Sleuthing The Secrets To A Scrumptious Strawberry
The other day I went to my local bodega in Brooklyn, New York and bought a 16-ounce plastic carton full of Driscoll’s strawberries. These fruit, the packaging informed me, were grown in Mexico...
Brainwaves
Current thoughts on mind, life and culture
STAFF BLOG
Searching For The Elephant's Genius Inside the Largest Brain on Land
Many years ago, while wandering through Amboseli National Park in Kenya, an elephant matriarch named Echo came upon the bones of her former companion Emily.
The Year Drones Ruined Christmas
Kylie ran towards her fallen dragonfly and knelt beside it. One of its four wings had snapped nearly in half. She rummaged through a toolbox until she found a small tube of accelerseal, bit off the cap and squeezed a generous amount onto the wing’s fracture, holding the two pieces together...
Leafy Green ‘Solar-Powered’ Sea Slugs Begin to Reveal Their True Colors
Nature is full of thieves. Instead of laboriously collecting pollen and nectar from flowers, robber bees raid the hives of other pollinators and steal the honey within.
Why Life Does Not Really Exist
I have been fascinated with living things since childhood. Growing up in northern California, I spent a lot of time playing outdoors among plants and animals.
Catching Ourselves in the Act of Thinking
From 1934 to 1970, Louie Mayer worked as a cook and housekeeper for writers Virginia and Leonard Woolf at their home in Rodmell, England. Her very first day on the job, she noticed something strange...
Are We Too Close to Making Gattaca a Reality?
Sometime in the not-too-distant future, Marie and Antonio Freeman step into a doctor’s office to design their next child. “Your extracted eggs, Marie, have been fertilized with Antonio’s sperm,” the doctor says...
Film Review: “GMO OMG” SRSLY? An #EpicFail in Exercising Our Right to Know
Jeremy Seifert’s new documentary “GMO OMG” opens with a series of maudlin pastoral scenes—sun-dappled forests, kids playing outdoors, a close-up of ants crawling in a line—as a man’s somber voice reads Wendell Berry’s poem “The Peace of Wild Things.” With this subtle Malickian prelude out of the way, the film begins more earnestly...
Health
Outgrowing the Traditional Grass Lawn
A few weeks ago, I moved into a new apartment in Brooklyn. What I like best about my new home is its garden. For the first time in 10 years I have a private outdoor space in which to read and relax; the option to grill in my own backyard; and the freedom to sculpt [...]..
Evolution
Is Sugar Really Toxic? Sifting through the Evidence
Our very first experience of exceptional sweetness—a dollop of buttercream frosting on a parent's finger; a spoonful of strawberry ice cream instead of the usual puréed carrots—is a gustatory revelation that generally slips into the lacuna of early childhood...
Blog Index
@ScientificAmerican
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Anecdotes from the Archive
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Anthropology in Practice
Exploring the human condition.
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Beautiful Minds
Insights into intelligence, creativity, personality, and well-being
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Budding Scientist
Everything you always wanted to know about raising science-literate kids
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Cross-Check
Critical views of science in the news
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Dark Star Diaries
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Dog Spies
Explore the science behind the dog in your bed
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Extinction Countdown
News and research about endangered species from around the world
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Eye of the Storm
The Science Behind Extreme Weather
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Frontiers for Young Minds
Science by and for kids ages 8-15
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Guest Blog
Commentary invited by editors of Scientific American
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Hot Planet
Climate science in a changing world
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Illusion Chasers
Illusions, Delusions, and Everyday Deceptions
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Life, Unbounded
Discussion and news about planets, exoplanets, and astrobiology
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Observations
Opinion, arguments & analyses from guest experts and from the editors of Scientific American
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Roots of Unity
Mathematics: learning it, doing it, celebrating it.
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Rosetta Stones
Adventures in the good science of rock-breaking.
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SA Visual
STAFFIllustrating science since 1845
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Talking back
STAFFA science blog, sans blague
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The Artful Amoeba
A Blog About the Weird Wonderfulness of Life on Earth
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Voices
Exploring and celebrating diversity in science.
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