Innovation
Do you know how common everyday items, such as mirrors, fireworks or sunglasses work? This collection of Innovation articles explores the workings of objects you may come into contact with on a regular basis.
Jerry Lawson Forever Changed the Video Game Industry
Eugenics Overshadows the Legacy of Scientific Genius Francis Galton
Jane Goodall: A Global Face for Global Peace
How That Creamy Chocolate Is Made
Barrels and Barrels of Aged Beer
HowStuffWorks: Candyland Comes Alive at Candytopia!
8 Everyday Items Originally Invented for People With Disabilities
How High-tech Fabrics Cool You Down When You Heat Up
Why Are Legal Pads Yellow?
Who Invented the Light Bulb? It Wasn't Just Edison
Meet the Man Who Invented Cool Whip, Tang and Pop Rocks
Louis Pasteur's 19th-century Medical Discoveries Are Still Saving Lives
Butterflies Inspire Creation of Lightest Paint in the World
Video Software System Syncs Lips to Other Languages
How Morse Code Works and Still Lives On in the Digital Age
How WISE Works
5 Green NASA Inventions
5 Strange Items Developed from NASA Technology
Graphene: 200 Times Stronger Than Steel, 1,000 Times Lighter Than Paper
New Liquid Magnets Go Places Solid Magnets Can't
Turning Air Pollution Into Ink
The Ultimate Downsize: Living in a Shipping Container Home
McDonald's French Fry Oil Anti-Frothing Agent May Cure Baldness
10 New Uses for Old Inventions
Would Sonic the Hedgehog Be Able to Survive His Own Speed?
Database of 18,000 Retracted Scientific Papers Now Online
How Long Can a Person Safely Hang Upside Down?
Lasers Shed Light on Why You Need to Close the Lid Before You Flush
The 'SnotBot' Drone Is Making Scientific Research Easier on Whales
Three Famous Hypotheses and How They Were Tested
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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
Humans routinely break the sound barrier in supersonic aircraft. Could everyone's favorite hedgehog do it, too?
By Robert Lamb
The blog Retraction Watch released an online database of more than 18,000 papers and conference materials that have been retracted since the 1970s.
By Oisin Curran
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Algae represents big money to some investors and could provide protein to help solve the problem of world hunger.
Robots are starting to show up in the restaurant industry, but their developers say they're designed to work alongside human workers, not replace them.
A Rube Goldberg machine is intentionally designed to perform a simple task in the most indirect and circuitous fashion possible. Meet the funny man behind these one-of-a-kind contraptions.
A startup in California is touting the anti-aging effects of transfusing teenagers' blood on older people.
By Diana Brown
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Dimethylpolysiloxane has many uses, not the least of which might be curing baldness.
We might not be able to reanimate a corpse, but Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein' has influenced the research and ethics of scientists for 200 years.
Although spending time upside down can be good for overall health, doing so eventually can be fatal under the right conditions.
HowStuffWorks explains the secrets of static electricity.
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Neanderthals distilled tar more than 100,000 years before modern humans created glue; archaeologists compared three potential ways this ancient tech was used.
It's almost like making food out of air.
In this week's roundup of HowStuffWorks podcasts and articles, a neurological disorder causes an addiction to joking, and slug mucus inspires surprisingly strong glue for biological tissues.
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.
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Food spoilage is an urgent issue for the millions of people with unreliable electricity — or no electricity at all. A supercool $35 fridge could change that common scenario.
With antimicrobial resistance a worldwide threat, researchers develop a new antibacterial dressing using the shells of crustaceans.
By Alia Hoyt
According to a new study, whole-body vibration has muscle and bone health benefits for mice.
The set of pioneering real-life scientists beat out other fan proposals including "Voltron," "Star Wars" and "Spaceballs" characters.
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President Donald Trump has proposed cutting the agency's Earth science budget. But doing so could negatively impact construction, farming and infrastructure projects.
Around the world, in study after study, one color and one number always emerge as faves. Can you guess what they are?
Critics worry that journals with lax standards are lowering the reliability of scientific literature — and exploiting the inexperience of young researchers.
Researchers have discovered a way to trigger and control a visual hallucination without drugs, illness or direct brain stimulation.
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The app aims to make the school cafeteria a kinder and more welcoming place for all students. But will it work?
Paper airplanes are much more than child's play.