Scientific American

Graphic shows a National Hurricane Center map of Hurricane Milton overlaid with fifteen colorized lines highlighting possible storm paths, with line thickness indicating relative likelihood of the different paths.

WeatherAugust 21, 2025

How to Decode a Hurricane Forecast

Hurricane forecasts feature a “cone of uncertainty,” but what is it actually showing? Scientific American breaks it down for you

Andrea Thompson

a sign displaying that measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccines are available at the the lubbock public health facility

Public HealthAugust 21, 2025

Texas’s Measles Outbreak Is Over, but the Disease Is Still a Threat

Lauren J. Young

Illustration of silhouette portraits of scientists

CosmologyAugust 19, 2025

The Universe Is Static. No, Expanding! Wait, Slowing? Oh, Accelerating

Richard Panek

Creative polygonal brain on virtual screen

Artificial IntelligenceAugust 21, 2025

Can Writing Math Proofs Teach AI to Reason Like Humans?

Deni Ellis Béchard

GamesAugust 21, 2025

Spellements: Thursday, August 21, 2025

Emma R. Hasson

An artist's concept of a Majorana quasiparticle, a theoretical entity that can pair with an antimatter version of itself in a manner that could be very useful for quantum computing.

Quantum ComputingAugust 21, 2025

Controversial Quantum-Computing Paper Gets a Hefty Correction

Dan Garisto, Nature magazine

Blue water seen through a hurricane eye surrounded by swirling white cloud bands

WeatherAugust 21, 2025

Hurricane Science Has a Lot of Jargon—Here’s What It All Means

Meghan Bartels

A mosquito biting a human

EpidemiologyAugust 20, 2025

Second U.S. Malaria Case Not Tied to Travel Raises Fears of Local Transmission

Stephanie Pappas

An artist's impression of multiple small devices soaring on sunlight at the edges of Earth's atmosphere

Planetary ScienceAugust 20, 2025

These Tiny Disks Will Sail on Sunlight into Earth’s Mysterious ‘Ignorosphere’

Payal Dhar

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Celebrating 180 Years of Scientific American

Various Covers from Scientific American

Neurotic Cats, One-Eyed Aliens and Hypnosis for Liars Are among the Historical Gems Reported in Scientific American

Mark Fischetti

A full-disk image of Neptune, featuring the bluish planet's dark spot and bright cloud bands.

The UniverseAugust 15, 2025

One Year after Scientific American’s First Issue, the Solar System Grew by a Planet

Phil Plait

Cover of the September 2025 issue of Scientific American against a gray backgroud

CultureAugust 19, 2025

180 Years of Standing Up for Science

David M. Ewalt

An illustrated robotic hand gently releases a jigsaw puzzle piece

GamingJuly 30, 2025

Jigsaws: SciAm Cover Art

Sarah Lewin Frasier

A robotic hand holds out an abacus-like word game in this illustration

GamingAugust 11, 2025

Wordology: Terms from the Archive

Sarah Lewin Frasier

Explore Collection

September 2025 Issue

Pile of peanuts

Public Health

Can Peanut Allergies Be Cured?

Maryn McKenna

Illustration of people walking on Mobius Strip

History of Science

What Happens When an Entire Generation of Scientists Changes Its Mind

Charles C. Mann

Illustration of two people shaking hands with regenerated nerves

Neuroscience

How Scientists Finally Learned That Nerves Regrow

Diana Kwon

Illustration of a large water bottle with an ocean in it

Sustainability

Plastics Started as a Sustainability Solution. What Went Wrong?

Jen Schwartz

Illustration of silhouette portraits of scientists

Cosmology

The Universe Is Static. No, Expanding! Wait, Slowing? Oh, Accelerating

Richard Panek

Illustration of purple and yellow DNA and RNA strands

Biology

How RNA Unseated DNA as the Most Important Molecule in Your Body

Philip Ball

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Games

A robot hand reaches toward bubbles with letters in them

Spellements

Create as many words as you can!

