Life makes our planet an incredibly exotic place compared to the rest of the known universe, says astrobiologist Betül Kaçar, whose research uses statistics and mathematical models to simulate ancient environments and gather insights...

Explore cell signaling with the Amoeba Sisters! This introductory video describes vocabulary such as ligand and receptor. It includes the stages of cell signaling (reception, transduction, and response) and different types of signaling...

This week, scientists announced great news about our brains and those discoveries may help us find the cure for a number of diseases and disorders.

Hank tells us how some gamers are outperforming sophisticated computer programs to help solve the puzzle of protein folding and to assist scientists in finding better treatments for HIV/AIDS, cancer, and Alzheimer's.

Jedidah Isler dreamt of becoming an astrophysicist since she was a young girl, but the odds were against her: At that time, only 18 black women in the united States had ever earned a PhD in a physics-related discipline. In this personal...

If you're lucky enough to live without want, it's a natural impulse to be altruistic to others. But, asks philosopher Peter Singer, what's the most effective way to give? He talks through some surprising thought experiments to help you...

Humans are great at understanding medium-sized things, like how far the supermarket is from your house, or how to find the bathroom in the dark. But imagining distances in light-years is a lot harder -- so you'll have to use a trick or two.

Countless poets and writers have tried to put words to the experience of a panic attack— a sensation so overwhelming, many people mistake it for a heart attack, stroke, or other life-threatening crisis. Studies suggest that almost a...

How do we make sense of a world that doesn't? By looking in unexpected places, says mathematician Eugenia Cheng. She explains how applying concepts from abstract mathematics to daily life can lead us to a deeper understanding of things...

In the quest to map the brain, many scientists have attempted the incredibly daunting task of recording the activity of each neuron. Gero Miesenboeck works backward -- manipulating specific neurons to figure out exactly what they do,...

In her New Orleans neighborhood, artist and TED Fellow Candy Chang turned an abandoned house into a giant chalkboard asking a fill-in-the-blank question: "Before I die I want to ___." Her neighbors' answers -- surprising, poignant, funny...

There are more than 10,000 nuclear weapons in existence today, each one capable of causing immense destruction. Why don't we talk about this threat as much as some other major issues? In this practical talk, nuclear security expert Emma...

Whether you get it from standing on the top of Mount Everest or watching a video about the size of the universe on SciShow Space, awe can be a powerful, transformative emotion.

As humans, we can perceive less than a ten-trillionth of all light waves. "Our experience of reality," says neuroscientist David Eagleman, "is constrained by our biology." He wants to change that. His research into our brain processes...

M31N 2008-12a is a rare phenomenon called a recurrent nova, and it may hold the key to understanding the lives and cataclysmic deaths of massive stars.

Say the word "doubt" aloud. What is that "b" doing there? Does it have any purpose? Gina Cooke explains the long and winding history of "doubt" and why the spelling, though it seems random, is a wink to its storied past.

Researchers were inspired by a certain purple villain to study the physics of finger snapping, and they found that the mundane hand motion is actually quite an impressive feat.

We might be able to use slime molds to help predict the shape of matter in the universe, and the Rosetta mission may have figured out why many comets seem to be missing a bunch of nitrogen.

This video is about weird condensed matter systems, aka materials that have bizarre emergent particles in them that are unlike most other particles in the universe.

The Ulysses mission revolutionized our understanding of the sun, but it's been the only orbiter to take this kind of out-of-ecliptic journey. Will an upcoming mission give us even more?

OSIRIS-REx finally entered orbit around the asteroid Bennu this week and new research has found an old recipe for RNA.

The Imitation Game comes out tonight, but before its release, Hank got to talk with the film's director Morten Tyldum and screenwriter Graham Moore about bringing one of the world's most brilliant mathematicians to film.

Most rocky planets have pretty consistent surface features, with a fairly even mix of mountains and basins in each hemisphere. This is NOT the case on Mars! What do scientists know about this mystery?

The auroras are one of earth's most dazzling displays, but thanks to Joan Feynman we know that they're so much more.