History of Science

Betrayal, ambition and the double helix: turning Rosalind Franklin’s story and the discovery of the structure of DNA into an opera

Humans have been in space onboard the ISS continuously for 25 years. As the station nears its end, new commercial habitats are lining up to take its place

New peer-reviewed research reporting strange lights in the pre-space-age sky is sparking curiosity and controversy

The Nobel Prize in Physics for 2025 honors scaled-up quantum physics—while sidestepping controversies swirling around quantum computing

How a determined socialite, inspired by true crime, helped professionalize the field of murder investigations

Total reversals in scientific thinking are rare—but earth-shattering

Neptune’s discovery was a race that ended not long after this magazine came to be

Federal officials seized 3,000 copies of Scientific American in 1950 in a “red scare” era of attacks on science. The move backfired and offers lessons for today

A controversial arsenic microbe study unveiled 15 years ago has been retracted. The study’s authors are crying foul

History tells us what happens when great nations attack science

The most anticipated particle physics result of recent years is here—but the real news came one week before: the “muon g–2 anomaly” might have never existed

Telescopes in space give us a view we literally cannot get from the ground