Systems
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On Adapting to Sandpiles
February 03, 2011
Joshua Cooper Ramo argues that in an era defined by instability, society must remain imminently flexible and turn disruption into a force for good.
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On Early Warning Signs
December 20, 2010
Rapid shifts are the hallmark of climate change, epileptic seizures, financial crises, and fishery collapses. Deep mathematical principles tie these events together.
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On Systemic Risk
December 16, 2010
In an increasingly interconnected world, the actions of the few can rapidly spiral into a global crisis. Policymakers must learn from recent events to control the risk latent in our interdependence.
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The Asymmetry of Life
September 07, 2010
Look into a mirror and you’ll simultaneously see the familiar and the alien: an image of you, but with left and right reversed.
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The Body Politic
July 15, 2010
The deep symbiosis between bacteria and their human hosts is forcing scientists to ask: Are we organisms or living ecosystems?
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Beneath the Surface
June 15, 2010
Powerful computer simulations may be the best method available to quantify the amount of oil leaking from the Deepwater Horizon—and to predict where it will go.
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Extinction’s Tipping Points
March 12, 2010
How the extinction of the dinosaurs, Arctic methane leaks, and nuclear weaponry reveal the precarious thresholds of life on Earth.
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Urban Resilience
February 16, 2010
Merging complex systems science and ecology, resilience scientists have broken new ground on understanding—and preserving—natural ecosystems. Now, as more and more people move into urban hubs, they are bringing this novel science to the city.
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Winds of Change
December 21, 2009
The stories we tell provide us with a record of our continuing struggle to understand the peculiar effects weather has on our lives.
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The Question of Quantum Chaos
December 14, 2009
Chaos is everywhere in the natural world, present in the coiling of smoke rings, the fronds of ferns, and the beating of our hearts. But at the level of quantum physics, chaos as we now define it is unquantifiable.
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Portfolio: Flight Patterns
September 07, 2009
Richard Barnes's photographs of birds’ flight patterns above a Rome suburb highlight the tension between the individual and the collective.
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Serious Fun
June 23, 2009
Kodu doesn’t have realistic graphics, huge explosions, or even a way to win. But it just might change the way we think about the world.
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Critical Mass
June 22, 2009
For particle physicists who study phase transitions, a traffic jam is simply a solid made up of idling cars.
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What Seashells Tell
May 08, 2009
The growth and pigment of a seashell is controlled by a network of nerve cells. Modeling this process is giving us insight into neural networks and even human memory.
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The Tricorder Arrives
May 01, 2009
Cell phones will soon be able to sense our environment and its pollutants. This new power may change the way we move through the world, but can it motivate us to change it?
data, information, innovation, networks, systems, technology
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This Is Your Brain on Facebook
April 21, 2009
Recent studies on the effects of the internet and other new media on brain plasticity raises an open research question: Is Google making us smarter?
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The Hive Mind
April 14, 2009
Is understanding the selfless behavior of ants, bees, and wasps the key to a new evolutionary synthesis?
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The Body Politic
April 14, 2009
The deep symbiosis between bacteria and their human hosts is forcing scientists to ask: Are we organisms or living ecosystems?
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Adapting to a New Economy
February 12, 2009
An evolutionary perspective on economics can explain how we got into this current mess, and how we might find our way out.
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The Prophetic Brain
January 27, 2009
The commonly held belief that information from the outside world impinges upon our brains through our senses to cause perception and then action now appears to be false.
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Group Think
December 22, 2008
A Tel Aviv University professor melds math and sociology of the Internet to predict the next big thing in music.
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Yeast Gone Wild
December 18, 2008
Feral yeast shed light on one of Darwin's greatest evolutionary puzzles, by getting drunk and socializing.
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The Mason’s Apprentice
October 24, 2008
Our closest single-celled relatives reveal the origins of the stuff that holds us together.
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Bacterial Foresight
October 09, 2008
Can bacteria anticipate changes in their environment?
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The Trouble with Biodiversity
October 07, 2008
Life is more varied near the equator. But making sense of that has confounded biologists for 200 years.
Now on SEEDMAGAZINE.COM
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Ideas
I Tried Almost Everything Else
John Rinn, snowboarder, skateboarder, and “genomic origamist,” on why we should dumpster-dive in our genomes and the inspiration of a middle-distance runner.
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Ideas
Going, Going, Gone
The second most common element in the universe is increasingly rare on Earth—except, for now, in America.
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Ideas
Earth-like Planets Aren’t Rare
Renowned planetary scientist James Kasting on the odds of finding another Earth-like planet and the power of science fiction.
