From the Sewer to the Syringe By Katie Kosma Highlight Biomedical researchers find remedies for antibiotic-resistant infections in grody places.
The Age of Forever Crises By Linda Kinstler Feature We need to learn how to talk about our irreversible mistakes. Historian Kate Brown says the first step is to resist the Chernobylization of knowledge.
Against Hustle: Jenny Odell Is Taking Her Time at the End of the World By Rebecca McCarthy Feature The attention economy is killing us and the planet. Artist and writer Jenny Odell talks about why slowing down could be the only way to survive.
‘I Cannot Name Any Emotion That Is Uniquely Human.’ By Hope Reese Feature According to primatologist Frans de Waal, we don’t like to admit that animals, especially apes, have emotions just like ours, and science has become better at studying apes’ behaviors than human ones.
A Fascinating Case of Precocious Puberty By Cheri Lucas Rowlands Highlight Patrick Burleigh carried an extremely rare genetic mutation, which brought on puberty prematurely.
The Hunt for Planet Nine By Shannon Stirone Feature What will it take to find the biggest missing object in our solar system?
Tommy Tomlinson: The Weight I Carry By Krista Stevens Highlight “On top of all that, some of us fight holes in our souls that a boxcar of donuts couldn’t fill.” Tommy Tomlinson shares the physical and emotional costs of weighing 460 pounds.
A Race to Claim a Piece of Space: The Out-of-This World Obsession of Meteorite Hunters By Cheri Lucas Rowlands Highlight Meteorite hunters Mike Farmer and Robert Ward travel to Carancas, a tiny village at 12,000 feet in Peru’s remote altiplano, to examine a crater in the hope to claim precious rock from space.
The Science of Dreaming By Jessica Gross Feature Science journalist Alice Robb on why we need to take our dreams seriously.
The Bat-Borne Virus That Threatens to Become the Next Pandemic By Cheri Lucas Rowlands Highlight Steven Bedard, a former field biologist, travels around Bangladesh with a team of public health investigators studying Nipah, a bat-borne virus with the potential to become the next pandemic.
Duet for a Small Porpoise’s Extinction By Kimi Eisele Feature Kimi Eisele contemplates coherence, the near extinction of the vaquita, and the expensive bycatch of being human.
Science Has Yet to Prove Mold Makes us Sick By Krista Stevens Highlight Is it the black mold causing your headaches, or is it all in your head? Don’t turn to science. It has no answers.
Life Under (Water) Pressure By Michelle Weber Highlight Welcome to the dangerous, cramped world of the saturation diver, and the extraordinary strangeness of working 500 feet under the sea.
We Are Scientists By Kirtan Nautiyal Feature A scientist examines the connections between his Indian immigrant father and the brilliant but overlooked Indian scientist Yellapragada Subbarow.
How Do You Control One of Nature’s Biggest Rivers? By Aaron Gilbreath Highlight The Mississippi River’s infrastructure is aging, and no one can agree who should fix it.
Welcome to the Center of the Universe By Shannon Stirone Feature For the men and women who use the Deep Space Network to talk to the heavens, failure is not an option.
Homeward Bound: Allegedly a Sea of Sexual Harassment in the Field of Science By Krista Stevens Highlight A program to encourage women to take leadership positions in the field of science has sailed into the rough seas of the #metoo movement.
What If Forensic Science Isn’t Really Science? By Michelle Legro Highlight When bad forensics enter the courtroom, it can become impossible to get rid of them.
Longreads Best of 2017: Science, Technology, and Business Writing By Longreads Reading List We asked writers and editors to choose some of their favorite stories of the year in various categories. Here is the best in business, tech, and science writing.
The Planet Is Pissed and Wants You Outta Here By Aaron Gilbreath Highlight Massive volcanic events are the cause of most global mass extinctions. When will the next one destroy life on earth?
The Big Black Market for Spare Human Body Parts By Krista Stevens Highlight Beware, should you donate your body to science in the US. Lightly regulated, the industry is ripe for fraudsters trying to make a buck on your personage.
The Aftermarket for (Human) Spare Parts By Pam Mandel Highlight “What they are doing is profiting from the sale of humans.”
Bringing Up the Bodies: How NecroSearch Helps Police to Locate the Dead By Krista Stevens Highlight Why do they volunteer their time in such a grisly enterprise? To bring closure to the families of the dead.
What Makes a Disability Undesirable? By Danielle Tcholakian Commentary Should we try to correct disabilities to help the disabled, or make their existence easier for the abled?
The Dream of a Perfect Android By Michelle Legro Highlight Hiroshi Ishiguro has spent his career creating robots. But does he know enough about humans to make them lifelike?
The Woman Who Smashed Codes: America’s Secret Weapon in World War II By Longreads Feature How “know-nothings” Elizebeth Smith Friedman and William F. Friedman became the greatest codebreakers of their era.
Atomic City By Justin Nobel Feature On January 3, 1961, a nuclear reactor the size of a small grain silo exploded in the Idaho desert, causing one of the only recorded nuclear fatalities on U.S. soil.
The Uncomfortable Discoveries That Come with Home DNA Testing Kits By Mike Dang Highlight Home DNA testing kits are making it easier for people to learn more about who they are, but they often come with surprising results.
Swabbing Filthy Surfaces for Tomorrow’s Cures By Aaron Gilbreath Commentary As the world faces a global health catastrophe from drug-resistant microbes, one scientists is searching the natural world for the antibiotics of the future.
