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To save Oklahoma from treacherous tornados, scientists in the 2024 blockbuster “Twisters” try to use a real-life technique called cloud seeding. But would this really work? Researchers have actually been using cloud seeding to modify the weather since the 1940s. For professor Katja Friedrich, it’s a promising way to address some of the issues caused by climate change.

Dogs don’t talk to us the way our human best friends do, but they are biologically prepared to communicate with us in a range of ways. What if we could understand our furry companions better? Dr. Emily Bray, a canine cognition specialist, says that dogs are better at understanding us than we are them, but there are ways we can bridge the gap.

Fireworks have been used to dazzle and entertain for centuries. These spectacles can seem out of this world, and they’re directly related to Kate the Chemist’s favorite subject: chemistry. Kate answers your questions about fireworks, including what causes their sound, colors and even smell.

We haven’t been giving the Plant Kingdom enough credit. Plants can move, attack, communicate, and adapt — even though they don’t have what's normally defined as a brain. But do plants meet the criteria for intelligent life? That’s the question Paco Calvo and Natalie Lawrence explore in their book “Planta Sapiens: Unmasking Plant Intelligence.”

Asteroids heading straight for planet Earth aren’t just a scenario out of a Hollywood thriller. Luckily, scientists around the world have long been preparing for such an “Armageddon” scenario.Kate The Chemist speaks with Nancy Chabot, one of the leaders behind NASA’s planetary defense missions, about destroying asteroids in space before they reach our atmosphere.

Over the last few years, the box office has been dominated by films like "Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse" that explore ideas of parallel universes, quantum worlds and alternate lives. There's some real science behind those ideas, but they may not look exactly how we imagine. Theoretical physicist Sean Carroll helps us untangle the madness from the multiverse.

In April 2023 alone, floods hit numerous regions of the United States, including land-locked states like Kansas, Tennessee and Colorado. With warmer temperatures and human activity causing the oceans to rise and the ground to sink, flooding is now a question of “when,” not “if.” NOAA oceanographer William Sweet explains why those disasters are getting worse and how we can prepare for a “floodier future.”

In February 2021, Texas and wide swaths of North America were shut down by Winter Storm Uri, which caused massive blackouts and left millions of people without power for days. The winter storms exposed vulnerabilities in our country’s electrical grid, and underlined the pressing need for a more reliable energy system. Is a recent breakthrough in nuclear fusion a possible path forward?

In 1997, Captain Charles Moore discovered the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch,” the largest accumulation of plastic waste in the ocean. Since then, scientists have documented how plastic has permanently damaged marine ecosystems and even altered evolution. But marine biologist Danni Washington says it’s not all “doom and gloom" — scientists are already putting innovative solutions in motion to protect our oceans.

We tend to think of getting older as inevitable, but what if it’s actually something we can control? Researchers like David Sinclair and Nir Barzilai have discovered some of the secrets to reversing aging, found animals who defy our understandings of life, and turned old mice young again. But even if humans could live forever, should we?