Smart News

WWII Marine Buried at Arlington, 73 Years After His Death

Harry K. Tye's body went missing after the 1943 Battle of Tarawa. Decades later, his remains were discovered and returned home.

Sourdough starters can be used to make all kinds of things: –pancakes, waffles, even cake–but the staple is sourdough bread.

Gold Miners Kept Their Sourdough Starters Alive By Cuddling Them

San Francisco-area miners used sourdough starters as a replacement for commercial leavening agents

Cool Finds

Nanocars Will Race Across (a Very, Very Tiny Bit of) France

Ladies and gentlemen, start your molecules

Cool Finds

Researchers Spot Giant, Deep-Sea Octopus Munching on an Unusual Snack

The cephalopod was chowing down on a jellyfish—long thought unimportant in the food web

Though the pictured fish belong to a German research collection, they represent similar samples around the world that have come under attack.

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The Campaign Is On to Save the Natural History Collections of a Louisiana University

The school is displacing millions of specimens in favor of a new track

Was sticking an eraser on the back of a pencil common sense, or a new invention?

Happy Birthday to the Modern Pencil

The patent for this supremely convenient invention didn't last long

By the time Harvard relented and offered Mary Whiton Calkins a special Ph.D, she turned it down.

This 'Brilliant' Pioneering Psychologist Never Got a Ph.D....Technically

Despite "the most brilliant examination" Harvard had ever seen, the school didn't grant degrees to women at the time

The queen

Trending Today

Corrosion Could Bring a Premature End to This Legendary Ship

New report sounds the alarm on the RMS Queen Mary

These baby eagles mean business.

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Watch a Baby Bald Eagle Hatch in Real Time

Things are getting serious for the world's most famous bald eagles

Christo's "Floating Piers" racked up 1.2 million visitors in just over two weeks.

Cool Finds

What Kind of Art is the Most Popular?

It's not always in museums—and historic name recognition is starting to matter less

Museum Devoted to Camille Claudel, Long Overshadowed by Rodin, Opens in France

Her work has long been obscured by her dramatic personal life

New Research

New Device Allows Paralyzed Man to Move His Arm With His Mind

The brain implant bypasses the patient's injured spinal cord, allowing him to eat and drink on his own

Behold the glory of the middle of the Milky Way—thanks to an even better photo database at NASA.

Cool Finds

NASA Launches the Galaxy’s Most Glorious Space Database

Now you can easily peruse more than 140,000 of the agency's photos, videos and visualizations

There are ways to treat heroin addiction—but they remain controversial.

New Research

U.S. Heroin Use Has Risen Dramatically Since 2001

White males under 45 are most likely to report using the drug

A vintage ad for Coca Cola from around the late 19th or early 20th century.

Coca-Cola’s Creator Said the Drink Would Make You Smarter

Like the wine and cocaine drink that preceded it, Coca-Cola was first marketed as a brain tonic

Trending Today

Norway Proposes World's First Mile-Long Tunnel for Ships

The tunnel would help ships and ferries avoid rough seas around the Stadlandet Peninsula where 33 people have died since World War II

"Straight Outta Compton" just landed a spot in the National Recording Registry.

Trending Today

N.W.A., NPR Among This Year’s National Recording Registry Inductees

The latest class of 25 also includes Judy Garland and Vin Scully

Can Playing Tetris Block Traumatic Memories?

New research suggests that the engaging, visual-spatial nature of the game may disrupt the formation "intrusive memories"

Corbin Fleming plays with President Obama's desk phone in 2012.

Before 1929, Nobody Thought the President Needed a Telephone in his Office

Herbert Hoover got a phone in the Oval Office over fifty years after the White House first got a switchboard

John Cohen photographs a young Bob Dylan playing his guitar and harmonica in New York City in 1962.

Bob Dylan Will (Finally) Collect his Nobel Prize for Literature

But the songwriter won't be delivering a Nobel Lecture at this time

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