With her sharp wit and humor, Carrie Fisher was unapologetically open about her battles with mental illness, addiction, and her Hollywood legacy. | Continue reading
Japan is pulling out of the International Whaling Commission. Here's how it works and what it means. | Continue reading
The Netherlands has become an agricultural giant by showing what the future of farming could look like. | Continue reading
Do you donate your whole body, or just your organs? Who accepts donations? And what happens to your cadaver? Get the basics on body donation. | Continue reading
If you’ve never seen a duck penis before, have a look at the infamous video above. That long corkscrew belongs to a Muscovy duck, and it’s typical of the group. Some ducks have helical penises that are longer than their entire bodies. But forget the helical shape, the size, and t … | Continue reading
Black mothers are particularly at risk. Better basic care could help. | Continue reading
Susan Potter’s remains were frozen, sliced, and photographed. The result: a virtual cadaver that speaks to medical students from the grave. | Continue reading
A new study found rapid movement of the plastic throughout the mollusk bodies, surprising scientists. | Continue reading
Not just mammals: These odd spiders nurse their young with milk | Continue reading
Instruments picked up the seismic waves more than 10,000 miles away—but bizarrely, nobody felt them. | Continue reading
These are some of the most common geographic misconceptions that are both surprising and surprisingly hard to correct. | Continue reading
Researchers have found that the way our brains are wired can affect how much empathy we feel toward others—a key measuring stick of good and evil. | Continue reading
Although the majority of U.S. foreign-born residents are Latin American, recent immigrants are most likely to arrive from Asia. | Continue reading
Scientists are teasing out how jitters, sleeplessness, and even bitter taste are all influenced by tiny variations in your genetic code. | Continue reading
An excavation provides tantalizing hints about a little-known group that celebrated Thanksgiving two years before the New England Pilgrims. | Continue reading
Some animal groups have displayed more than 20 ways of using tools while others demonstrate just a few, scientists say. | Continue reading
In Mozambique, researchers are racing to understand the genetics of elephants born without tusks—and the consequences of the trait. | Continue reading
What really happens to all the stuff you put in those blue bins? | Continue reading
With help from cartographers, native peoples’ hand-drawn maps of their own territory become a tool against exploitation. | Continue reading
With help from cartographers, native peoples’ hand-drawn maps of their own territory become a tool against exploitation. | Continue reading
Our home galaxy snacked on a dwarf galaxy about 10 billion years ago—and it has its next victims in sight. | Continue reading
The materials have no proven medicinal value in humans, and conservationists call the move a major setback for wild populations. | Continue reading
Astronomers are building instruments that can characterize the many alien worlds the Kepler spacecraft revealed—and look for signs of life. | Continue reading
An intense temblor in Mexico was just the latest example of an enigmatic type of earthquake with highly destructive potential. | Continue reading
Mapping American diversity reveals not just a snapshot of today but the imprint of two and a half centuries of migration, conflict, and prosperity. | Continue reading
As the Antarctic Peninsula heats up, the rules of life there are being ripped apart. Alarmed scientists aren’t sure what all the change means for the future. | Continue reading
The push to cut back federally protected lands is fueling a dispute rooted in our history and culture. The big question: Whose land is it? | Continue reading
A film by E. Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, from National Geographic Documentary Films | Continue reading
A National Geographic photographer recounts his fight to escape the world's deepest cave. | Continue reading
A new study looked at sea, rock, and lake salt sold around the world. Here’s what you need to know. | Continue reading
Archaeologists in Norway using ground-penetrating radar have detected one of the largest Viking ship graves ever found. | Continue reading
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says the world is headed for painful problems sooner than expected, as emissions keep rising. | Continue reading
As modern life lures a generation to cities, some left behind struggle with drought and dust storms and wonder: What kind of life is this? | Continue reading
This team crossed invisible lakes of noxious gas to map the mountain's mysterious caves and search for clues to life on Mars. | Continue reading
Better protections, including an increased number of anti-poaching rangers, has allowed populations of tigers to grow quickly. | Continue reading
Once thought to be extinct, the Wondiwoi tree kangaroo has just been photographed in a remote New Guinea mountain range. | Continue reading
Some scientists think Colombia's "cocaine hippos" could help fill-in for long extinct megafauna, while others argue that they should go. | Continue reading
The Ocean Cleanup’s nearly 2,000-foot boom will collect ocean plastics from the gigantic garbage gyre over the next year. | Continue reading
Dickey Chapelle was one of history's most fearless conflict journalists—and the first American woman to die on the job. | Continue reading
Starting in the 1940s, Indian immigrants built a hospitality industry that their children and grandchildren have turned into an empire. | Continue reading
Some of the biggest deposits of iron, copper, and rare-earth elements are in the middle of the Pacific. They come at a cost. | Continue reading
The versatile gas lies at the center of a complex, fragile global market. | Continue reading
It is the bitterest of ironies that a snake which spends its entire life at sea, constantly submerged in water, should spend months on end being thirsty and dehydrated. Fresh water quenches thirst. Salt water worsens it. If you drink seawater, your kidneys try to get rid of the e … | Continue reading
The national park could power the entire continental U.S. with clean energy. Here’s why it remains untapped. | Continue reading
New data from two Arctic sites suggest some surface layers are no longer freezing. If that continues, greenhouse gases from permafrost could accelerate climate change. | Continue reading
Are we our faces? This poignant story explores that question. | Continue reading
Are we our faces? This poignant story explores that question. | Continue reading
Inside the groundbreaking face transplant that has given a young woman a second chance at life | Continue reading