history of science

As a deadly smallpox outbreak ravaged Boston, one of the city’s leaders advocated for a preventive measure he’d learned about from Onesimus, an enslaved man.

Watch Nobel Laureate Rita Levi-Montalcini tell the story of how she continued her transformative cell biology research as World War II raged.

Neuroscientist Rita Levi-Montalcini began her Nobel Prize–winning work in a makeshift laboratory in Italy during the Second World War.

Lore has always surrounded argonauts, pelagic octopuses that build shells and travel the seas.

In the past, it was not uncommon for researcher to test their experimental therapeutics and vaccines on themselves. Some even volunteered to be exposed to pathogen-carrying vectors.

Electron microscopy revealed that a deadly disease of birds was not a form of flu, but a different type of virus entirely.

A new book explores the history of scientists’ efforts to classify living things.

Scientists are taking their own vaccines, an ethically murky practice that has a long and sometimes celebrated history in medicine.

The medical scientist made important contributions to polio treatment and Australian environmental policy—despite substantial resistance.

Download our poster of the biggest milestones, from the discovery of the viral family in humans in the 1960s to the identification of SARS-CoV-2.

Milder, cold-causing members of this pathogenic viral family long remained under the radar, although they aren’t entirely harmless.

Microbiologist Maurice Hilleman foresaw the global spread of a novel influenza strain in 1957. His vaccine saved hundreds of thousands of lives.

In Chapter 10, “Memory," author Matthew Cobb takes readers inside a couple of seminal moments in the scientific search for memory’s mechanics.

Kim Peek, the inspiration for the title character in Rain Man, brought public attention to savant syndrome.

Advances in imaging technology over the last century have allowed increasingly sophisticated glimpses into the ancient processes of mummification.

An analysis of the En Tibi herbarium’s plants and handwriting has given clues to the identity of its maker.

Florence Sabin was known for her pioneering research and efforts to support women in science.

Frederik Ruysch’s collections blended specimens for scientific discovery with macabre art.

Most know Rachel Carson for her work on the dangers of chemical pollutants, but the writer’s earlier prose took readers on a tour of a mysterious underwater world.