This video is part of our Brilliant Breakthroughs series: our new 20-episode mini-series exploring the “Eureka!” moments and proud accomplishments of the greatest scientific minds of our time. Join us …

Thirty-five years ago string theory took physics by storm, promising the coveted unified theory of nature’s forces that Einstein valiantly sought but never found. In the intervening decades, string theory …

Does your dog really think and feel like a human? Do our closest primate relatives have brains and emotions similar to ours? What about the storied intelligence of dolphins and singing humpback whales? And do other species hold surprises for us if we’re willing to look closely?

The powerful James Webb Space Telescope–the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope–promises insight into profound questions that have dogged philosophers and astronomers for millennia. What is the origin of the …

Looking millions of light-years into deep space requires a special kind of glass telescope. Prior to the 1980s telescopes were limited in size and too heavy to follow the motion …

What are scientists looking for when searching for alien life? A lot, it turns out: the search for extraterrestrials requires the help from astronomers, planetary scientists, chemists, computer scientists, and geneticists, just to name a few. But are we barking up the wrong carbon-based tree?