Distillations

The downside of using genetic genealogy to fight crime.

Seventy years ago, a group of stubborn Philadelphia scientists and a brave 18-year-old pushed surgery to its final frontier.

Episode 4 from the ‘Innate: How Science Invented the Myth of Race’ series.

Dow’s gamble on magnesium helped push the boundaries of human exploration and launched an ocean of consumer products.

A reclusive expert of 19th-century photography laid the foundation for green chemistry solutions emerging today.

How a feisty, suicidal Nobel laureate infuriated both Hitler and Stalin, and stalled cancer research for 50 years along the way.

The world’s first plastic made Hollywood possible—and killed thousands of people along the way.

Forensic science can be a powerful crime-fighting tool, but misdeeds, dubious methodologies, and bogus claims threaten its reputation—and the reputation of science as a whole.

Gore-Tex changed the way Americans spend time outdoors.

Despite a lack of evidence, many have been captivated by the electrical whiz’s most mysterious project.

Institute fellow, science historian, and author Lisa Ruth Rand talks about all the debris floating around in outer space.

When Latin America challenged a new era of colonization.

How a radio pioneer transformed life at sea.

 The rise, fall, and resurrection of the humble leech.

What happens when an earth-shattering discovery runs up against the scientifically impossible?

Dreams of turning a wax cylinder into a “talking book.”

In the 1960s RCA created the world’s first liquid-crystal displays. How did the company fail to cash in on one of the modern world’s most ubiquitous technologies?

New forensics techniques are allowing researchers to solve historical mysteries based on the small traces we leave on everyday objects.

In commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, the Science History Institute Book Club reads two histories of the space race: T-Minus by Jim Ottaviani and Shoot for the Moon by James Donovan.

Better photosynthesis, bomb-sniffing spinach, and that’s just the start of the ways plants are inspiring scientific innovation.

Around the world a network of detectives searches for evidence of illicit nuclear activity. Is it enough to keep us safe from a nuclear catastrophe?

Lice can tell us a lot about who we are and where we came from.

A tiny animal with a big story.  

Old films are fragile, flammable, and frequently lost.

This episode highlights a 17th-century edition of Johannes de Sacrobosco’s astronomy textbook, De sphaera mundi (On the Sphere of the World), complete with interactive diagrams.

This episode highlights an object from the 19th century that was a precursor to the View-Master and virtual reality: the stereoscope.

A long-running genetics project in Siberia helps us understand how we made man’s best friend.

A misunderstanding of hippo physiology gave rise to one of the most widespread and pointless practices in medical history.

An early cervicouterine device—aka a pessary—that was a precursor to the IUD.

The disputed origin story of one of the 20th century’s most important inventions.

The rise of synthetic fibers and the war on cotton.

Can artificial intelligence help us decipher smell?

Many tragic accidents have provided unexpectedly valuable information for scientists.

An animation drawn from a podcast episode titled “Is Space the Place?: Trying to Save Humanity by Mining Asteroids.”

GMOs are one of the great success stories of the postwar era. So why do many find this technology so distasteful?

In the 1950s, a devious oil company created a television show to flatter industrialists and win their business.

How biohackers are using artificial perceptions to enhance reality.

Dissatisfied with the limitations of the human body, some people are modifying themselves with electronic compasses and magnetic implants. But are they adding anything that the average smartphone can’t already do?

A novel swimsuit reveals that faster isn’t necessarily better.

The unexpected origin of the sports bra.

Data overload is nothing new. How have people in the past managed their versions of big data?

Resurrecting radium’s role in early genetics research.

Does history explain why today’s smart machines can seem so dumb?

Some of the most indestructible menswear ever made.

Science’s centuries-long hunt for a common language.

Take a peek behind the scenes at Dogfish Head, a brewery in Milton, Delaware, to see how they make their signature brews and their “ancient ales.”

The Cold War is long gone, as are our fears of global nuclear annihilation. But many nuclear weapons remain. Daniel Gross looks at what happens when some weapons can’t be retired.

