NASA's About to Try Grabbing a Chunk of Asteroid to Bring to Earth—and You Can Watch . If you’ve seen the movie The Martian, you no doubt remember the rescue scene, in which (spoiler alert!) Matt Damon launches himself off Mars in a stripped-down rocket i

Scientists Found a New Way to Control the Brain With Light—No Surgery Required . If I had to place money on a neurotech that will win the Nobel Prize, it’s optogenetics. The technology uses light of different frequencies to control the brain. It’s a bri

The US Is Trying to Hijack Space Mining, and There Could Be Disastrous Consequences . Exploiting the resources of outer space might be key to the future expansion of the human species. But researchers argue that the US is trying to skew the game in its fa

Watch a Jet Suit Pilot Glide Up a Mountain in a Test for Wilderness Paramedics . A few years ago, I saw a guy in a jet suit take off in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. The roar was deafening, the smell of fuel overwhelming. Over the span of a few minute

A New Factory in France Will Mass-Produce Bugs as Food . Though the world’s population is no longer predicted to grow as much as we thought by the end of this century, there are still going to be a lot more people on Earth in 30, 50, and 80 years than the

2020 Nobel Prize in Physics Awarded for Work on Black Holes—an Astrophysicist Explains the Trailblazing Discoveries . Black holes are perhaps the most mysterious objects in nature. They warp space and time in extreme ways and contain a mathematical imposs

How Machine Learning Made Hops-Free Hoppy Beer (and Other SynBio Wonders) Possible . Synthetic biology is like a reality-altering version of Minecraft. Rather than digital blocks, synthetic biology rejiggers the basic building blocks of life—DNA, proteins

New Reactor Design Could Produce First Ever Energy-Positive Fusion Reaction . Nuclear fusion has gone from a scientists’ pipe dream to a technology attracting serious investment. Now one of the startups chasing this holy grail of energy production has pub

The Far Side of the Moon Is an Ideal Place to Listen For Alien Civilizations . Are we alone in the universe? It’s a question whose answer—whether it’s yes or no—would philosophically and scientifically rock our world to the core. To find out, scientists

These Robotic Virtual Reality Boots Make It Feel Like You're Walking While You Stay in Place . Last year I did a VR experience meant to simulate what it’s like to be at the US-Mexico border wall. The tall, foreboding wall towered above me, and as I turned