Could shrunken heads from the Amazon hold the key to curing cancer?
research
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Social Life of Forests
“Trees appear to communicate and cooperate through subterranean networks of fungi. What are they sharing with one another?”
Posted inStory
Behind the Writing: On Research
Sarah Menkedick speaks with Leslie Jamison, Carina Chocano, and Elena Passarello on the art of research.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Why Are Humans So Curious?
Mario Livio on his new book about human curiosity, his work as an astrophysicist, and why we shouldn’t fear our expanding universe.
Posted inBusiness & Tech, Nonfiction, Quotes, Science & Nature
A Nuclear Bomb at Ground Zero, and What Happens Next
At the Atlantic, two researchers discuss their study of how humans might respond after a nuclear attack on Manhattan.
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Hi-Tech War on Science Fraud
A team of researchers at Tilburg University’s Meta-Research Center in the Netherlands focuses full time on detecting misconduct and fabricated data in science.
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Hermit Who Inadvertently Shaped Climate-Change Science
Billy Barr moved into a remote part of the Rocky Mountains in search of solitude over 40 years ago. To avoid boredom, he documented snow levels, animal sightings, and the date flowers first bloomed. “…collectively his work has become some of the most significant indication that climate change is rearranging mountain ecosystems more dramatically and […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quote Posts, Quotes
On the Brink of a Cure: An Innovative Immunologist’s Quest for an AIDS Vaccine
Louis Picker, an AIDS vaccine researcher in Portland, hopes to lay the groundwork for an HIV cure within the next two decades.
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Early Roots of Surgery
The first recorded cases of cancer show how the Ancient Egyptians used cauterisation (using red-hot instruments to burn off tissue and seal off wounds) to destroy tumours and to treat a variety of infections, diseases and bleeding lesions. Until the mid-18th century, surgery was the only effective option for addressing several conditions. But it was […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The People Who Get Woken Up at 2am When Bob Ballard Finds Something on the Ocean Floor
73-year-old ocean explorer Bob Ballard discovered the wreck of the Titanic 30 years ago, and he hasn’t stopped exploring the ocean floor since. In a recent piece for Popular Mechanics, Ryan D’Agostino profiled Ballard and the research aboard his ship Nautilus (a 211-foot former East German research vessel that carries seventeen crew and thirty-one scientists and operations specialists). But what […]