Last update:

The extraordinary life of Alfred Nobel

The Nobel prizes may be one of the most famous and prestigious awards in the world—but who was the man behind them? As I explain in my lectures about Alfred Nobel, the inventor and entrepreneur has left a lasting legacy ...

Winning the Nobel 'an earthquake', says Ruvkun

US scientist Gary Ruvkun, who on Monday won the Nobel Prize in Medicine with fellow American Victor Ambros for their discovery of microRNA, said winning the honor was like "an earthquake".

Publisher Springer Nature makes stock market debut

Leading academic publisher Springer Nature made its stock market debut Friday, one of the few initial public offerings in Frankfurt this year despite the exchange's strong performance.

2024 Nobels offer glimmer of hope as global crises mount

Next week's Nobel Prize announcements will crown achievements that made the world a better place, a glimmer of optimism amid a spiraling Middle East conflict, war in Ukraine, famine in Sudan and a collapsing climate.

Will AI one day win a Nobel Prize?

Artificial intelligence is already disrupting industries from banking and finance to film and journalism, and scientists are investigating how AI might revolutionize their field—or even win a Nobel Prize.

Researchers unpack sign language's visual advantage

Linguists have long known that sign languages are as grammatically and logically sophisticated as spoken languages—and also make greater use of "iconicity," the property by which some words refer to things by resembling ...

More news

Other
'The data on extreme human aging is rotten from the inside out,' says Ig Nobel winner
Other
Study looks at funded partnerships between nonprofit organizations and researchers
Other
Saturday Citations: Permian-Triassic mystery solved; cute baby sighted; the nine-day 2023 seismic event
Other
Backside breathing and pigeon bombers studies win Ig Nobel prizes
Other
Studies on pigeon-guided missiles, swimming abilities of dead fish among Ig Nobels winners
Other
First publication of J.R.R. Tolkien's collected poems offers new insights into author's personality
Other
This year's $890,000 Balzan Prizes awarded for research on aging, restorative justice, climate crisis
Other
Saturday Citations: Teen seals photobomb research site; cell phones are safe; serotonin and emotional resilience
Other
A mural honoring scientists hung in Pfizer's NYC lobby for 60 years. Now it's up for grabs
Other
US disinformation researcher laments 'incredible witch hunt'
Other
Researchers propose framework for contextual metadata
Other
First Nations people are three times more likely to die on the road. Here's how to fix Australia's transport injustice
Other
Saturday Citations: Corn sweat! Nanoplastics! Plus: Massive objects in your area are dragging spacetime
Other
Claw machine games are Rio de Janeiro's new public enemy
Other
Best of Last Week—How humans really killed mammoths, making AI systems smarter, mitochondria fling their DNA
Other
Saturday Citations: Tarantulas and their homies; how mosquitoes find you; black holes not mysterious at all
Other
World's second largest diamond found in Botswana
Mathematics
New research analyzes 'Finnegans Wake' for novel spacing between punctuation marks
Other
Saturday Citations: Citizen scientists observe fast thing; controlling rat populations; clearing nanoplastic from water
Other
Study sheds light on creative thinking

Other news

Astronomy
'Islands' of regularity discovered in the famously chaotic three-body problem
Archaeology
Advanced technology discovered under Neolithic dwelling in Denmark
Materials Science
Inspired by Spider-Man, researchers recreate web-slinging technology
Astronomy
Astronomers find Webb data conflict with reionization models
Astronomy
A sharper view of the Milky Way with Gaia and machine learning
Biochemistry
A look into 'mirror molecules' may lead to new medicines
Bio & Medicine
New nanotherapy targets artery inflammation in cardiovascular disease
Condensed Matter
Theoretical study demonstrates existence of giant photocaloric effects in ferroelectric perovskites
Cell & Microbiology
Signaling pathway discovery could lead to faster, more reliable human stem cell differentiation
Molecular & Computational biology
Benchmarking study aims to assist scientists in analyzing spatial transcriptomics data
Cell & Microbiology
Targeting 'selfish' bacteria could optimize inhibitors that fight antibiotic resistance
Social Sciences
Deleting your Facebook may increase your well-being but reduce your political knowledge
Ecology
Landscape effects of hunter-gatherer practices reshape idea of agriculture
Earth Sciences
Geologist helps track lead pollution in a Tibetan glacier, revealing global impact of human activities
Molecular & Computational biology
High-resolution structural data shows how a supercomplex links mRNA translation and decay
Earth Sciences
Study finds it could take over 40 years to flush PFAS out of groundwater
Agriculture
What yields per acre reveal about the impact of extreme weather
Plants & Animals
Red milkweed beetle genome offers evolutionary insights into plant-insect interactions
Cell & Microbiology
Claustrophobic cells slow their own growth, forming beautiful patterns of concentric circles
Nanophysics
A new plasma-based technological design boosts graphene production by more than 22%

How to multitask when nuclear nonproliferation is on the line

New cognitive science research from Sandia National Laboratories shows that while maps can help someone identify landmarks while being escorted, using one also limits situational awareness and knowledge of surroundings not ...

Portrait by Renaissance master expected to soar past $80M

An enigmatic painting from Renaissance master Sandro Botticelli will go on auction next year and art watchers will be seeing if it fetches more than its eye-watering $80 million estimate, despite the pandemic.

Why San Francisco felt like the set of a sci-fi flick

On Sept. 9, many West Coast residents looked out their windows and witnessed a post-apocalyptic landscape: silhouetted cars, buildings and people bathed in an overpowering orange light that looked like a jacked-up sunset.

In first, Scientific American magazine endorses Biden

For the first time in its 175-year history, US magazine Scientific American has endorsed a White House candidate, saying Tuesday it wanted Democrat Joe Biden to prevail because President Donald Trump "rejects" science.

Pandemic spawns 'infodemic' in scientific literature

The science community has responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with such a flurry of research studies that it is hard for anyone to digest them all, underscoring a long-standing need to make scientific publication more accessible, ...