Quanta Magazine

How do you define a species? The question has been controversial since the days of Darwin. Recent advances in genomics have both clarified and complicated the picture. quantamagazine.org/how-ecotypes-h…

What Albert Einstein was to 20th-century physics, Alexander Grothendieck was to 20th-century mathematics. quantamagazine.org/how-alexander-…

Stephen Smartt serves as scientific lead for Lasair, one of the data brokers that will help astronomers sift through the Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s vast data haul. Rubin is expected to produce 7 million alerts and 20 terabytes of data a night. quantamagazine.org/rubin-tracks-s…

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory is years in the making — it was originally imagined as the Dark Matter Telescope in the mid-1990s. Scientists are already making use of the explosion of data from its preliminary images. quantamagazine.org/rubin-tracks-s…

Peter Scholze (left) and Dustin Clausen are undertaking an ambitious project to generate an entire new category of mathematical objects. Their work retains all of the best parts of topological spaces — without the drawbacks. quantamagazine.org/two-researcher…

By putting ice under extreme pressure, researchers have discovered three new forms of ice in the past year alone. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Tune in to The Quanta Podcast: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ice…

Mathematical tools such as the Navier-Stokes equation allow experts to predict how some volcanic outpourings will emerge, how far the different kinds of flows will reach, and how quickly it will all happen — but not whether or when an eruption will take place. quantamagazine.org/will-we-ever-b…

Topology is the bedrock of modern math. But it doesn’t gel with algebra. A pair of mathematicians have proposed a new framework that eases topology’s limitations. Their work rewrites our understanding of how numbers behave. quantamagazine.org/two-researcher…

The mathematician Alexander Grothendieck is revered in the world of math; outside of it, he’s known for his unusual life, if he’s known at all. But what were his actual mathematical contributions? quantamagazine.org/how-alexander-…

Columnist Natalie Wolchover spent the early weeks of the pandemic learning how the 25-year-old Austrian logician and mathematician Kurt Gödel established that no formal system of math can ever be complete. “Oh yeah, that time you almost went crazy?” was how her wife remembered it. Read the full column: quantamagazine.org/what-do-godels…

“We’ve never had this kind of explosion of discovery within astronomy,” said astronomer Sarah Greenstreet. Greenstreet authored a paper on the first asteroid discoveries from Vera C. Rubin Observatory. quantamagazine.org/rubin-tracks-s…

Here are three words: pine, crab, sauce. There’s a fourth word that combines with each of the others to create another common word. What is it? quantamagazine.org/how-your-brain…

In my monthly column in @QuantaMagazine , I seek answers to hard questions in science and math. Please suggest topics you’d like me to look into, as I’m planning out the next several months of research now. And/or please check out what I’ve covered so far...🧵

The LSST Camera is installed in the Simonyi Survey Telescope at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile. The car-sized digital camera is the largest on Earth. quantamagazine.org/rubin-tracks-s…

Whether imaginary numbers are indispensable features of quantum mechanics or mere mathematical conveniences affects our understanding of reality itself. “The mathematical formulation does guide what we infer about the nature of the physical world,” says philosopher of physics Jill North. quantamagazine.org/physicists-tak…

The idea that depression stems primarily from a lack of serotonin has lost much of its support. Scientists are rethinking the causes — and definition — of the illness. (From the archive) quantamagazine.org/the-cause-of-d…

At age 25, Kurt Gödel proved there can never be a mathematical “theory of everything.” In this week’s Qualia column, @nattyover asks experts how his ideas changed the course of humanity’s unending search for truth. quantamagazine.org/what-do-godels…

A Fields Medal–winning mathematician once called one of Marijn Heule’s proofs “the most disgusting proof ever.” But his methods go beyond what any human can do. quantamagazine.org/to-have-machin…

Soil fungi have long been considered passive infrastructure for plants, or worse, parasites of their roots. But they are in fact highly active, controlling not only their own destinies but also the fates of those around them. quantamagazine.org/an-arctic-road…

What happens when you blend the language of groups with the language of geometry and linear algebra? quantamagazine.org/what-are-lie-g…