The first detection of gravitational waves in 2016 provided decisive confirmation of Einstein’s general theory of relativity. But another astounding prediction remains unconfirmed: According to general relativity, every gravitational wave should leave an indelible imprint […]
Artificial intelligence sees things we don’t — often to its detriment. While machines have gotten incredibly good at recognizing images, it’s still easy to fool them. Simply add a tiny amount of noise to the […]
Last summer a group of Harvard University neuroscientists and Google engineers released the first wiring diagram of a piece of the human brain. The tissue, about the size of a pinhead, had been preserved, stained […]
To look back in time at the cosmos’s infancy and witness the first stars flicker on, you must first grind a mirror as big as a house. Its surface must be so smooth that, if […]
Quantum computers, enthusiasts forecast, will one day work no end of miracles — from breaking digital encryptions to designing wonder drugs. At this early stage, however, the advantage of many quantum algorithms remains speculative. And […]
As the end of the year approaches, we are nearing the two-year anniversary of the COVID-19 pandemic. Globally, over 5 million have died, and that’s almost certainly an undercount, especially in countries that still lack […]
I met up with Jay Roberts in what had been the parking lot of hell. On that warm morning last September in the heart of Sonoma’s wine country, it was just another dusty stretch of […]
Last month, we presented three puzzles that seemed ordinary enough but contained a numerical twist. Hidden below the surface was the mysterious transcendental number e. Most familiar as the base of natural logarithms, Euler’s number […]
Suppose you are trying to transmit a message. Convert each character into bits, and each bit into a signal. Then send it, over copper or fiber or air. Try as you might to be as […]
An elegant ballet of proteins enables modern cells to replicate themselves. During cell division, structural proteins and enzymes coordinate the duplication of DNA, the division of a cell’s cytoplasmic contents, and the cinching of the […]
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