Marriage equality supporters in 2006 probably had no idea the law they advocated would spur innovation.
Darren McCollester/Getty Images News via Getty Images
Inventors in states with more socially liberal laws on the books end up with more diverse collaborators – and more higher-impact patents.
Duck decoys lure real ducks within range of hunters. Nanoparticles that look like cells serve as both decoys and hunters to ensnare virus particles.
Chuck Holland/Flickr
Nanoparticles dressed up in cell membranes snag SARS-CoV-2 virus particles before they reach human cells.
This Bioculture System will let biologists learn about how space impacts human health by studying cells grown in the microgravity environment of the International Space Station.
NASA/Ames Research Center/Dominic Hart
Why are scientists trying to grow organs at the International Space Station? People live on Earth not in zero-gravity. A stem cell expert explains why it is useful to do these experiments in space.
The only way to learn about the sensory abilities of dolphins is with the help of trained dolphins.
Dolphin Quest
Wild dolphins are fast, smart and hard to study, but it is important to understand how human actions affect their health. So we are building a drone to sample hormones from the blowholes of dolphins.
Remote learning can be used for more than just education at home.
Suzanne Kreiter/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
If a high school doesn’t offer advanced coursework, having students take such a class remotely offers a promising alternative.
It takes a tremendous amount of computing power to simulate all the components and behaviors of viruses and cells.
Copyright: Thomas Splettstoesser scistyle.com
Scanning through billions of chemicals to find a few potential drugs for treating COVID-19 requires computers that harness together thousands of processors.
Wind turbines and solar panels in Southern California.
4kodiak/E+ via Getty Images
Pegor Aynajian, Binghamton University, State University of New York
Generating energy usually means wasted heat. Semiconductors let the electrons flow with zero waste – but so far scientists only know how to get them to work at ultra-low temperatures.
Will robo-umps make the game of baseball better or worse?
AP Photo/Julio Cortez
An antigen test was given emergency use authorization by the FDA in early May. A biochemist explains how COVID-19 antigen tests work.
Artist rendition of the National Western Center, a net-zero campus under construction in Denver to house multiple activities.
City and County of Denver | Mayor’s Office of the National Western Center
Net zero energy buildings produce at least as much energy as they use. Designing whole net zero campuses and communities takes the energy and climate benefits to a higher level.
Mating laser-driven atomic clocks like the one shown here with microwaves promises more accurate electronic devices.
N. Phillips/NIST
Researchers have made some of the most accurate clocks imaginable in recent years, but the trick is harnessing those clocks to electronics. Using lasers to tune microwaves bridges the gap.
What if you could test yourself for coronavirus with a test in the comfort of your home?
John Paraskevas/Newsday RM vis Getty Images
Testing for coronavirus has been a fiasco in the US. But now companies are developing super fast tests, including ones that might eventually be as simple as at home pregnancy tests.
The cockpit has long been the dominion of white men.
Benjamin Ohnona/EyeEm via Getty Images
The scientific community is churning out vast quantities of research about the coronavirus pandemic – far too much for researchers to absorb. An AI system aims to do the heavy lifting for them.
A conceptual schematic of a laser-based method for identifying the coronavirus quickly.
Penn State University
Nevan Krogan, University of California, San Francisco
Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, identified nine existing drugs that show promise to treat COVID-19. The proteins they target haven’t been tried before.
Many items labeled “Made in China” could be made on people’s desktops instead.
kynny/iStock via Getty Images
The rush to make personal protective equipment like facemasks and face shields using 3D printers shows that the technology can help circumvent global supply chain disruptions.
Tiny fuel cells convert sweat to electricity that can power sensors in electronic skin.
Yu et al., Sci. Robot. 5, eaaz7946 (2020)
Lightweight, flexible materials can be used to make health-monitoring wearable devices, but powering the devices is a challenge. Using fuel cells instead of batteries could make the difference.
Professor and Director of Quantitative Biosciences Institute & Senior Investigator at the Gladstone Institutes, University of California, San Francisco