Popular Science

The answer to a deadly disease in Africa could be a babbling, bumbling band of baboons--or at least their genes, anyway. One-third of the African continent is almost completely free of cattle. About the size of the continental U.S., the region cannot support livestock because of the tsetse flies--tiny bugs no bigger than a half an inch--which live there. Molecular geneticist Steve Kemp may have a solution that could help increase agricultural success on African farms, and it’s all thanks to a baboon gene. This gene produces a protein that kills a protozoan called Trypanosoma brucei, which…

Two weeks ago, a routine resupply mission to the International Space Station turned into a rather dramatic affair. A Progress spacecraft, an unmanned cargo resupply ship…

Supercomputer Watson has a reputation for handling data problems large and small, from culinary innovations to running an efficient business meeting to, of course, winning…

In the ocean depths, off the western coast of Australia, a robot captain was listening to its subordinates. This isn't the plot of a science fiction. Instead it's part of a…

Zain Rajani was born 22 days ago in Toronto, Canada. To say he was much anticipated would be an understatement—his parents, Natasha and Omar Rajani, had been trying for…

Over the past fifteen years or so, bed bug infestations surged worldwide. The bed bug’s return was, in part, thanks to an increase in global travel, insecticide resistance,…

Two months after he was discharged from the hospital after a grueling fight with Ebola, Dr. Ian Crozier was back in the hospital with searing eye pain. When doctors looked…

We don’t know happens when quadcopters go really, really fast, but thanks to a tether system inside a padded room at a university in Switzerland, researchers are going to…

The small wars of the future may be fought with small drones to match. The Shadow drone, a light scout used by the U.S. Army, just successfully dropped bombs in a recent…

A man in Fairfax, Virginia is suing the local police department for indiscriminately scanning citizens' license plates and storing that information in massive databases.

For many, drone delivery was a novelty until Amazon jumped into the game. With a much-hyped concept video, Amazon provided a straightforward image of robot postmen,…

Liberia could be declared Ebola-free May 9, after no new cases reported for 42 days, double the virus’s incubation period. With cases also dropping in Sierra Leone and…

Last year, Yoshitomo Imura was arrested in Japan for 3D printing revolvers. Imura designed the “zig-zag” pistol, and was sentenced to two years in jail for making the weapon…

For a country looking to show off its military might, Russia is suffering from an embarrassing bit of projectile dysfunction. To celebrate the 70th anniversary of victory…

For the U.S., reestablishing diplomatic relations with Cuba means more than imports of the world’s best cigars—it could mean a better way to stop their damage. Cuban…

In Paradise Valley, Arizona, prickly plants have been recruited to catch lawbreakers. According to a Fox 10 report, the town has hidden a set of license-plate readers in…

Last Friday, the AeroMobil 3.0 prototype, recently featured in Popular Science’s 2015 Invention Awards, crashed during a flight test in Slovakia. When the flying car ran…

The future is unevenly distributed in favor of the United Arab Emirates. Recently, two men donned jetpacks and flew into the night air above Dubai. Yves “Jetman” Rossi…

Moving a mountain is considered about as possible as emptying an ocean with a teaspoon. Sure, over time, the rocky peaks of a mountain can be worn down and moved by…

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