NIAC has awarded their first two grant winners for phase III: optical mining and 3D modeling craters, and researchers are further honing in on how to identify faraway habitable planets.

In a culture where being social and outgoing are prized above all else, it can be difficult, even shameful, to be an introvert. But, as Susan Cain argues in this passionate talk, introverts bring extraordinary talents and abilities to...

The words we use to describe our emotions affect how we feel, says historian Tiffany Watt Smith, and they've often changed (sometimes very dramatically) in response to new cultural expectations and ideas. Take nostalgia, for instance:...

Mister Brown teaches Squeaks all about engineering to help him solve a problem he is having!



K-2 Next Generation Science

Standards

Science and En
gineering Practices:
Asking Questions and Defining...

Since you're on YouTube, you probably know what a meme is; but what is it really and how does it go viral?

Some words just SOUND like the thing they refer to. But are these associations come from the specific culture we were raised in, or is there something more fundamental going on here?

On a daily basis, you spend between a third and half of your waking hours daydreaming. That may sound like a huge waste of time, but scientists think it must have some purpose, or humans wouldn't have evolved to do so much of it. So,...

If you've watched the news or followed politics, chances are you've heard the term Orwellian thrown around in one context or another. But have you ever stopped to think about what it really means, or why it's used so often? Noah Tavlin...

Jessi had the weirdest dream last night and wants to share with you why our brains make dreams.

Why do people succeed? Is it because they're smart? Or are they just lucky? Neither. Analyst Richard St. John condenses years of interviews into an unmissable 3-minute slideshow on the real secrets of success.

Artists Jeroen Koolhaas and Dre Urhahn create community art by painting entire neighborhoods, and involving those who live there -- from the favelas of Rio to the streets of North Philadelphia. What's made their projects succeed? In this...

Very few of us hold jobs that line up directly with our past experiences or what we studied in college. Take TED Resident Jason Shen; he studied biology but later became a product manager at a tech company. In this quick, insightful talk...

We make important decisions every day -- and we often rely on experts to help us decide. But, says economist Noreena Hertz, relying too much on experts can be limiting and even dangerous. She calls for us to start democratizing expertise...

As an expert on cutting-edge digital displays, Mary Lou Jepsen studies how to show our most creative ideas on screens. And as a brain surgery patient herself, she is driven to know more about the neural activity that underlies invention,...

In part 2 of our special series on human ancestry, we ask why we are the only surviving branch on the human evolutionary tree. Just 50,000-100,000 years ago, Earth was home to three or four separate human species, including our most...

Meet seven all-terrain robots -- like the humanoid, soccer-playing DARwIn and the cliff-gripping CLIMBeR -- built by Dennis Hong's robotics team at RoMeLa, based at Virginia Tech. Watch to the end for the five creative secrets to his...

In 2006, open-learning visionary Richard Baraniuk explains the vision behind Connexions (now called OpenStax), an open-source, online education system. It cuts out the textbook, allowing teachers to share and modify course materials...

A new study calls the claims of fossilized brains into question, and another finds ichthyosaurs might have been bigger than our current champions, the blue whales.

* Viewer discretion advised. This video includes discussion of mature topics and may be inappropriate for some audiences. A massive generation of young people is about to inherit the world, and it's the duty of everyone to give them a...

In 1993, Bill and Melinda Gates took a walk on the beach and made a big decision: to give their Microsoft wealth back to society. In conversation with Chris Anderson, the couple talks about their work at the Bill & Melinda Gates...

Look at the letters around you: on street signs, stores, restaurant menus, the covers of books. Whether you realize it or not, the letters are speaking to you, telling you something beyond the literal text -- that whatever they represent...

Roughly 85 percent of mass in the universe is "dark matter" -- mysterious material that can't be directly observed but has an immense influence on the cosmos. What exactly is this strange stuff, and what does it have to do with our...

Even after writing eleven books and winning several awards, Maya Angelou couldn't escape the doubt that she hadn't earned her accomplishments. This feeling of fraudulence is extremely common. Why can't so many of us shake feelings that...

What's the science behind a sublime perfume? With charm and precision, biophysicist Luca Turin explains the molecular makeup -- and the art -- of a scent.