The Moon is entering a new phase of exploration. Governments and private companies are planning missions that could do more than collect rocks and conduct experiments. They could test technologies for...
For decades, the Moon was treated largely as a scientific destination—a place to study, visit and photograph. That view is changing. Scientists and space agencies are investigating lunar water ice, ...
For decades, nuclear fusion has carried the reputation of being the ultimate promise of clean energy: abundant fuel, enormous power and far less long-lived radioactive waste than conventional nuclear ...
For centuries, humans discovered materials by experimenting, copying nature and gradually refining familiar ideas. Artificial intelligence is changing that process. Instead of asking researchers to ch...
Materials have traditionally been designed to be strong, light, flexible, conductive or heat-resistant. But a new generation of engineered materials is challenging those familiar categories. Scientist...
Computers have moved from rooms to desks, pockets and even watches. The next transformation could make computing almost invisible. Researchers are developing networks of extremely small sensors—ofte...
Tiny machines navigating through the human body sound like science fiction, but researchers are already developing microrobots and nanoscale systems that can move, sense their surroundings and interac...
Robots are getting smaller—and scientists are approaching a scale where machines can be measured in micrometers rather than centimeters. These microscopic systems could one day navigate inside the h...
An axolotl can regrow a lost limb. A starfish can rebuild damaged arms. Some flatworms can reconstruct almost their entire bodies. Humans, meanwhile, can repair a wound—but cannot naturally replace ...
Dreams have fascinated humans for thousands of years. We know they emerge from the sleeping brain, yet the bizarre stories, emotions and images that fill them remain difficult to explain. Now artifici...
The human brain is one of the most complicated structures known to science. Now, researchers are creating increasingly detailed maps of its cells, connections and activity. The goal is not simply to d...
The idea of copying a human mind into a computer has moved from pure science fiction into serious scientific discussion. Researchers can already map individual neurons, record brain activity and build...
Every thought, memory, sensation and dream you experience happens inside a brain weighing roughly as much as a small melon. Yet somehow, billions of neurons produce something far more mysterious than ...
For much of modern biology, scientists had to freeze, stain or destroy cells to understand what was happening inside them. New imaging technologies are changing that. Researchers can increasingly watc...
The ground beneath our feet looks solid and permanent. Deep below, however, Earth is anything but still. Massive tectonic plates are moving, sinking, breaking, colliding and recycling material into th...
The deeper scientists go beneath Earth's surface, the stranger the planet becomes. New drilling projects are pushing into rocks that have remained isolated for millions of years, searching for clues a...