Engineering Design
- Chemistry
Explainer: What is chirality?
Chiral molecules are mirror images of each other. They might not seem all that different — but can have drastically different effects in medicine, materials and more.
- Physics
Precise tee placement can improve golf driving, teen finds
A homemade golf-ball-driving machine helped this middle-school engineer improve his own game.
- Animals
Lions have a second roar that scientists have only just discovered
This insight from machine-learning analyses of recordings of calls in the wild might help detect where lions are declining.
- Climate
As winters warm, athletes must cope with harder snow and tricky ice
Ice arenas and artificial snow now dominate the winter Olympics. Athletes there — and everywhere — may need to adjust how they train and perform.
- Tech
A mosquito’s mouth can ‘print’ lines thinner than a human hair
Scientists turned a mosquito’s straw-like mouthpart into a 3-D printing nozzle that creates ultra-thin lines.
- Brain
Scientists Say: Hallucination
Humans are not the only ones who can hallucinate. When a chatbot confidently generates a plausible but incorrect response, this error is called a hallucination.
- Artificial Intelligence
Chatbots may make learning feel easy — but it’s shallow
People who use search engines gain deeper knowledge and care more about what they learn than those who rely on AI chatbots, a new study finds.
- Materials Science
‘Stenciling’ tiny gold particles gives them new properties
Decorating nanoparticles with other chemicals could give them useful properties for medicines, textiles and more.
- Science & Society
Linking science to dance, culture and more expands who can take part
Through movement, sound, culture and community, some researchers are expanding the ways we learn, think about and communicate science and engineering.
- Physics
Chopping an onion? Sharp knives can keep its juice out of your eyes
Slow and steady cuts with a sharp blade, video shows, can reduce the pain-inducing spray of tiny onion-juice droplets.
- Artificial Intelligence
AI can now write working genetic instruction books from scratch
Two AI models designed these genomes for viruses that kill E. coli bacteria. They’re the first functioning full sets of DNA ever designed by machines.
- Tech
Origami folds let paper support 9,000 times its weight, teen finds
Miles Wu, 14, tested the strength of different ‘Miura-Ori’ origami folds and showed they might be useful in the design of pop-up emergency shelters.
