Hacking the body for a future that didn't happen

A comic book-style review of attending a biohacking conference

When Andrew Greenstone attended a biohacking conference in Austin, Texas, he didn't expect to walk away a newly implanted member of the techy cadre. Partway through the event, he paid $150 to have an NFC chip inserted into his right hand.

My experience with biohacking

A general approach that employs technology to enhance the functioning of the human body, biohacking enthusiasts are continuously seeking new ways to optimize their performance. Martin Kremmer, an entrepreneur who became interested in the topic after experiencing burnout, explores his own experiences in biohacking his own diet and lifestyle in pursuit of a longer, healthier life.

An essay exploring how living day-to-day with a brain implant helps restore a sense of identity

Companies like Neuralink are experimenting with volunteers who have lost control over their bodies. Many of the program's participants claim the most significant benefit from the tool is the ability to perform simple, mundane tasks, such as playing video games or shaking hands, rather than more obvious milestones like walking or eating. This essay explores what it's like, day to day, to use a brain implant.

The man who turned his leg into a hotspot

Biohacker Michael Laufer recently had a 512GB drive implanted in his leg, which can store data, stream music or movies, and power a hot spot and mesh network. It's called the PegLeg, and WIRED's Daniel Oberhaus spoke with Laufer about the device and the field of biohacking.

Implanted neurotechnology can leave users vulnerable when manufacturers go under

Despite providing relief from neurological conditions, patients are left stranded when the companies that make these devices shut down. The lack of regulation means patients often face technical failure, insurance battles, or risky surgeries to maintain their quality of life.

How to prevent a worst-case scenario with synbio

Author and entrepreneur Rob Reid reviews the risks of a world where more and more people have access to the technology needed to create a doomsday bug that could wipe out humanity.

The quest to find natural ways to extend lifespan

Tales of searching for the Fountain of Youth persist. Our modern-day version is marked by promises of pharmaceutical miracles and a proliferation of viral "biohacking" routines. One doctor’s quest to unlock the keys to longevity stimulated much of this renewed fervor, though his ideas are often taken out of context.

The origin of cyborgs

The term "cyborg" was coined in a 1960 academic paper discussing what alterations humans would need to undergo to survive in extraterrestrial environments, a venture far "more logical than providing an earthly environment" in space. According to authors Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline, Cyborgs with a capital C have incorporated exogenous components that extend their ability to adapt to new environments. Read the paper here.

Researchers use the brain's ability to edit memories to explore memory deletion

Scientists have successfully implanted false memories in mice after studying how the editing process works in the brain. Beyond potentially deleting memories in those with PTSD, upcoming research may allow clinicians to forecast the onset of neurodegenerative diseases.

Contactless credit cards descend from a batteryless Cold War listening device

The same physics that let Soviet spies eavesdrop on the US ambassador in 1945 underlie contactless payment methods today. The device is a passive chip powered wirelessly by incoming radio waves.

Genetically modified viruses can help construct battery electrodes

MIT scientists' modifications caused the viruses to attract conductive materials, such as gold ions, which the viruses self-assembled into nanowires that could be used in batteries. These components allow batteries to be thinner and flexible enough to be constructed into new shapes.

Misfired motor signals may explain why many people with schizophrenia hear voices

Up to 80% of schizophrenia patients may have auditory hallucinations. Recent research concluded that this symptom may be from misfired motor signals that feed into each other, essentially failing to suppress certain sensory neural activities and that resulting overexcitment fuels hallucinations. The finding suggests that, one day, magnetic pulses might be used to stimulate specific nerves to better regulate the errant signals and reduce or stop hallucinations. (Some users may encounter a paywall.)

Mixed reality devices and other wearables may usurp smartphones

The integration of smartphone features into watches, glasses, and even clothing suggests future technology may be geared toward working independently in the background. Mixed reality technologies are expected to facilitate this ambient computing world by seamlessly and proactively displaying real-time content without physical interactions solely in the real world.

As of 2025, perfect synthetic replication of natural organs remains elusive

Advancements such as 3D printing muscles, performing vaginal reconstruction with colon tissue, and growing organs in a lab have shown promise, but artificial options and transplanting substitutions continue to exhibit functional and performance limitations compared to their natural equivalents.

Recent research found that the brain doesn't seem to massively rewire following amputation—upending earlier beliefs about the cause of phantom limb pain.

Six of history's most unethical human experiments, from deliberate flu exposure to withholding syphilis treatment

Some of the progress made in mental health treatment, vaccines, blood transfusions, and more came about before the advent of consent and ethics committees, resulting in serious physical and psychological harm that participants in studies were not even anticipating.

Metal detectors identify induced magnetic fields in conductive objects

A changing magnetic field in a transmitter coil causes an electric current to be produced in materials that conduct electricity. This current generates its own magnetic field, which can be detected by a receiver coil and transmitted to a control box, which identifies the presence and depth of an object.

In 2015, a custom virus program was used to destroy and transform art images

At the Art Laboratory Berlin's "bOdy pandemOnium: Immersion into Noise" exhibit, Chicago-born artist Joseph Nechvatal explored viractualism—the interface between the biological and the technological—via a custom virus program that randomly altered images representing the human eye and rectum.

