Latest Articles
Molecule-Building Innovators Win Nobel Prize in Chemistry
The chemists Carolyn Bertozzi, Morten Meldal and K. Barry Sharpless were recognized for their development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry.
Geneticist Awarded Nobel Prize for Studies of Extinct Human Ancestors
Svante Pääbo has been awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for studying our extinct ancestors’ DNA.
Record-Breaking Robot Highlights How Animals Excel at Jumping
Robots can surpass the limitations on how high and far animals can jump, but their success only underscores nature’s ingenuity in making the most of what’s available.
A Good Memory or a Bad One? One Brain Molecule Decides.
When the brain encodes memories as positive or negative, one molecule determines which way they will go.
Geometric Analysis Reveals How Birds Mastered Flight
Partnerships between engineers and biologists have begun to reveal how birds evolved their superb maneuverability.
An Immunologist Fights Covid with Tweets and a Nasal Spray
Akiko Iwasaki, an immunologist who became a lifeline for the worried and the curious during the pandemic, thinks that nasal spray vaccines could be the next needed breakthrough in our fight against the coronavirus.
Reshuffled Rivers Bolster the Amazon’s Hyper-Biodiversity
The lush biodiversity of the Amazon may be due in part to the dynamics of branching rivers, which serve as invisible fences that continuously barricade and merge bird populations.
Life’s First Peptides May Have Grown on RNA Strands
RNA and peptides coevolving in the primordial world might have jointly served as a precursor to the modern ribosome.
Why ‘De-Extinction’ Is Impossible (But Could Work Anyway)
Several projects are aiming to bring back mammoths and other species that have vanished from the planet. Whether that’s technically possible is beside the point.