Natural Sciences

Perhaps the most fundamental philosophical question that you can ask in science is: "Why are we here?"

To understand the universe, we have to bring together the two key ideas that are governing modern physics. On the one hand, we have Einstein’s...

The project is called SESAME — as in “Open, Sesame!” — and it is an acronym for Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East.

The machine functions a bit like an X-ray. About 50 of these “light sources” exist around...

Robbert Dijkgraaf, Director and Leon Levy Professor, narrates The Mind of the Universe, a ten-part television series that explores the work of thirty scientists. The program features Institute scholars including Juan Maldacena, Carl P. Feinberg...

It’s a fascinating question, “How far can you see in the universe?”

As far as we know the universe is not infinite, there's actually a place where it ends. While astronomers have never actually seen the edge of the universe, they know it's out there...

The New York Times's Dennis Overbye writes about the origins and purpose of Sesame (Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East), a project spearheaded by former Member Eliezer Rabinovici, a theoretical physicist...

Professor Nima Arkani-Hamed is among those newly elected.

Einstein’s general theory of relativity taught us that the universe is expanding, but we have only recently discovered the pace of that expansion and its consequences. View the video at Business Insider as Robbert Dijkgraaf, Institute Director and...

How does science work? . . . The scientific method—famously objective, logical and eminently reliable; and the fruits of its success, both pure and applied, are the single most obvious factor in distinguishing the varying levels of progress between...

Proving the Riemann hypothesis remains arguably the most important unsolved problem in pure mathematics—one whose solution would fetch a $1 million Millennium Prize from the Clay Mathematics Institute. Conversely, as the number theorist Enrico...

Mathematics might be more of an environmental science than we realize. Robbert Dijkgraaf, Director and Leon Levy Professor, explores the possibility of developing a new realm of mathematics in order to fully understand the quantum world.