Space
Did the Universe Boot Up with a “Big Bounce?”
The cosmos may have rebounded from an earlier contraction and “big crunch” into a “big bang” that started it all over again
Stories by Clara Moskowitz
Space
Doomed Spacecraft Shows Tantalizing Hints of Surprising Black Hole Behavior [Video]
Before it died barely a month after launch, the Hitomi spacecraft spied interesting effects of black holes on the Perseus cluster of galaxies
Space
Gravitational Wave Observatory Finds More Colliding Black Holes
The second confirmation of ripples in spacetime is announced by astronomers at LIGO
Physics
Gravitational Wave Scientists Astounded--by Your Interest
Caltech’s Kip Thorne and Ronald Drever and MIT’s Rainer Weiss were the founders of the LIGO experiment that detected gravitational waves. They were just awarded the Kavli Prize in Astrophysics and two of them spoke with Scientific American 's Clara Moskowitz about LIGO and the public's reaction...
Physics
How Mistakes Help Science [Video]
Astrophysicist Mario Livio will discuss how famous thinkers’ blunders have played a vital role in research during a live Webcast tonight at 7 P.M.
Arts & Culture
Essays Celebrate the Centennial of America's National Parks
New Books for May 2016
Physics
Wanted: Gravitational Constant's True Value
Scientists from numerous disciplines will brainstorm new strategies for measuring "Big G" in July.
Strange Supernovae are Driven by Magnetic Fields [Video]
Three animations model how strongly magnetized stars produce oddball stellar explosions
Space
Hunt for Big Bang Gravitational Waves Gets $40-Million Boost
The nonprofit Simons Foundation will fund a new observatory to search for signs of stretching in the very early universe
Physics
Godless Universe: A Physicist Searches for Meaning in Nature
The natural world is the only world, theoretical physicist Sean Carroll argues in a new book
Arts & Culture
A Visionary Mathematician Comes to the Silver Screen
Film and book reviews from Scientific American’s May 2016 issue
Physics
Shape-Shifting Particles: Mysterious Neutrinos [Video]
Nobel physics laureate Arthur McDonald will discuss the surprising characteristics of neutrinos, which can change their identities as they fly through the universe
Space
Cosmic Speed Measurement Suggests Dark Energy Mystery
A new measurement of how fast space is expanding disagrees with estimates based on the early universe, potentially pointing toward a break from the standard model of physics
Physics
Are We Living in a Computer Simulation?
High-profile physicists and philosophers gathered to debate whether we are real or virtual—and what it means either way
Physics
Physics Fiction: Quantum Shorts 2015 Winner
Scientific American partnered on a writing contest for science fiction short stories inspired by the realm of quantum physics
Space
Twin Birth Proposed for Colliding Black Holes That Produced Gravitational Waves
A flash of light shortly after the detection of gravitational waves could mean that that historic event has an added wrinkle—the black holes that collided may have been born in the same collapsing massive star. ...
Space
Book Review: The Right Kind of Crazy
Recommendations from Scientific American
Physics
New Tetraquark Particle Sparks Doubts
The Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator failed to confirm the Tevatron accelerator’s discovery of a new arrangement of quarks
The Sciences
Physicists May Have Discovered a New "Tetraquark" Particle
Data from the DZero experiment shows evidence of a particle containing four different types of quarks
Physics
Quantum Cuteness: Neutron Beta Decay
This toy is radioactively cute—and able to explain how a neutral-faced neutron turns into a proton with a positive expression.
