Archive

RNA and peptides coevolving in the primordial world might have jointly served as a precursor to the modern ribosome.

Why verify every line of a proof, when just a few checks will do?

Synthetic biology experiments suggest a “MultiFate” model for how genetically identical cells become the many different types found in complex organisms like us.

The space telescope is one of the most ambitious scientific projects ever undertaken. Marcia Rieke and Nikole Lewis, two of the scientists leading JWST investigations, talk to Steven Strogatz about how it may transform our understanding of the universe.

“Ribbon concordance” will let mathematicians compare knots by linking them across four-dimensional space.

Leslie Lamport revolutionized how computers talk to each other. Now he’s working on how engineers talk to their machines.

By resolving a paradox about light in a box, researchers hope to clarify the concept of energy in quantum theory.

In 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope released a historic image of a supermassive black hole in another galaxy. The follow-up — an image of Sagittarius A* — shows it shimmering at the center of our own.

Finding out whether a question is too difficult to ever solve efficiently depends on figuring out just how hard it is. Researchers have now shown how to do that for a major class of problems.