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Mondrian Meets Euclid: An Eccentric Victorian Mathematician’s Masterwork of Art and Science

Mondrian Meets Euclid: An Eccentric Victorian Mathematician’s Masterwork of Art and Science

Primary colors, geometry, and graphic design before there was graphic design.

The Catalogue That Made Metrics, and Changed Science

The Catalogue That Made Metrics, and Changed Science

As new ways emerge to assess research, Alex Csiszar recalls how the first one transformed the practice and place of science in society.

How Science Transformed the World in 100 Years

How Science Transformed the World in 100 Years

We need to be more concerned than ever about how society uses scientific discoveries, says Venki Ramakrishnan, President of the Royal Society UK.

The Readability of Scientific Texts Is Decreasing Over Time

The Readability of Scientific Texts Is Decreasing Over Time

Scientific abstracts have become less readable over the past 130 years, in part because recent texts include more general scientific jargon than older texts.

How a Polymath Transformed Our Understanding of Information

How a Polymath Transformed Our Understanding of Information

It took a polymath to pin down the true nature of ‘information’. His answer was both a revelation and a return.

A Nobel Doesn't Make You an Expert

A Nobel Doesn't Make You an Expert

In an excerpt from her book "Making Sense of Science," Cornelia Dean of The New York Times shares hard-won insights in teasing out substance from hype.

Collection of Letters by Codebreaker Alan Turing Found in Filing Cabinet

Collection of Letters by Codebreaker Alan Turing Found in Filing Cabinet

The correspondence, dating from 1949 to 1954, was found by an academic in a storeroom at the University of Manchester.

Einstein’s Little-Known Passion Project? A Refrigerator

Einstein’s Little-Known Passion Project? A Refrigerator

Humanity might have saved itself a lot of trouble in the long run by investing in the Einstein-Szilard approach to cooling water with fire.

'Tired of medals': new letters reveal how Alfred Russel Wallace shunned Darwin's fame

'Tired of medals': new letters reveal how Alfred Russel Wallace shunned Darwin's fame

From declining royal honour to refusing to sit for a portrait, correspondences show co-discoverer of evolutionary theory avoiding publicity.

The Man Who Knew Too Much

The Man Who Knew Too Much

His nuclear research helped a judge determine that former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko had been assassinated – likely on Putin’s orders.

How Pasteur’s Artistic Insight Changed Chemistry

How Pasteur’s Artistic Insight Changed Chemistry

Louis Pasteur was a scientific giant of the nineteenth century, but, as Joseph Gal asks, was his most famouscontribution to the understanding of chemistry — chirality — influenced more by his artistic talents?