The profit margin on crypto mining is all about the physics of computers and energy conversion.

Alignments of five or more planets are rare—there will be two more featuring five or more planets this year, but after that the next won’t happen until 2040.

What may be the first commercially available book saved in DNA is the latest example of how consumers might use molecular data storage.

New photos of Mercury taken during the joint European and Japanese BepiColombo mission reveal fascinating details of the small rocky planet.

Calculating air pollution from wildfires and other events has become more complicated. That doesn’t mean it’s necessarily more accurate.

After the devastation of the Los Angeles fires, officials are ready to rebuild. But defending against future fires requires thinking about more than buildings.

The space agency’s Spinoff project displays the countless everyday technologies that were spurred by space-related research.

Signals from the global navigation satellite system can be jammed and spoofed, so a Google spinout is working on an alternative positioning and navigation system that uses the Earth’s magnetic field.

Melted plastic pipes and drastic water-pressure drops are potentially leaching toxic chemicals and contaminants into local supplies. Multiple water authorities in north Los Angeles have issued Do Not Drink notices.

Now that Novo Nordisk is the world’s weight-loss juggernaut, will it have to betray its first patients—type 1 diabetics?

Three exotic new species of superconductivity were spotted last year, illustrating the myriad ways electrons can join together to form a frictionless quantum soup.

The 1,100-pound mystery object landed in Kenya at the end of December. Experts are still baffled.

In early January, soil moisture in much of Southern California was in the bottom 2 percent of historical records.

The arrival of La Niña is starving California of rain, and more high Santa Ana winds could be on the way.

On January 13, Atlas C/2024 G3 will reach its closest point to the sun.

As he prepares to leave the White House, Ali Zaidi is sober about what’s coming—but says too much has already been built and invested for Donald Trump to undo it.

Exposure to smoke is dangerous regardless of your health status, so follow these steps to limit the risk.

In 2024, natural disasters related to variations in the water cycle caused more than 8,700 deaths and at least $550 billion of economic loss.

With wind speeds falling, firefighting reinforcements arriving from out of state, and more water sources online, authorities now have a critical window to take control of the situation.

Cartilage cells that contain fat explain why some skeletal tissues are less rigid than others, and could one day be grown in labs to produce better materials for performing reconstructive surgeries and rhinoplasties.

The state’s insurance industry was reformed in late 2024 to promote coverage in disaster-prone areas. Tens of billions in fire damage will stress-test the new regime.

More than 130,000 people have been evacuated from their homes, with the fires—which are still uncontained—having been declared a major disaster by President Biden.

As hurricane-force winds fan the most destructive wildfires in California history across bone-dry foothills, communities face the dual threat of natural forces and a warming world.

Research and development is underway to create robots that can hunt for signs of life in the vast oceans that exist under the thick ice shells of bodies like Europa.

A Louisiana patient is the first person in the United States to die as a result of H5N1 infection. One expert likens what happens next to Russian roulette.