Today the Smithsonian Institution announced Eva J. Pell, Senior Vice President for Research and Dean of the Graduate School at Pennsylvania State University, will be the new Under Secretary for Science at the Institution.

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New observations by the Smithsonian’s Submillimeter Array, a radio telescope atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii, are shedding light on planet formation. The array provides sharp views by combining eight antennas into the equivalent of a single, large telescope. It can resolve details as small as a dime seen from seven miles away.

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The Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies is hosting “Climate Change,” a three-day, free, education online conference Tuesday, Sept. 29 through Thursday, Oct. 1. This […]

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The giant squid was collected during a 60-day scientific study in which NOAA scientists were studying the availability and diversity of sperm whale prey. The squid was caught in a trawl net pulled behind a research vessel at a depth of more than 1,500 feet.

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Determining the locations of future highways and roads in countries with tropical rainforests will be the greatest single factor in influencing future forest loss, fragmentation and degradation. In broad terms, roads can be thought of as the enemies of rainforests. By spreading people out across the forest, roads inherently promote rapid and widespread deforestation.

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The Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum has opened a new Public Observatory that contains a 16-inch, 3,000-pound Boller and Chivens telescope, on loan from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Through this powerful telescope, museum visitors can now observe the sun (with a special filter), the moon and the brighter stars and planets, such as Venus, Jupiter and Saturn, during daylight hours. Funding for the project was provided by the National Science Foundation.

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Scientists from the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center at the National Zoo have taken blood samples from thousands of birds and mosquitoes in an effort to track the progress of the West Nile Virus in the eastern United States. Come along in this video as Smithsonian scientists net birds living in downtown Washington, D.C., extract small amounts of blood, and then release them back into the "wild."

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A major new exhibition hall dedicated to the discovery and understanding of human origins will open next year at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History: The David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins

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Invasive species, contaminants, excessive nutrient's and sediment are just some of the many factors threatening sensitive wetlands and seagrass beds.

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Nearly 100 years ago, scientists detected the first signs of cosmic rays—subatomic particles (mostly protons) that zip through space at nearly the speed of light. […]

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In a series of ongoing experiments on Barro Colorado Island in the Panama Canal, Kays and other researchers are using camera traps, radio collars and palm nuts with tracking transmitters attached to them to take a closer look at the nut-hoarding strategies of the agouti.

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Dennis W. Kelly has been named director of the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington, D.C., effective Feb. 15, 2010.

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Timing was critical because female giant pandas ovulate only once a year. A short period of two to three days around ovulation is the only time she is able to conceive. Gestation typically lasts from 90 to 185 days.

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A meteorite that crashed through the roof of a Lorton, Va., doctors’ office on Monday, Jan. 18, 2010 was recently identified by scientists in the […]

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It’s not an exaggeration to say Hedrick was ecstatic when she peered into her inverted phase contrast microscope and found "Amphisolenia quadrispina" floating in her sample. “For 20 years I’ve been hoping to see something like this,” she says.

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A new study published in the Feb. 2 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences indicates that forests in the Eastern United […]

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White, who was a student at Columbian College from Accomack County, Va., died of pneumonia and complications from a mitral heart defect. When his coffin was unearthed, his identity was a deep mystery.

The post Remains of William Taylor White (1837-1852) donated to Smithsonian with his coffin and clothing appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

Eleven bats remain in the National Zoo’s colony. The initial challenge the team faced was how to feed the animals. Virginia big-eared bats, which are a subspecies of the Townsend’s big-eared bat (Corynorhinuss townsendii), eat while flying.

The post Captive colony of Virginia big-eared bats providing valuable lessons in battle against deadly white-nose syndrome appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

Recently, scientists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama discovered that the brain region responsible for learning and memory is larger in the social queens than in the solitary queens of this species. Their study is the first comparison of the brain sizes of social and non-social individuals of the same species.

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The Caddo people of Arkansas, Louisiana, Texas and Oklahoma have maintained many of their traditional ways and actively work to preserve their unique tribal cultural today. One example is the pottery of Jeri Redcorn.

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The new study suggests that echolocation calls also serve a social function--bats listen to the ultrasonic calls of other bats to identify roost mates, bats of the same species, members of the opposite sex and intruders to their territory.

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Take to the water with this behind-the-scenes video about Maryland blue crab research at the Smithsonian's Environmental Research Center. Fisheries Ecologist Eric Johnson takes viewers on a journey along the Rhode River to show how scientists tag and monitor Maryland blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

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Smithsonian scientist Tom Watters explores the universe. His most recent discovery the moon is shrinking. Watch the video to learn more about his research.

