Feature
- Health & Medicine
Smruthi Karthikeyan turned to wastewater to get ahead of COVID-19
Smruthi Karthikeyan’s system for tracking the coronavirus gives lifesaving public health measures a head start.
- Science & Society
Big questions inspire the scientists on this year’s SN 10 list
These scientists to watch study climate change, alien worlds, human evolution, the coronavirus and more.
- Anthropology
Tina Lasisi wants to untangle the evolution of human hair
Tina Lasisi is pioneering studies of human variation in an ethical and scientifically sound way.
- Earth
Jacky Austermann looks to the solid earth for clues to sea level rise
Jacky Austermann’s work could help inform practical climate change solutions for at-risk coastal cities.
- Particle Physics
Carlos Argüelles hunts for particles beyond the standard model
Carlos Argüelles overcame hardship and discrimination to pursue a passion for physics.
- Chemistry
Josep Cornella breaks boundaries to make new and better catalysts
Josep Cornella reinvents chemical reactions essential for agriculture and the pharmaceutical industry.
- Computing
Huijia Lin proved that a master tool of cryptography is possible
Cryptographer Huijia Lin showed that the long-sought “indistinguishability obfuscation” is secure from data attacks.
- Life
Marcos Simões-Costa asks how cells in the embryo get their identities
Marcos Simões-Costa combines classic studies of developing embryos with the latest genomic techniques.
- Neuroscience
Emily Jacobs wants to know how sex hormones sculpt the brain
Emily Jacobs studies how the brain changes throughout women’s reproductive years, plus what it all means for health.
- Health & Medicine
Christopher Barnes is on a quest for a universal coronavirus vaccine
Christopher Barnes wants to stop the viruses that cause COVID-19, the common cold and more.
- Ecosystems
A Caribbean island gets everyone involved in protecting beloved species
Scientists on Saba are introducing island residents to conservation of Caribbean orchids, red-billed tropicbirds and urchins.
- Life
Has AlphaFold actually solved biology’s protein-folding problem?
An AI called AlphaFold predicted structures for nearly every protein known to science. Those predictions aren’t without limits, some researchers say.
