Popular Science

Spending long summer evenings outside comes with a big nuisance: bug bites. Mosquitos and other insects are drawn to the lights illuminating your dinner party, which helps…

Pollution in waterways can cause terrible algae blooms that choke out marine life and contaminate water supplies. In some places, the blooms are so big that they are visible…

Antarctica is a frozen, beautiful continent, that might not be completely frozen for much longer. Just like the Arctic, Antarctica's ice shelves are disappearing, and fast,…

Airplane wings are rigid structures. They're great for wide open skies, but one bad collision with a wall or a tree branch and suddenly the flying machine has trouble…

Welcome to the third and final installment of my stress series, in which I ask whether the organisms I talk about the most on this blog—plants, microbes, and insects—get…

In the near future, putting out grease fires in the kitchen might be as easy as turning up the music, thanks to engineering students Viet Tran and Seth Robertson at George Mason University. The students just unveiled a 20-pound backpack prototype that blasts out flames using low-frequency sound waves. The students used their own money to fund their project, and had an uphill battle from the start--including searing skepticism from both classmates and faculty. “My initial impression was that it wouldn’t work,” engineering professor Brian Mark said in a press release. “Some students take the…

On Tuesday, the news of the Germanwings flight crash en route to Dusseldorf appeared to be another tragic accident, like the AirAsia and Malaysia Airlines flights of the…

Lorikeets are cute, colorful parrots that typically eat pollen and nectar. But some populations have also developed a taste for flesh. The species’ carnal appetite was…

Ten hours, 32 minutes, and 44 seconds. That’s how long a day lasts on Saturn. Researchers finally calculated this elusive statistic thanks to a new method developed by Tel…

In The Hobbit, the sword Sting glows blue whenever Bilbo Baggins approaches orcs or goblins--a convenient feature in Middle-earth. In the real world, free wireless…

Sodium silicate, better known as water glass, can bond projects together where regular glue fails. But not all hardware stores keep water glass in stock. On the bright side,…

Yesterday, DARPA released their latest vision for the future. As the far-seeing technological eye of the Defense Department, DARPA’s had its hand in everything from the…

DARPA knows that people are afraid of robots. And the agency's response--a video contest for high school kids--is equal parts adorable and insightful.

In a lab in Germany lives a strange breed of ant. These ants have ceramic limbs and 3D-printed bodies. They gain sustenance by charging their batteries through metal…

There's nothing like the sight of gently falling snowflakes outside the window. Too bad they're so impermanent. But you can make your own unmelting snow substitute. It's…

The Apollo 13 anniversary event at the San Diego Air and Space Museum was basically the greatest event for a space nerd.

DARPA’s latest drone program just took a turn for the better. The Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node (TERN) is designed as a Medium Altitude Long Endurance (MALE)…

Ghose looks more like a spacecraft than a seaborne combat vessel. It's waiting for us in the Piscataqua River, a few minutes out from its home at the Portsmouth Naval…

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