Illustration of a hand and multiple numbers against a purple background.

Math Puzzles

Stretch your math muscles with these puzzles.

A robot hand unleashes a swirl of puzzle pieces, crosswords, and circles with numbers and letters

All Games

Science inspired games, puzzles and quizzes

Special Edition

Imagined illustration of atomic nuclei

Particle Physics

The Secret to the Strongest Force in the Universe

Stanley J. Brodsky, Alexandre Deur, Craig D. Roberts

Quantum computer shown against a black backdrop.

Mathematics

Tomorrow’s Quantum Computers Threaten Today’s Secrets. Here’s How to Protect Them

Kelsey Houston-Edwards

Purple and pink materials being conducted by electricity

Quantum Physics

Quantum Weirdness in New Materials Bends the Rules of Physics

Douglas Natelson

Chien-Shiung Wu in laboratory setting working on equipment.

Quantum Physics

The Little-Known Origin Story behind the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics

Michelle Frank

The inside of a hexagon-shaped ultrahigh vacuum chamber.

Particle Physics

Physicists Make Matter out of Light to Find Quantum Singularities

Charles D. Brown II

Illustration of two spheres nearly touching, with a bright yellow light near where they touch.

Particle Physics

Why Aren’t We Made of Antimatter?

Luke Caldwell

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Podcasts

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August 20, 2025

What Can Nature Teach Us about Sex and Gender?

Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Alex Sugiura

Natural DisastersAugust 18, 2025

Chikungunya Outbreak, Glacial Outbursts and a New Human Ancestor

Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Alex Sugiura

ArchaeologyAugust 15, 2025

Sam Kean’s New Book Dinner with King Tut Explores the Wild World of Experimental Archaeology

Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Alex Sugiura

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ReproductionAugust 13, 2025

This Hormone-Free Pill Could Finally Expand Birth Control Options for Men

Rachel Feltman, Hannah Seo, Fonda Mwangi, Alex Sugiura

An artist's depiction of a free roaming rogue planet

Space & PhysicsAugust 11, 2025

Rogue Worlds May Not Be So Lonely After All, Europa Clipper Completes Key Test, and RFK, Jr., Pulls $500 Million in mRNA Vaccine Funding

Rachel Feltman, Fonda Mwangi, Alex Sugiura, Jeffery DelViscio

Popular Stories

Illustration of people walking on Mobius Strip

History of ScienceAugust 19, 2025

What Happens When an Entire Generation of Scientists Changes Its Mind

Total reversals in scientific thinking are rare—but earth-shattering

Charles C. Mann

Illustration of silhouette portraits of scientists

CosmologyAugust 19, 2025

The Universe Is Static. No, Expanding! Wait, Slowing? Oh, Accelerating

The universe has a habit of disproving “unassailable” facts

Richard Panek

Eastern Cottontail rabbit, with the papilloma virus growths protruding from its head

AnimalsAugust 14, 2025

Here’s Why Rabbits Are Sprouting Tentacle Horns

Rabbits spotted with hornlike growths on their face in northern Colorado are doing better than they look

Stephanie Pappas

Illustration of a person sleeping and having their thought cleaned

NeuroscienceAugust 19, 2025

How Your Brain’s Nightly Cleanse Keeps It Healthy

Washing waste from the brain is an essential function of sleep—and it could help ward off dementia

Lydia Denworth

3D illustration of 2 cubes, one made from numbers and the other mathematical symbols

MathematicsAugust 20, 2025

Math Breakthroughs from Behind Bars

People in prisons and jails have contributed to some of the greatest ideas in mathematics

Manon Bischoff

Uranus with bright polar cap, rings, and moons

Planetary ScienceAugust 19, 2025

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope Discovers New Moon of Uranus

Using the powerful James Webb Space Telescope, scientists have spotted a moon nestled near Uranus’s rings that’s so small you could walk around it

Andrea Tamayo

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