Despite the fact that all I want in life is a daemon familiar and a wand and a sarcastic dappled mare who really gets me and violet eyes and a tower, in actuality I'm forever harping on the fact that magic isn't real. There are no magic Spanx that will turn you into Cindy Crawford. There is no magic begoggled top hat…

For the first time ever, planetary scientists have created a topographical map of Titan, the largest of Saturn's many moons, and the second-largest in the entire solar system. The map is a boon to researchers who study Titan, a mysterious moon that is arguably the most Earth-like body in our solar system – and it's…

An ancient sword, the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, is linked to ancient tales of gods and serpents in Japanese lore. The sword is seen as a weapon of immense power, a weapon that legitimizes the rule of a Japanese emperor. But where is this sword now?

Buridan's Ass is one of the oldest insults in existence. It has been consistently used to make fun of a particular worldview — one that doesn't allow for free will. But this notion gained new relevance, when we started making little electronic Buridan's Asses, which had to come to terms with the problem on more than…

Or, to be more precise, practical spoon-melting. Do you know about a de-lite-ful little trick that some scientists like to play on one another that causes a spoon to melt in hot liquids? Did you know that once it caused the victims to fill themselves with mercury?

Six weeks after he was born, Kaiba Gionfriddo began to experience severe breathing difficulties, the result of a rare obstruction in his lungs called bronchial malacia. In desperation, doctors attempted a technique never tried before on a human: they 3D-printed a splint from biological material.