North Pole Changed Colors

The years-long shift may be a sign of changing seasons

One of the subjects of a new study on how the human nervous system responds to tactile intensity cracks an egg with ease with the help of an experimental prosthetic device.

New Research

How Hacking Neural Networks Can Help Amputees Flawlessly Crack an Egg

By tapping into the body’s nervous system, researchers could create touch-sensitive prosthetics

Marián Cueto, author of a new study on fossilized cave lion claws, working in La Garma.

New Research

Humans May Have Hunted Cave Lions to Extinction—For Throw Rugs

Dear cave lions: We’re so, so sorry.

Trending Today

Jive to the Academic Beat With This Year’s “Dance Your Ph.D.” Winners

Sometimes explaining complex scientific research requires a cow doing the worm, glittering e. coli and an immune cell with a killer plie

Cool Finds

Magnificent Millipede Has 414 Legs and Four Penises

Meet Illacme tobini, a newly described species of millipede discovered in a cave in Sequoia National Park

Why do some people seem able to lie without feeling bad?

New Research

How White Lies Snowball Into Full-On Deception

Using brain scans, researchers find evidence that bad feelings associated with lying lessen over time

Heavy drinking can cause brain changes that make you want to drink more.

How a Genetically Engineered Virus Could Help the Brain Fight Alcohol Cravings

Heavy drinking can change the brain to make cravings worse. Can gene therapy change it back?

Striations on teeth of a Homo habilis fossil 1.8 million years old suggest the earliest evidence in the fossil record for right-handedness. Researchers believe the marks came from using a tool to try to cut food being pulled from the mouth with the left hand.

New Research

Two-Million-Year-Old Jaw Has a Lot to Say About the Origins of Human Handedness

Scientists have discovered one of the earliest examples of handedness in an ancient human

New Research

Pediatricians Switch Up Screen Time Rules for Tots

Doctors say there’s no “one size fits all” approach to introducing kids to technology

Tombac, a form of tobacco, grows on a farm in Darfur. The plant could one day be used to create cheaper, better anti-malarial drugs.

New Research

Scientists Hijacked Tobacco Plants to Make Malaria Drugs

A promising new advance could make the world’s best anti-malarial drug more widely available

Page 182 of 301