The Northwest’s blistering heat wave underscores the fragility of our grids
The record-breaking heat wave baking the Northwest US offers the latest example of how ill-prepared…
Inside the risky bat-virus engineering that links America to Wuhan
In 2013, the American virologist Ralph Baric approached Zhengli Shi at a meeting. Baric was…
Can the most exciting new solar material live up to its hype?
Testing perovskite solar cells in the lab used to require a decent pair of running…
What a collapsed trial says about US claims of Chinese high-tech spying
In April 2018, Anming Hu, a Chinese-Canadian associate professor at the University of Tennessee, received…
They called it a conspiracy theory. But Alina Chan tweeted life into the idea that the virus came from a lab.
Alina Chan started asking questions in March 2020. She was chatting with friends on Facebook…
Brazil’s most vulnerable are struggling to survive the stress of covid
When oxygen supplies ran out in several municipalities across the Brazilian state of Amazonas in…
What it will take to achieve affordable carbon removal
A pair of companies have begun designing what could become Europe’s largest direct-air-capture plant, capable…
How astronauts deal with the boring parts of being in space
Mundane tasks suddenly become extremely complex in space. I spoke with former NASA astronaut Leland…
Radio waves from Earth have reached dozens of stars
For billions of years, Earth has been playing a cosmic game of hide-and-seek. New research…
Using machine learning to build maps that give smarter driving advice
If you drive in the United States, chances are you can’t remember the last time…