What We're Reading

The oceans teem with photosynthesizing bacteria, tiny-tailed dinoflagellates gobbling other plankton, algae surrounded by intricate glass skeletons. In the 1960s, the ecologist G. Evelyn Hutchinson pointed out something confusing: why do so many kinds of plankton exist?

Penn physicist Randall Kamien, visiting scholar Lauren Niu, and collaborator Geneviève Dion of Drexel bring unprecedented levels of predictability to the ancient practice of knitting by developing a mathematical model that could be used to create a new class of lightweight, ultra-strong materials.

Princeton geoscientists Xinning Zhang and Ashley Maloney have discovered that a geology technique shows promise in detecting cancer-like cells. If their preliminary results bear out, they may have identified a new signature for cancer, which could mean earlier diagnosis and better outcomes.

Renowned cosmologist David Spergel joins Brian Greene to discuss the triumphs and tensions of precision cosmology, exploring remarkable successes as well as persistent discrepancies bedeviling current understanding.

Like Bill Murray in the movie “Groundhog Day,” bacteria species in a Wisconsin lake are in a kind of endless loop that they can’t seem to shake. Except in this case, it’s more like Groundhog Year.

There is no one factor that causes autism — or explains its growing prevalence. Researchers are seeking explanations for the surge. Here are some possibilities.

For the first time, researchers have observed a type of quasiparticle that behaves in an unusual way. In one direction, it acts like it has no mass, zipping around as if it were made of pure energy.

Distant, ancient galaxies are giving scientists more hints that a mysterious force called dark energy may not be what they thought.

Elias Most, an assistant professor of theoretical astrophysics, did not want to be an astronomer or a physicist when he grew up. He studied physics but was more interested in computers; he even remembers buying a book about nonscience career paths for physicists, thinking he might end up in finance.

Main-sequence stars with brighter than expected mid-infrared emission can signal the presence of a debris disk, rubble from planetary collisions, or even a theorized sign of a technologically advanced civilization. New research demonstrates a data-driven method to identify mid-infrared excesses in main-sequence stars.