Innovation

Do people born on the 13th of a month have a lifetime of bad luck? Researchers examined whether an "unlucky" birthdate could impact employment, earnings and marriage.

By Laurie L. Dove

Researchers have discovered a way to trigger and control a visual hallucination without drugs, illness or direct brain stimulation.

By Jesslyn Shields

Paper airplanes are much more than child's play.

By Laurie L. Dove

Researchers develop a gadget that lets winemakers hasten the fermentation process, experiment more.

By Kathryn Whitbourne

In 1915, the great physicist predicted the existence of ripples in space-time called gravitational waves. A century later, scientists finally have detected them on Earth.

By Patrick J. Kiger

The Stanford Prison Experiment is one of the most well-known psychological studies, infamous for the participants' cruel behavior. But the whole story of the study is much more complex.

By Ed Grabianowski

After surveying thousands of published genetics papers, researchers found nearly one-fifth had errors caused by Microsoft Excel in their supplementary files. Uh-oh.

By Jonathan Strickland

Ever wonder what's happening as your hair changes color? Permanent hair dyes physically and chemically change each hair, whether it's mermaid blue or bleach blonde.

By Laurie L. Dove

Hedy Lamarr's twin passions were acting and inventing. During World War II, she came up with a secret communication system that paved the way for technology like WiFi and GPS. But for decades, people thought this was an urban legend.

By Michelle Konstantinovsky

If you're a gamer, you've got Jerry Lawson to thank for inventing the first commercial home video game console with interchangeable game cartridges.

By Tara Yarlagadda

This is one 'supermaterial' that might actually live up to its hype. So what is graphene really, and why is it so versatile?

By Dave Roos & Austin Henderson

In her legendary 60-year career, Jane Goodall has made being an intrepid scientist, environmentalist, writer and teacher look easy.

By Jesslyn Shields

Salt is something most of us use without thinking about it. But with so many options available, how do we know what's best?

By Shaun Chavis

You've seen them. Those iconic, mesmerizing liquid sculptures that dance inside a glass bottle, casting a warm and nostalgic glow. Yes, we're talking about the lava lamp. But, how do lava lamps work?

By HowStuffWorks.com Contributors & Austin Henderson

Algae represents big money to some investors and could provide protein to help solve the problem of world hunger.

By Stell Simonton

Nothing quite thrills like seeing fireworks light up the night sky. A lot of design and planning goes into creating the awe-inspiring shapes we've come to love.

By Karen Kirkpatrick

Many people consider caviar, unfertilized sturgeon eggs, to be a delicious delicacy. But how exactly is this luxury harvested, and what is the proper way to eat it?

By Laurie L. Dove & Austin Henderson

Gravity dictates the structure of the universe, from the way cosmic bodies form to the way they orbit more massive planets or stars. Has it always played such a starring role in our cosmic history?

By Robert Lamb

Gravity is great, but if we could figure out how to selectively reduce its effects, we could cut the energy demands of travel and transportation. Don't cheaper airline tickets sound pretty good?

By Robert Lamb

The pollution produced by cars, trucks and factories can be recycled as ink, cleaning the air of dangerous particulate matter and turning it into a useful product.

By Jim Marion

Galton was a pioneer in meteorology, psychology, statistics, biometrics, forensics and anthropology. But all of that is overshadowed by his promotion of and work on eugenics.

By Dave Roos

The trend toward tiny houses and rabid clutter clearing have combined to lead more than a few people away from the traditional home and into shipping container life.

By Carrie Whitney, Ph.D.

From Isaac Newton to Ivan Pavlov, scientists have developed and tested hypotheses through carefully crafted experiments for centuries. Here are three groundbreaking hypotheses and the predictions they tested.

By Mark Mancini

A drone with some petri dishes attached is making research much less stressful for whales and scientists alike.

By Jesslyn Shields

They're instantly recognizable - mostly for their color. We're talking about yellow legal pads. So who decided they'd be yellow, anyway?

By Meg Sparwath