Smart News Ideas & Innovations

Cool Finds

New Underpass Helps New Zealand Penguins Cross Busy Road

The blue penguin colony in Oamaru can now cross between their nesting area and the ocean without dodging traffic

A U.S. Air Force pilot performs a pre-flight check. Perhaps one day, connecting electrodes to the scalp could be part of that routine.

New Research

U.S. Military Tests Brain Stimulation to Sharpen Mental Skills

Could electrodes one day replace pill bottles in the theatre of war?

A visitor to the Andy Warhol Museum experiences a Warhol print of a Coca-Cola bottle with the help of an audio app and a tactile 3D reproduction.

Cool Finds

Visually Impaired People Can Now Explore Andy Warhol’s Work With Their Ears and Fingers

"Out Loud" adds depth to an artist obsessed with the surface of things

New Research

Spinach: The Superfood That Could Help Detect Bombs

Now more than Popeye’s favorite food, carbon nanotubes are turning the leafy green into a bomb detector

New Research

Chill Ways to Recycle Last Year's Snow

Let it snow!

Since diamonds are forever, your data could be, too.

New Research

New Method Could Store Massive Amounts of Data in Diamond Defects

Scientists use lasers to probe the gem's flaws, creating data storage that could potentially last forever

One of the subjects of a new study on how the human nervous system responds to tactile intensity cracks an egg with ease with the help of an experimental prosthetic device.

New Research

How Hacking Neural Networks Can Help Amputees Flawlessly Crack an Egg

By tapping into the body's nervous system, researchers could create touch-sensitive prosthetics

Tombac, a form of tobacco, grows on a farm in Darfur. The plant could one day be used to create cheaper, better anti-malarial drugs.

New Research

Scientists Hijacked Tobacco Plants to Make Malaria Drugs

A promising new advance could make the world's best anti-malarial drug more widely available

Cool Finds

How Many Comedy Writers Does It Take to Help A.I. Tell a Funnier Joke?

Jokesters from Pixar and <i>the Onion</i> are on the case to make artificial intelligence seem more human

"The Kiss" Gustav Klimt,

Cool Finds

Reach Out And Touch This Version of Klimt’s “Kiss”

A 3-D printed version of the classic painting lets blind people appreciate the artwork

Human blood contains red blood cells, T-cells (orange) and platelets (green)

New Research

Scientists Are Creating an Atlas of Human Cells

The Human Cell Atlas will boldly go where science, surprisingly, hasn’t gone before

Cool Finds

How Virtual Reality Is Helping Prosecute Nazi War Criminals

A new, detailed 3D simulation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp is helping prosecutors build stronger cases against these still-living Nazis

New Research

Coming Soon: Otter-Inspired Wetsuits

A team at MIT has figured out exactly how otter and beaver fur keeps the animals warm in cold water

Who says you can't buy friendship?

Cool Finds

Toyota Hopes This Adorable Robot Will Make Japan Less Lonely

Meet your $390 best friend

All aboard the book train

The Innovative Spirit fy17

This Speedy, Wall-Crawling Conveyor System Will Now Deliver Books at the New York Public Library

Like a robotic, book-carrying train

This grocery store's shelves are lined with 100% wasted food.

Cool Finds

This Supermarket Sells Only Wasted Food

It’s a yummy solution to a worldwide problem

Alaska's yellow-cedar forests are slowly dying as climate change takes root.

Anthropocene

This Music Was Composed by Climate Change

Dying forests make magnificently melancholy listening

A concept design for the completed Glenner Town Square.

Cool Finds

Fake Towns Could Help People With Alzheimer’s Live Happier Lives

Model towns meant to spark memories could help patients with dementia

These flowers may look beautiful, but in the imagination of Tamiko Thiel, they've turned hostile due to climate change.

Cool Finds

Augmented Reality Art Imagines What Could Be Seattle’s Weird, Bleak Future

Artist envisions mutant flowers and drone-like seaweed that may one day take over a post-climate change Seattle

Kayak may be the best way to explore the climate change memorial of the future.

Anthropocene

What Will the Memorials of the Future Look Like?

From underwater trees to mechanical parrots, the memorials of tomorrow don’t look much like the ones that exist today

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