Distillations magazine

Scientists are known to be dedicated to accuracy. But sometimes, as in the case of Francesco Redi, a sense of humor can lead one astray.

Did alchemists disappear from history, or did they just change their coats?

Following World War II, President Dwight Eisenhower attempted a risky balancing act between war and peace, secrecy and transparency.

More than 350 years ago the very first air pump changed how science was done.

What connects a founder of the Western model of university education to the secrets of women?

How did the launch of Sputnik I in 1957 change the lives of two Americans?

Death Salon founder Megan Rosenbloom tells us what a good death means to her.

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

Pity butter’s poor relative, margarine, which has shifted from outlaw to savior to villain in the space of 100 years.

In Renaissance maps geography becomes an art form.

Katharine Burr Blodgett was the first female scientist hired by General Electric. Her work was truly invisible, deliberately so.

Sometimes scientific discovery requires an unusual tool.

The rise of synthetic color and the scientists and designers who tried to save society from itself.

Fancy some alchemical recipes from 15th-century Italy?

The man who wanted to make the United States a healthier place and the sometimes fuzzy line between science and quackery.

How hard can it be to make a gemstone? Plenty hard. People have been trying for almost 2,000 years, but success finally beckoned in 19th-century France.

For decades serious people have tried to turn the stuff of science fiction—space colonies, self-replicating machines, and solar sails—into scientific reality.

A Confederate doctor had no problem breaking the Hippocratic oath.