Spotlight Is on African American Visions of Freedom and Unmet Promises Following the Civil War. Exhibition Also Explores the Contemporary Legacies of Reconstruction, Racial Profiling, and Voter Suppression Through Items From the Families of Trayvon Martin
Astronomers have discovered a giant, spherical cavity within the Milky Way galaxy; its location is depicted on the right. A zoomed-in view of the cavity (left) shows the Perseus and Taurus molecular clouds in red and blue, respectively. Though the clouds appear to touch in this 2D view, new 3D images of the clouds show they lie at very different distances on the surface of the cavity shown in green. This image was produced in glue using WorldWide Telescope’s Milky Way data-driven cartoon (produced by Robert Hurt). Credit: Alyssa Goodman/Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian.
Astronomers Discover a Humongous Cavity in Space While Mapping Interstellar Dust; the Sphere-shaped Phenomenon May Explain How Supernovae Lead to Star Formation
Male cheetah cub being hand-reared temporarily by carnivore keepers at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute. Photo credit: Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute
Autonomous Electric Concept Vehicle Will Be Making Its Museum Debut at the Arts and Industries Building in November, Alongside Iconic 1960s Bell Jetpack
In this artist’s conception, planets form from the gas and dust in the protoplanetary disk surrounding a young star. The gas is made up of many different molecules, including hydrogen cyanide and more complex nitriles—linked to the development of life on Earth. The soup of molecules in a particular location in the disk shapes the future of the planet forming there and determines whether or not that planet could support life as people know it. Credit: M.Weiss/Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian
“Reckoning: Protest. Defiance. Resilience.” Exhibition Uses Art To Explore the Black Lives Matter Movement, Social Protests and the Struggle for Equality and Freedom
Scientists from the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and partners are the first to use frozen coral sperm to bolster coral genes of the same species that would otherwise remain apart as they are geographically isolated, with the aim of giving coral like this endangered Elkhorn coral (Acropora palmata) a boost against warming oceans.
Credit: Roshan Patel, Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute
Detected in 2019,the Borisov comet was the first interstellar comet known to have passed through our solar system. Credit: NASA, ESA and D. Jewitt (UCLA).
Long-Term Monitoring of the Bat Species Saccopteryx bilineata in Their Natural Setting Revealed That Pups Display Babbling Behavior Strikingly Similar to That of Human Infants
Unidentified artist, Untitled (brooch, man with goatee), undated, albumen print in metal setting. Smithsonian American Art Museum, the L. J. West Collection of Photographic Jewelry, Museum purchase made possible through the Franz H. and Luisita L. Denghausen Endowment