Imagining…
Where Science Meets Creative Writing
Find a story within the topics above
How can we look at fossils and understand what creatures roamed the Earth millions of years ago?
How can we predict the behavior of materials deep within planetary interiors?
How can we reverse humanity’s impact on the global climate?
How can we predict habitats for life on other planets?
Doing impactful, innovative research requires training our brain to imagine the elusive unknown, even when bounded by scientific evidence. Now, more than ever in the history of human civilization, there is a pressing need to exercise our imagination muscles. Writing scientific fiction while accounting for the real science is a powerful way to do just that—to learn what is possible, what is probable, how we can change the future, and what our responsibility is to the future generation of our species.
Most Recent Stories
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Progress Without Morals
A scientist is trying to harness microbial properties to develop a fantastic tool. He believes he can; but should he?
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For Today’s Inspiration
- An Agricultural Mosaic in Taiwan
Diversity reigns across the farmland of Yunlin County in southwestern Taiwan—a region that produces an array of crops on small farms.
- Johnson Leaders Honored by National Space Club & Foundation
The National Space Club & Foundation announced its annual award recipients March 13, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Two dedicated leaders from NASA’s Johnson Space Center were recognized for their contributions to human spaceflight. Orion Program Manager Howard Hu received the Norman L. Baker Astronautics Engineer Award for sustained technical contributions to multiple human spaceflight efforts. Hu leads
- Hurricane Helene Ravaged Farmers’ Topsoil. They’re Still Fighting to Build It Back.
“We’re dirt farmers. Our primary job is to tend the dirt. That’s the basis of everything.”
- Gravity Waves Help Drive Sediment to the Deep Ocean
Laboratory experiments reveal that gravity wave-turbidity current interactions (combined flows) can enhance sediment transport to the deep ocean.
- Thousands of shady ads sell paper authorship for cash, large-scale investigation finds
Results are “only the tip of the iceberg” of shadowy paper-mill marketplace
- Octopus ‘krakens’ as large as semi-trucks stalked ancient seas
Giant cephalopods may have rivaled marine reptiles as apex predators during the age of the dinosaurs
- In This Issue
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume 123, Issue 16, April 2026. <br/>
- Sparse identification of nonlinear dynamics and Koopman operators with Shallow Recurrent Decoder Networks
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume 123, Issue 16, April 2026. <br/>SignificanceWe present sparse identification of nonlinear dynamics with shallow recurrent decoders (SINDy-SHRED), which jointly solves the sensing, model reduction and model identification problem with simple implementation, efficient computation, and …
- Closure of China’s influential journal ranking leaves academics reeling — what will take its place?
Nature, Published online: 24 April 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01277-2Several other lists have been launched in the past year, but some scholars want research evaluation to take new forms.
- Hit a glitch in your research? Some ‘night science’ thinking could move it forward
Nature, Published online: 24 April 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01294-1Itai Yanai and Martin Lercher outline a creative thinking strategy to liberate you from the daily grind of the lab.