A high-profile court case is calling attention to this rare and understudied condition

An M.I.T. Ph.D. student and two University of California system cryptographers used GPT-5.6 Sol Ultra in different ways, raising new questions about independent discovery and scientific credit

While “protein maxxing” is all the rage, reducing your protein intake could add years to your life

Lakes of liquid methane on Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, could offer exhilarating—and terrifying—opportunities for otherworldly surfing

Frothy rock floating on the ocean near Papua New Guinea is the sign scientists needed that, hidden from view, an underwater volcano was erupting

Historian Craig Fehrman unpacks the science, politics and human stories behind one of America’s most famous expeditions

David Haskell brings readers through millions of years of botanical history for his latest book, How Flowers Made Our World

Centuries-old DNA that was found in these mummies belongs to an extinct viral lineage of smallpox that was brought across the Atlantic during European colonization of the Americas

Scientists analyzing modern genomes may have found a long-lost branch of the human family tree

The U.S. has been pummeled with heat waves this summer. Here’s how hot overnight temperatures can get in the way of a good night’s rest—in three charts

Space agencies around the globe are coordinating missions to visit the asteroid Apophis during a close encounter with Earth in 2029

The extreme conditions of atomic bomb explosions create “uncontrolled microexperiments” that, in Hiroshima, forged a never-before-seen metallic alloy

Many of these structures date to around C.E. 100–300, during the time of the Aquiry civilization, and may have been used for ceremonial purposes

A newly discovered change in ribosomal RNA makes protein production more precise, potentially safeguarding these cephalopods’ complex nervous systems

Giant black holes adrift in deep space are normally invisible—unless they’re dining on stars

A private spacecraft launched to boost the decaying orbit of NASA’s Swift Observatory is now suffering from potentially mission-ending malfunctions

Smell can bring back vivid childhood memories—the so-called Proust’s madeleine phenomenon—and neuroscientists now think they know why

New work explains how avocado trees coordinate a complex reproductive strategy, switching every day between male and female

SciAm books editor Bri Kane shares her favorite science books for every summer mood

Discovered by an amateur mathematician in 2022, this strange construct can tile an infinite surface without repeating. But can it be useful in the real world?