A mushroom cloud rises from the first atomic explosion, detonated on July 16, 1945 in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Three American spies were long known for having stolen U.S. atomic secrets between 1940 and 1948, sharing that information with the Soviets.…
Famous painters da Vinci and Rembrandt, though from different centuries, had one oddity in common: The way the artists saw themselves in the mirror was likely a bit different than how others saw them, according to new findings. The Renaissance…
This horned “rook” may be the world’s oldest-known chess piece. In the game of chess, a rook can move as many spaces as it can in one direction. Or, it can sit stone-still and guard the pieces around it, potentially…
The reptile’s long tail is visible, but most of the crocodile’s body is hidden under the bulk of the elephant that crushed it to death. A recent confrontation between an elephant and a crocodile ended in a surprising twist that…
Aye-ayes possess small “pseudothumbs” — complete with their own fingerprints — that may help them grip objects and branches as they move through trees. There’s a little extra thumb-thing on the hand of the aye-aye, a strange-looking nocturnal lemur native…
On Sept. 15, a group of journalists visited the control room of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant’s reactor 4. Tourists can now visit the control room of Chernobyl’s Reactor 4, the scene of the world’s worst nuclear disaster. But the…