Fire it up! We explain hot stuff.

2,300 years ago, the rulers of Alexandria set out to fulfill a very audacious goal: to collect all the knowledge in the world under one roof. In its prime, the Library of Alexandria housed an unprecedented number of scrolls and attracted...

Hank describes three of the whackest weather phenomena on Earth: atmospheric rivers, fire tornadoes, and ball lightning. Super interesting and super weird.

In 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt legendarily spared the life of a black bear -- and prompted a plush toy craze for so-called "teddy bears." Writer Jon Mooallem digs into this toy story and asks us to consider how the tales we tell...

Feeling like the world is becoming less friendly? Social theorist Jonathan Zittrain begs to differ. The Internet, he suggests, is made up of millions of disinterested acts of kindness, curiosity and trust.

Ragnarok! It's the end of the world, Norse style. It's got everything you want in an apocalypse. Earthquakes, destruction, armies of the dead, a giant evil wolf, giants with flaming swords, and a kind of happy ending. It's got it all....

Some lucky animals are naturally endowed with bioluminescence, or the ability to create light. The firefly, the anglerfish, and a few more surprising creatures use this ability in many ways, including survival, hunting, and mating....

In this video Paul Andersen explains how water quality can be degraded by pollutants. Wastewater is the main source of water pollution and can be measure using the BOD (biochemical oxygen demand). Dead zones, cultural eutrophication,...

What's your sign? In Western astrology, it's a constellation determined by when your birthday falls in the calendar. But according to the Chinese zodiac (__), it's your shuxiang, meaning the animal assigned to your birth year. And of the...

Ray Bradbury’s novel imagines a world where books are banned- and possessing, let alone reading them, is forbidden.The protagonist, Montag, is a fireman responsible for destroying what remains. The story raises the question: how can you...

Ramesh Raskar presents femto-photography, a new type of imaging so fast it visualizes the world one trillion frames per second, so detailed it shows light itself in motion. This technology may someday be used to build cameras that can...

John La Grou unveils an ingenious new technology that will smarten up the electrical outlets in our homes, using microprocessors and RFID tags. The invention, Safeplug, promises to prevent deadly accidents like house fires -- and to...

In this video Paul Andersen explains how natural disasters (like earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes and flooding) have affected and will continue to affect humans on the planet. Many of the natural hazards (like volcanoes and storms) can...

Megafires, individual fires that burn more than 100,000 acres, are on the rise in the western United States -- the direct result of unintentional yet massive changes we've brought to the forests through a century of misguided management....

Your mortal enemy has captured you and hooked you up to a bizarre experiment. He's extended your nervous system with one very long neuron to a target about 70 meters away. At some point, he's going to fire an arrow. If you can then think...

Hank takes a break from the desk to bring you to the lab in order to demonstrate some important points about the practical side of chemistry - experimentation in the laboratory. You'll learn what to wear in the lab, how to dispose of...

We ranked dragons based on how biologically and evolutionarily plausible they are.

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A song of ants and fire and ant-decapitating flies.

The world owes much of its cultural legacy to Constantinople's walls. When Constantinople was under seige by neighboring enemies, the Roman city's elaborate system of moats, outer walls, and inner walls stood tall. Surviving numerous...

New ReviewProfessor Hyll presents the story of Ragnarok: the Norse apocalypse and end of the world. He also explains the cyclical nature of the Norse Myths and how the end is the beginning in a constant cycle of birth and rebirth.

New ReviewFire breaks out as US consulate in Dubai hit by drone strikeCredit: Social media

New ReviewIn this video, the speaker discusses ten untranslatable German words that English should steal. From "yine" (a mix between yes and no) to "Fernweh" (a longing for faraway lands), these words capture unique concepts that English lacks....

New ReviewBeing a teacher is mostly consumed with times helping students learn content and teaching in front of the classroom. You don't think of many opportunities for teachers to embarass themselves but I found some.

New ReviewToday, together with Doctor Mac Wheelie, we will paint a real fire truck! Let's start with the wheels, they are black, wheel rims - gray, then paint the fenders, ladder, compartment with tools and all this - gray! We still have the...