Single-Stream Recycling Is Easier for Consumers, but Is It Better?
At some point, someone has to sort out paper from metal from plastic.
Creative Frontiers
The discoveries, inventions, and startups shaping the future
Making Babies Outside of the Womb Has Never Been So Easy
Today, one percent of American kids are conceived using some form of assisted reproductive technology.
Before Computers, People Programmed Looms
Just punch out 2,000 or so cards, string them together, and start weaving.
Cement Makes the Modern World Possible
The Romans might have made it better, but right now cement is one of the world's most used materials, period.
The First 'Picturephone' for Video Chatting Was a Colossal Failure
Bell Labs started selling commercial image and phone service in 1970, but it was too expensive—and a little too intimate.
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Generations Are an Invention—Here's How They Came to Be
Europeans created the idea that individuals share something important with, as one lexicographer put it in 1863, "all men living more or less at the same time"
Inventing the LED Lightbulb
An effort to make a semiconductor laser led to a totally new device
The Built-From-Scratch Heart
Medical researchers are getting closer to creating whole, working human hearts.
How Gore-Tex Was Born
One night in a basement, Bob Gore accidentally made camping much, much more comfortable—and himself the richest man in Delaware.
The Next Big Thing in Fancy Food
High-end chefs are beginning to work with farmers to breed custom new creations for their kitchens.