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Breitburg and her team want to determine just how much stress they cause. Over the next five years they will conduct a series of lab and field experiments that examine how diel-cycling hypoxia and the associated acidification affects the growth and disease rates in striped bass, the eastern oyster and other ecologically and economically important Chesapeake Bay species. They will also study the animals’ behavioral responses to these changes.

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The Kepler spacecraft was launched in March of 2009 to study extrasolar planets. One of its major goals is the detection of terrestrial planets in habitable zones.

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“Places of Invention,” a planned 3,500-square-foot exhibition at the National Museum of American History scheduled to open in 2014, will feature a selection of “hot spots” of invention and innovation—places where a critical mass of inventive people, networks, institutions, funding and other resources come together and creativity flourishes.

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To celebrate a cool Halloween creature--bats--we teamed up with the Smithsonian’s Kristofer Helgen, curator of mammals at the National Museum of Natural History. Here, he answers three commonly asked questions about these winged mammals.

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New research by astrophysicist David Kipping has revealed that in some special cases, a star can be weighed directly. Such a star must have a planet orbiting it with a moon orbiting the planet.

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An instrument on board NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, developed by Smithsonian scientists, is giving unprecedented views of the Sun's innermost corona 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

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Twenty years ago scientists at the Marine Invasions Lab of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Edgewater, Md., began studying the interactions between native grass […]

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A new telescope has begun to virtually explore the solar system outback, and already is scoring discoveries.

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"Physics for the 21st Century," a free, on-line course developed at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics about current research in physics is now available.

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The new agreement, effective immediately through Dec. 5, 2015, stipulates that the Smithsonian's National Zoological Park will conduct research in the areas of giant panda breeding and cub behavior.

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Subjects watched demonstrators for varying amounts of time. When given the pipe, each of the subjects in both groups opened the door on their first attempt using the method they had seen demonstrated.

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To honor Harvard-Smithsonian astronomer John Huchra, who passed away in October 2010, his friends and colleagues at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics have created a […]

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A new species of Brazilian leaf beetle named Cachiporra extremaglobosa, (which translated means the “extremely globular billy club leaf beetle,”) was recently discovered by scientists at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.

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Last week, the Kepler team and CfA astronomers announced the discovery of a system of six transiting planets around one Sun-like star. The previous record holder for the number of transiting planets was three.

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They found that the molars of fruit-eating species had sharp outer edges that likely allow them to pierce tough fruit skin and pulp... By contrast, the molars of insect-eating species were less complex, possibly because of their smoother shearing surfaces.

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Using modern genetic analysis, combined with traditional morphology, scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and the Ocean Science Foundation have discovered seven […]

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Recent work has added dozens of new measurements to star-forming regions in the Milky Way. These measurements have changed the map of the Milky Way, indicating our galaxy has four spiral arms, not two, as previously thought.

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Smithsonian WILD! a new Web site from the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute designed to showcase the use of motion-triggered 'camera traps' by Smithsonian researchers, has been launched at the Web address siwild.si.edu.

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On April 4 the Smithsonian and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology will launch VANISHED, an 8-week online/offline environmental disaster mystery game for middle-school children, meant […]

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The Sun has been in the news a lot lately because it's beginning to send out more flares and solar storms. Its recent turmoil is particularly newsworthy because the Sun was very quiet for an unusually long time. New computer simulations imply that the Sun's long quiet spell resulted from changing flows of hot plasma within it.

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In recent research on Santa Rosa Island off the coast of Southern California, isotope readings of carbon and nitrogen found in the bones of Chumash Indians and domestic dogs excavated from archaeological sites show that both humans and dogs have nearly identical signatures of stable isotopes.

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To help regulators and engineers develop and test such treatment systems, and ultimately enforce these standards, a team of researchers developed a statistical model to see how to count small, scarce organisms in large volumes of water accurately.

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“Our results support the idea that environmental conditions on tropical non-breeding areas can influence the departure time for spring migration,” said Colin Studds, a postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute's Migratory Bird Center and lead author of the study.

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The April 5 exhibits, “In the Mummy’s Tomb,” “Making a Mummy” and “What’s in a Face,” focus on Egyptian burial rites.

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The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has been selected by the National Science Foundation as the recipient of a 12-meter (39-foot) radio antenna designed for submillimeter-wavelength astronomy. The ALMA Vertex Prototype Antenna was one of three antennas built as prototypes for the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, a 66-dish radio observatory currently being constructed in Chile.

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Sita (SEE-ta), a 2-year-old female clouded leopard at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in Front Royal, Va., gave birth to these two cubs on Monday, […]

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A new bacterial genome sequence could help researchers solve a mystery as to how microorganisms produce a highly toxic form of mercury.

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