Can Microbes Encourage Altruism?
If gut bacteria can sway their hosts to be selfless, it could answer a riddle that goes back to Darwin
Quanta Magazine
Moonlighting Genes Evolve for a Venomous Job
An unexpected mechanism allows wasps to rapidly co-opt genes for new toxic functions
Wanted: More Data, the Dirtier the Better
The computational immunologist Purvesh Khatri embraces messy data as a way to capture the messiness of disease. As a result, he’s making elusive genomic discoveries
New Number Systems Seek Their Lost Primes
For centuries mathematicians tried to solve problems by adding new values to the usual numbers. Now they’re investigating the unintended consequences of that tinkering
The Shape-Shifting Army inside Your Cells
Proteins work like rigid keys to activate cellular functions—or so everyone thought
The Mathematics of Evolution: Q&A with Biologist Marcus Feldman
Feldman creates mathematical models that reveal how cultural traditions can affect the evolution of a species
The Mathematics of Cake Cutting
Computer scientists have come up with an algorithm that can fairly divide a cake among any number of people
Mathematical Beauty: A Q&A with Fields Medalist Michael Atiyah
The mathematician is a scientific matchmaker, famous for collaborating with researchers from many disciplines and pairing others
Taming Superconductors with String Theory
The physicist Subir Sachdev borrows tools from string theory to understand the puzzling behavior of superconductors
How Strange Twists in DNA Orchestrate Life
So-called “supercoils” change the behavior of DNA, opening a new role for topology in the study of life
