Science & Technology

Solid ground can behave like a liquid during earthquakes, causing objects to sink into or rise up from an otherwise rigid surface.

Most people are exposed to radiation every day, but most of it is either harmless nonionizing radiation or negligibly small doses of ionizing radiation.

The moon moves 3.8 centimeters (1.5 inches) farther away from Earth each year.

Watch five AI models try to solve versions of the trolley problem and explain the ethics of how they choose one of two bad outcomes.

Most cats' dislike of water may originate in the African wildcat—an animal that lives in deserts and savannas—which was domesticated about 10,000 years ago.

Scientists have transformed lead into gold—a process known as chrysopoeia—within the Large Hadron Collider.

There are places on Earth where the moon never sets and others where it never rises for days at a time throughout the year.

Glow sticks shine brighter and burn out faster at warmer temperatures because the additional thermal energy increases the rate of the underlying chemical reaction.

Water can hover and move against gravity when placed on a sufficiently hot surface—a phenomenon known as the Leidenfrost effect.

QR codes can be scanned from any angle because of the squares in their corners, which communicate the code's size and orientation.

Some octopuses change color while they sleep—a potential sign that they dream.

Streaks of condensed water vapor and soot from jet fuel, known as contrails, have been associated with mind- and weather-controlling chemicals, called chemtrails.

Time zones were established in the 1880s because of railroads, which suffered from scheduling problems due to each town managing its own timekeeping.

There may be up to 74,963 kinds of ice, each distinguished by differences in its density and the geometric arrangement of water molecules.

Airplane mode isn't there to protect planes, but it does save your mobile device's battery life.

Objects can be levitated by sound using an apparatus that causes these waves to interfere and combine, creating a 'pressure cage.'

Earth's core is about as hot as the sun's surface due to leftover thermal energy from the planet's formation and heat from ongoing radioactive decay.

Explore an interactive map of global water gaps—places where people use water faster than nature can replenish it.

As much as 10% of home electricity use comes from unused devices left plugged in.

If our universe had infinitely many stars, the night sky would still appear mostly dark—an apparent contradiction known as Olbers' paradox.

Copper, not bleach, is responsible for turning some blonde hair green in swimming pools—a phenomenon known as chlorotrichosis.

Null Island is a fictional location used to label zero degrees latitude and zero degrees longitude on some digital maps of Earth.

Fast-moving, lighter cars are at the greatest risk of hydroplaning, in which a vehicle's tires lose contact with the road.

Bolivia's Salar de Uyuni is considered the world's largest natural mirror, formed from a prehistoric lake that dried out about 40,000 years ago.

Many dogs enjoy squeaky toys because they mimic prey sounds, appealing to the animals' hunting instincts.

'Lightsabers' can be created by holding fluorescent bulbs up to overhead power lines, causing the bulbs to light up without making contact.

View a distribution of wind turbine locations across the US.

Replacing the sun with a black hole of identical mass would not change Earth's orbit, but life on Earth would collapse rapidly.

Tyrian purple, a dye made from the mucus of sea snails, was once worth more than three times its weight in gold.

White holes—the opposites of black holes—are impossible to enter and would endlessly eject material into the universe.

View a gallery of lightning photography taken from the Grand Canyon.

The sun does not just get lower or higher in the sky throughout the year—it traces a figure-eight pattern called the analemma.

Ginkgo trees are considered living fossils because they have existed largely unchanged for over 200 million years.

As of 2025, there are 90,000 tons of nuclear waste in the US, stored at over 100 sites in 39 states.

View colorful flowers that grow on cacti, succulents, and other xerophilic organisms—those that thrive in dry environments.

The observable universe has a mass of about 100 sexdecillion kilograms—a one followed by 53 zeroes.

Tree rings can track and reveal centuries of environmental change and natural events, including yearly precipitation and fire frequency.

Seaweed can collect critical minerals from ocean water, which can later be used in batteries, solar panels, and other clean-energy technologies.

El Niño makes the equatorial Pacific Ocean bluer than usual as high temperatures kill off microscopic plants that normally give the waters a green hue.

Gold can be dissolved by aqua regia—a combination of two acids that, on their own, cannot dissolve gold.

Explore a gallery of cellular activity at the microscopic scale, captured by participants of the 2026 Nikon Small World in Motion competition.

Watch the birth of a neutron star, which takes less than one second, in this high-fidelity, 3D visualization.

Gasoline engines cannot run on diesel fuel, which is thicker and not easily ignited by spark plugs.

Hydras appear to be immortal, and each of the aquatic animal's individual cells can rebuild its entire body within days.

It's always snowing in Earth's oceans, but marine snow is predominantly made of decaying organic material, not ice crystals.

Kodak operated a nuclear device in the basement of its Rochester headquarters for over 30 years to create neutron images and analyze materials.

Visualize annual changes in forest area across countries, continents, and national income levels since 1991.

The largest earthquake in recorded history is a 9.5-magnitude event in 1960, which left 2 million Chileans unhoused.

The Koch snowflake has an infinitely long border but can fit inside shapes with a finite area.

Thomas Edison's first patented invention was a voting machine, but Congress rejected its use.