If America’s nuclear waste could be turned into electricity, it could power the country for the next century. More than 77,000 tons of plutonium, americium, and other radioactive…

Our humble toilet has shaped civilization. Starting in 19th-century Britain, it spread throughout the industrialized world, eliminated recurring cholera epidemics, and contributed…

This month, in our article, “Literature by the Numbers,” we introduced you to scholars using digital tools to uncover fresh historical and critical insights into fiction, poetry,…

Thomas’ parents had not been sure, since his brain injury, if he recognized them or even sensed their presence. Lying in a hospital bed he looked like a typical 12-year-old boy.…

In November of last year, Jan Scheuermann did something she never thought she would do again: She fed herself a piece of chocolate. For the last decade Scheuermann, 54, has been a…

On the occasion of the inaugural Nautilus Quarterly, we asked Nicholas Carr to survey the prospects for a print publication. Here he shows why asking if digital publications will supplant…

It was 11:30 am on a sunny Tuesday in mid-April, and the Hong Kong Express had been docked at Hamburg’s Container Terminal Altenwerder for exactly 33 hours. Already, the ship was…

In today’s finest medical pavilions, where therapies are touted as cutting edge, the treatment of breast cancer still involves going under the knife. With luck, the tumor can be…

Ever since the dawn of the space age, a quixotic subculture of physicists, engineers, and science-fiction writers have devoted their lunch hours and weekends to drawing up plans for…

I am speeding down New Jersey’s highways, propelled by gasoline with a dash of ethanol, an alcoholic biofuel brewed from stewed corn kernels. As I drive through the outskirts of…