Human teleportation through quantum principles raises questions about identity

Through quantum entanglement, particles have been "teleported" by measuring their state in one location and effectively transferring that state to a new location. Doing so for the particles that make up humans would destroy the state of the original particles, killing the person, and effectively creating a clone.

Read a deep dive on the 'all-purpose healing' peptide BPC-157.

'Magic ink' is redefining the tattoo

One University of Colorado professor has developed an ink that can be "turned on" with exposure to UV light, and "turned off" with sunlight. While the ink could help those who want to hide their body art from family members or coworkers, there are potential uses for medical procedures.

Security technician hacks a voting machine to reveal its vulnerabilities

A technician bought an old, likely-decommissioned voting machine from 2013 and took it apart to see how a would-be hacker might be able to exploit its vulnerabilities. Get a sense of the needs for secure, up-to-date voting machines with this...

Astronauts have repaired genetic damage in space using CRISPR—a molecular tool that can make precise changes to DNA and is used in single-celled organisms to attack invasive viruses.

Did a Smithsonian anthropologist steal people's brains?

This comic examines "racial brain collection" of Ales Hrdlicka, the Smithsonian's head of physical anthropology during the early 1900s. Hrdlicka was a white supremacist who sought physical evidence for his theories on anatomical differences between...

Using fitness wearables to track muscle wasting in astronauts

All that exercising, and astronauts still are likely to lose a large amount of muscle mass while in microgravity. Astronauts can lose up to 20 percent of their muscle in as little as five days in space. Currently, tracking muscle loss means waiting until astronauts land to remeasure their muscle density post-trip. This article explains a NASA-backed fitness wearable that may be able to track muscle atrophy as it happens.

The anatomy of 'Mashle,' as described by a doctor

"Mashle: Magic and Muscles" is a manga and anime in which a seemingly magicless man performs outsized feats he blames on "muscle magic." In this 15-minute video, a doctor breaks down the anatomy and biomechanics of some of the feats performed by Mash, the series' main character who's spotted flying a broom via leg pumping and reading magical texts while sitting in an invisible chair (i.e., single-leg squat).

Thomas Edison, eager to communicate with ghosts, tinkered with an apparatus called the 'spirit phone'

The inventor was interested in developing a scientific method for communicating with the dead. He was not interested, though, in the occult figures who believed the dead could be reached through Spiritualism, which he found childish. He believed those kinds of people "permit themselves to become, in a sense, hypnotized into thinking that their imaginings are actualities."

Microplastics are infiltrating the human body with unclear but concerning effects

Scientists have linked microplastics to immune system damage, hormone disruption, inflammatory diseases, and even cancer—yet most of their health impacts remain unknown due to limited research. Studies suggest we ingest about a credit card's worth of plastic weekly.

The history of many kitchen appliances involves unexpected discoveries and applications, including wartime radar turned hamster defroster and replacing an 'ice king' with heat-stealing boxes.

The first line of 'immortal' human cells, which can divide indefinitely and are used in scientific research, was nonconsensually taken from a Black woman.

Discover the catastrophic consequences of a failure of the US electrical grid—something that is more likely than many Americans think.

Radioactive elements can introduce software errors because the ionizing radiation they produce can detach electrons from atoms, and computer code relies on the distribution of electrons.

At the beginning of the 20th century, a group of young men ate standard American food—replete with food additives like borax and formaldehyde—as part of government research to better understand food safety.

Hookworm infection, though risky, may help fight certain autoimmune conditions by tamping down the immune system's inflammatory response.

In 2019, a laptop loaded with six of the worst malware in history and described as 'an exhibit of historical weaponry' sold for $1.3M.

This site reaches millions of visitors who are tired of AI chatbots and seeking human connection. Pretend to be an AI chatbot and ask questions, provide answers, and draw for people in real time.

While atoms are normally made of protons, neutrons, and electrons, exotic ones have been built with antimatter—alternate versions of normal matter that live for fractions of a second and are about a billion times as rare.

Tattoos remain visible on your skin thanks to immune cells called macrophages

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

According to the physics of black holes, our 4D reality may be a hologram—a projection of information coded on a 2D surface on the edge of the universe.

In 2018, 26-year-old missionary John Allen Chau was killed by tribesmen after attempting to reach and evangelize on India's isolated North Sentinel Island

Studies suggest when you sleep is as important as how much you get, and syncing with your circadian rhythms may lead to less fatigue and improved long-term health outcomes

See images of medical cases of firework injuries shared on this 'Instagram for doctors.' (Warning: Graphic content)

As of 2025, the most cited papers in science include a review of graphene, methods to improve image recognition, streamlining electron density calculations, and optimizing protein studies.

Against his wishes, Albert Einstein's brain was removed before his cremation, and the pathologist responsible stored it for decades in mason jars within a beer cooler.

Some researchers have labeled nomophobia, the fear of being without your phone, as 'the phobia of the 21st century.'

Watch how deep-sea mining equipment collects and processes polymetallic nodules—metal-rich, potato-shaped rocks—from the ocean floor and creates environmentally damaging plumes of sediments.

In 2025, four executives from large tech companies were given positions in the US Army Reserves—including Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar, which reinforced Palantir's ties with the US military and its role as a leading defense partner.

Exploring the Larry Bird punch that almost changed March Madness

'Saturday Night Fever,' the 1977 film that introduced disco to the mainstream, was based on a fabricated magazine story.