Astronomy

A high-tech pair of gloves can help make learning instruments and other hands-on activities easier

Reducing the need for car travel is better for health, the environment and public safety

Contact with nature improves physical and mental health, but greenery is not easily reached by all

Making schools more welcoming for all can make for a fair and just society

What makes a word survive or go extinct?

A rice-grain-size fish screams louder than a jackhammer—and we have a lot to learn from its minuscule brain

In a new book, the wisdom of plants is a balm for our changing planet

Writers, artists, photographers and researchers share the stories behind the stories

Fossil and living birds reveal the dazzling biology of feathers

Artificial DNA sorts images like a neural network does

New research examines the molecular machinery behind a beetle’s strange biological cycle

Letters to the editors for the January 2024 issue of Scientific American

Certain brain layers specialize in particular waves—which might aid understanding of neuropsychiatric disorders

Science in meter and verse

Social context shapes how fiddler crabs communicate by vibrating the ground underneath their burrows

The first year of Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) data seems to show that dark energy is weakening over time, possibly the biggest cosmological discovery for 25 years.

As the Event Horizon Telescope pursues ambitious upgrades, the project’s latest results reveal the magnetic fields around our galaxy’s supermassive black hole

The emerging science of laying guilt through public messaging can help safeguard the planet and improve health behaviors

In cultures hostile to African hairstyles, so-called dreadlocks have long been a countercultural symbol for those who stand in opposition to oppressive ideals

Remote-controlled cockroaches with computers mounted on their backs can move as a swarm towards a target location, and could be used for search missions