How western travel influencers got tangled up in Pakistan’s politics

The Curse of the Buried Treasure

The Entire History of the Autopsy

Japan Is Using a Robotic ‘Monster Wolf’ to Scare Bears Away From People’s Houses

This ‘Telewriter’ Transmitted Handwriting Across Long Distances in the 1930s

This Bacterium Survived on The Outside of The Space Station For a Whole Damn Year

Discover the secrets of London’s oldest Roman road

Two-million-year-old skull of human ‘cousin’ unearthed

The Occult History Behind NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

The Plan to Turn Scrapped Rockets Into Space Stations

Radioactive elements may be crucial to the habitability of rocky planets

Charles Darwin’s hunch about early life was probably right

Video: AlphaGo – The first AI to seriously challenge human Go champions [1:30:27]

When Objects Become Extensions of You

Scientists Have Discovered an Ancient Lake Bed Deep Beneath the Greenland Ice

Computer Scientists Achieve ‘Crown Jewel’ of Cryptography

Why Didn’t the Soviets Ever Make It to the Moon?

Microbes Can Mine Valuable Elements From Rocks in Space

Video: How Large Can a Bacteria get? [11:04]

Pigeon message found over a century after sent by German soldier

In Russia’s far north, legends and lives are frozen in time

Investigating an ancient mystery: What really happened during Nero’s Great Fire of Rome?

Radio telescope detects a super-planet for the first time

Behind Pfizer’s vaccine, an understated husband-and-wife “dream team”

Inside the Secret Math Society Known as Nicolas Bourbaki

The Greatest Army Cover-Up of WWII Was a Marvel of Engineering

One of Jupiter’s icy moons may glow in the dark

Did the Great Wall of China Actually Keep Invaders Out?

Chris Nikic becomes first person with Down’s syndrome to finish an Ironman triathlon

The Genome of Your Pet Fish Is Extremely Weird

What if Earth shared its orbit with another planet?

On vaccines, evolution, and more, rejection of science has followed a familiar pattern

What Makes Sand Soft?

New curio by Alan Bellows: The Unknown Father

A Second Cable Fails at NSF’s Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico

Covid-19 vaccine candidate is 90% effective, says Pfizer

On this day in ’73, workers removed the remains of an extraordinary tree: The Lonely Tree of Ténéré

‘It was crazy,’ says California kayaker who was engulfed in a whale’s mouth

Meet an Intrepid Texan Who Spends Winters at the South Pole

On this day in 1939 a German handyman (and/or time traveller) almost succeeded in assassinating Hitler

A game letting players undermine democracy can reduce users’ susceptibility to political misinformation

Alex Trebek, Longtime Host of ‘Jeopardy!,’ Dies at 80

Wombats’ deadly bums: how they use their ‘skull-crushing’ rumps to fight, play and flirt

The asteroid NASA landed on is hollow and spinning itself to death

Honour among thieves: the study of a cybercrime marketplace in action

Some Surgeries Are Performed Millions of Times Per Year Even Though They Are No Better Than Placebo

The foul-smelling fuel that could power big ships

Why Consumers Think Pretty Food Is Healthier

London’s First Police Force Was Established by Novelist Henry Fielding and His Brother

Human Intelligence Just Got Less Mysterious

Human recombinant soluble ACE2 (hrsACE2) shows promise for treating severe COVID­19

In this Damn Interesting Week: Two-headed snakes, eight-legged mating rituals, 26-second planetary pulsations, zero-degree allergies

This ancient big-game hunter was a woman

Decoding Cuneiform, One of the Earliest Forms of Writing

Brain study brings us closer to understanding why music moves us

The History of the Gatling Gun

The Desperate Quest for American Cinnamon

What It Takes to Dismantle and Move a 40-Foot Whale Skeleton

The mystery of feather origins: how fluffy pterosaurs have reignited debate

The History of Poop Is Really the History of Technology