Society has long had strict ideas about sex and gender binaries, but even nature doesn’t always comply.

The arrival of electric light.

Before today’s cell-phone, laptop, and TV screens, there was a whiskey advertisement.

The spectacles of Sophie Blanchard and the scientific missions of James Glaisher.

A tour through the history of radioisotopes, used to study and treat disease and to unlock the secrets of DNA and photosynthesis.

Studying ancient DNA (aDNA) is a lot like playing Whac-A-Mole: stamp out one problem and another will pop up and take its place.

Winter’s coming, so wrap up and discover the history of home insulation.

Phil Allegretti’s collection of old DDT cans, sprayers, and diffusers tells the story of our contradictory approach to pesticides.

Can scientists bring the woolly mammoth back from extinction? And should they?

Sometimes scientific discovery requires an unusual tool.

Whale oil has been used as an ingredient in soap, explosives, and even margarine. Has it also been a vital ingredient in space exploration?

Phosphorus helps power cells and forms the backbone of DNA. It’s also a vital ingredient in fertilizer, and one that may run short in the not-too-distant future.

The early 20th century was a rich time for creating new ways to process food.

In the 1950s hearing aids shrank from the size of a cigarette packet to the size of a lighter. The secret behind this shrinkage? The mighty transistor.

Coal fueled the cities of the Industrial Revolution. But coal did far more than power steam engines and heat homes.

What happened before humans could produce fertilizer from the air itself, courtesy of the Haber-Bosch process?

Meet J. J. Thomson, who disproved Einstein’s dictum that the man “who has not made his great contribution to science before the age of thirty will never do so.”

In 1905, in France, chemist Jacques Brandenberger spilled wine on a tablecloth and wished for a material that could be wiped clean with a wet cloth.

Joseph E. Snodgrass’s poetry memorably reflected the public faith in bloodletting as medical treatment.

Vanadium was a rare metal, but for 100 years after its first discovery in 1801 no one cared—until a chemist discovered it strengthened steel.

Electricity and Enlightenment go together like Benjamin Franklin and 100-dollar bills.

One mother’s dogged search for the cause of her two healthy babies’ mental decline led to the discovery of a new disease, the first preventative screening program for a genetic condition, and the first medical food in the United States.

By 1790 chemistry was the up-and-coming science. The products of chemistry—industrially useful salts, acids, and alkalis—would soon be measured not by the ounce (or the gram) but by the ton.

When the EPA needed a way to identify and measure pollutants, Robert Finnigan, an ex–Cold War engineer, offered his computerized mass spectrometer for the job.

Faced with the prospect of a world without oil, French engineer Eugene Jules Houdry turned low-grade coal into gasoline.

A natural plastic found in tree sap allowed the expansion of the 19th century’s global communications network.

In the 19th century a young Italian outside the chemistry mainstream played a part in the creation of the first periodic table.

A legislator, a showman, and an inventor together created the first practical way to catch the world and the people in it in the strange and beautiful chemistry of the photograph.

A1828 murder trial provides insight into the moral ambiguity of forensic science and scientific testimony.

Cellophane celebrates its 100th anniversary with a comeback, after losing out to cheaper imitations in the 1970s.

Through experiments and the application of new technologies, scientists at UC Davis are working to determine the molecular makeup of a good glass of vino.

Dalton proposed his atomic theory in 1808; another century passed before the theory was universally accepted by scientists.

Putting chemistry back into the standard history would force us to change many of the historical arguments that shape our account of an extraordinary century.

In 1788 Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier and Jacques-Louis David were introduced during a sitting for the illustrious scientist’s portrait.

Now ubiquitous and vital to modern life, aluminum was once more expensive than gold, locked away in its ore without a commercially viable method to release it.

The rise of the digital age depended on integrated circuits made with new materials and techniques that could both increase performance and drive down cost.

Mendeleev’s greatest achievement was not the periodic table so much as the recognition of the periodic system on which it was based.