Editor in Chief Nancy Shute discusses the history of unethical practices in research on human remains and the progress toward more ethical standards.

Parasite-induced cases of explosive diarrhea are sweeping the United States. Containing the outbreak won’t be easy.

The lab-made cells open a window into what’s possible for synthetic life, researchers say.

Biological anthropologist Fatimah Jackson is leading an effort to prevent history from repeating.

Solve the math puzzle from our August 2026 issue, in which a family investigates an odd happening.

Analysis of six mummies from ancient Egypt challenges the idea that the bows and daggers buried with some royal women were merely ceremonial.

Astronomers found a helium atmosphere around a rocky exoplanet — a good sign for the search for life outside the solar system.

A new generation of therapies aims to intervene at a recently discovered gap between the disease’s molecular march and its neurological consequences.

A Maya calendar formula bears the name Sak Tahn Waax, the first known Classic Maya mathematician-astronomer directly credited for such work.

The brine-formed meteorite that crashed into a New Jersey roof in 2024 could teach us about how life first arrived on Earth.

In sci-fi, AI can navigate the unknowns and — ideally — keep human travelers safe. But it’s not intelligent enough to do that yet.

Clinical trial results show an experimental drug lowered tau levels in the brain and slowed some memory loss, but the data came with a surprise twist.

Atmospheric rivers bring heavy rain and floods, but if they don’t come around, it could mean drought. A new global map reveals little-known pathways.

The Euclid space telescope discovery could help researchers understand how black holes grew so massive so quickly in the early universe.

Researchers looking for the origins of left-right dominance in the brain found no innately better motor skills on either side.

Two “superpuff” planets orbiting a sunlike star over 1,000 light-years from Earth are as big as Jupiter and as dense as cotton candy.

New Horizons data reveal Pluto’s first six confirmed landslides along steep crater rims.

Proposed federal rules would rely on political appointees to decide how a lot of U.S. science gets done. History shows the consequences of such actions.

In her new book, science journalist Roberta Kwok takes readers behind the scenes to understand how researchers get nature to give up its secrets.

A boost to heat production and drawing in more oxygen may help Andean leaf-eared mice thrive at altitude.