Four centuries ago, Johannes Kepler established three laws of planetary motion that accurately describe how planets in the solar system orbit the Sun. That might be enough for most; however, befitting ...

We’ve now seen farther, deeper and more clearly into space than ever before. A stellar birthplace, a nebula surrounding a dying star, a group of closely interacting galaxies, the first spectrum of an ...

A century ago, people needed help to understand science. Much as they do today. Then as now, it wasn’t always easy to sort the accurate from the erroneous. Mainstream media, then as now, regarded ...

From “experimental archaeology” to the mysterious appeal of exploration, the wide-ranging subjects detailed in these titles captivated Smithsonian magazine’s science contributors this year Joe Spring, ...