Science

In popular culture and history, Vikings are contradictory figures: both raiders and traders, settlers and explorers. According to Smithsonian Magazine, these ancient Scandinavians took to the high seas, venturing to the likes of Britain, Paris, and even North America. But Vikings didn’t just affect the lands around them — it turns out they in-process were […]

Making a scientific discovery is an incredible achievement at any age — and Indeever Madireddy made one at just 17 years old. The Silicon Valley high school senior, avid fishkeeper, and 2022 Davidson Fellow channeled his curiosity about his pet fish, Calvin, who recently died, into a research project. The result: Madireddy made history, becoming […]

Scientists have uncovered the world’s oldest known DNA in northern Greenland — a major discovery that sheds light on what the now-barren landscape may have looked like 2 million years ago. Publishing their findings in Nature in December, an international team of scientists studied 41 microscopic fragments of environmental DNA, the genetic material organisms release […]

For those of us who aren’t scientists, a chance encounter with an inert ground-dwelling rodent probably wouldn’t turn into a decades-long quest for knowledge about the animal that is now linked with making space exploration safer for humans. But in 1992, for Kelly Drew, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Alaska, […]

Every day, diligent researchers are making scientific breakthroughs that help change the way we understand and interact with the world. Much of the exploration that leads to these achievements occurs under a microscope — where the building blocks of life are magnified and their otherwise unseen properties made visible to the human eye. Established in […]

Despite earning over 50% of bachelor’s degrees total, women make up only about one-fifth of degrees obtained in physics, according to the American Institute of Physics. Although this statistic has not deviated much over time — staying stagnant during the period between 2007 and 2017 — one female physicist is hoping to change that by […]

If you’ve ever been to a Maryland-style crab feast, a summer staple in the mid-Atlantic state, you’re well aware of the affinity many people have for the crustacean. Crab has been enjoyed around the world for thousands of years — so much so that we’ve even created a more affordable imitation of the delicacy. In […]

A new study has established a correlation between preschool-educated children and numerous positive educational outcomes, including a boost in high school graduation and college attendance, and a decrease in problematic behavioral issues. The study, led by MIT economist Parag Pathak and published in The Quarterly Journal of Economics, followed the academic paths of over 4,000 […]

Ellen Xu, a 17-year-old from San Diego, created an award-winning algorithm that uses smartphone photographs to help diagnose Kawasaki disease — a leading cause of acquired heart disease in the U.S. that primarily affects children younger than age 5. It’s a disease that’s personal to Xu; her younger sister, Kate, was diagnosed with Kawasaki when […]

The Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope on Maui, Hawaii, is the largest and most powerful solar telescope on the planet, and the recent images it captured surely live up to those superlatives. The National Science Foundation released a set of eight new pictures last week, showing our sun in “unprecedented detail.” The shots provide a […]

For over a hundred years, scientists have believed that the connections between the 86 billion neurons in the human brain — think of an electric spark traveling along a spiderweb — form the basis for our thoughts, feelings, and experiences. Up until now, little importance has been placed on the actual shape of the brain, […]