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Recent controversies bode ill for the effort to detect life on other planets by analyzing the gases in their atmospheres.

Electroconvulsive therapy is highly effective in treating major depressive disorder, but no one knows why it works. New research suggests it may restore balance between excitation and inhibition in the brain.

Long-anticipated experiments that use light to mimic gravity are revealing the distribution of energies, forces and pressures inside a subatomic particle for the first time.

Teleporting people through space is still science fiction. But quantum teleportation is dramatically different and entirely real. In this episode, Janna Levin interviews the theoretical physicist John Preskill about teleporting bits and the promise of quantum technology.

The recipient of the 2024 Crafoord Prize in Mathematics discusses math as art, math as language, and math as abstract thought.

Researchers have shown that a problem relating to the energy of a quantum system is easy for quantum computers but hard for classical ones.

Altering a protein in the neurons that coordinate a rattlesnake’s movement made a slow slither neuron more like a speedy rattle neuron, showing one way evolution can generate new ways of moving.

By eliminating a hidden inefficiency, computer scientists have come up with a new way to multiply large matrices that’s faster than ever.

How did cells evolve a process to end their own lives? Recent research suggests that apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death, first arose billions of years ago in bacteria with a primitive sociality.