Biomechanical interactions, rather than neurons, control the movements of one of the simplest animals. The discovery offers a glimpse into how animal behavior worked before neurons evolved.

This Animal's Behavior Is Mechanically Programmed

Susan Valot narrates in-depth news episodes based on Quanta Magazine's articles about mathematics, physics, biology and computer science.

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Physics

Life Sciences

A recent neurological study provides an unprecedented look at how number sense works in the human brain.

Why the Human Brain Perceives Small Numbers Better

An Icelandic peninsula that hadn't seen any volcanism for 800 years has now awoken. Eruptions could continue for decades or even centuries.

Inside Scientists' Life-Saving Prediction of the Iceland Eruption

Physics is a rich well of inspiration for mathematicians to draw from.

Echoes of Electromagnetism Found in Number Theory

Using large language models to generate training data for smaller models might be more effective than vacuuming up text from the internet and filtering out the garbage.

Tiny Language Models Come of Age

Astronomers have long known of rogue worlds - cosmic loners that drift through space, untethered to a star. Now JWST is spotting them in pairs.

This Animal's Behavior Is Mechanically Programmed

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