Feature
- Materials Science
A materials scientist seeks to extract lithium from untapped sources
Lithium is an essential ingredient for batteries in electric vehicles but getting enough will become a problem.
- Computing
This engineer’s light-based computers take inspiration from the brain
Physicist and engineer Bhavin Shastri is working to create the first photonic computer modeled after the human brain.
- Quantum Physics
Why this physicist is bringing thermodynamics to the quantum age
Like a steampunk fantasy-world, which pairs high-tech with an old-timey setting, Nicole Yunger Halpern melds old and new science.
- Particle Physics
A neutrino mass mismatch could shake cosmology’s foundations
Cosmological data suggest unexpected masses for neutrinos, including the possibility of zero or negative mass.
- Health & Medicine
A next-gen pain drug shows promise, but chronic sufferers need more options
A new painkiller nearing approval called suzetrigine may prove to be an opioid alternative. But for many with chronic pain, treatment must go beyond pills.
- Health & Medicine
A newly approved ‘living drug’ could save more cancer patients’ lives
Tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte, or TIL, therapy is the first T cell treatment for solid tumors. It fights melanoma and maybe other cancers too.
- Animals
A frog’s story of surviving a fungal pandemic offers hope for other species
Evolving immunity to the Bd fungus and a reintroduction project saved a California frog. The key to rescuing other species might be in the frog’s genes.
- Space
Scientists are getting serious about UFOs. Here’s why
UFOs have been rebranded as UAPs (unidentified anomalous phenomena). Probably not aliens, they might impact national security and aircraft safety.
- Artificial Intelligence
AI’s understanding and reasoning skills can’t be assessed by current tests
Assessing whether large language models — including the one that powers ChatGPT — have humanlike cognitive abilities will require better tests.
- Climate
How powdered rock could help slow climate change
A method called enhanced rock weathering shows promise at capturing carbon dioxide from the air. But verifying the carbon removal is a challenge.
- Humans
Does social status shape height?
A controversial idea drawing on findings from the animal kingdom suggests there’s more to human stature than genetics and nutrition.
- Physics
The second law of thermodynamics underlies nearly everything. But is it inviolable?
Two centuries on, scientists are still seeking a proof of the Second Law and why heat always flows from hot to cold.
