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Webb Space Telescope Snaps Its First Photo of an Exoplanet
The grainy image of a “super-Jupiter” is a sign of what’s to come as the telescope’s exoplanet observations ramp up.
How Isaac Newton Discovered the Binomial Power Series
Rethinking questions and chasing patterns led Newton to find the connection between curves and infinite sums.
The AI Researcher Giving Her Field Its Bitter Medicine
Anima Anandkumar wants computer scientists to move beyond the matrix, among other challenges.
Bacteria’s Immune Sensors Reveal a Novel Way to Detect Viruses
A new study reveals that bacteria can fight viruses in a surprisingly elegant way that has no known counterpart in more complex life.
Old Problem About Mathematical Curves Falls to Young Couple
Eric Larson and Isabel Vogt have solved the interpolation problem — a centuries-old question about some of the most basic objects in geometry. Some credit goes to the chalkboard in their living room.
Why and How Do We Dream?
Dreams are subjective, but there are ways to peer into the minds of people while they are dreaming. Steven Strogatz speaks with sleep researcher Antonio Zadra about how new experimental methods have changed our understanding of dreams.
‘Post-Quantum’ Cryptography Scheme Is Cracked on a Laptop
Two researchers have broken an encryption protocol that many saw as a promising defense against the power of quantum computing.
What Drives Galaxies? The Milky Way’s Black Hole May Be the Key.
Supermassive black holes have come to the fore as engines of galactic evolution, but new observations of the Milky Way and its central hole don’t yet hang together.
Electric Fish Genomes Reveal How Evolution Repeats Itself
By studying how electric organs arose in different lineages of fish, scientists gain new insights into a long-standing question of evolutionary biology.