The Culture Desk

Home of The Culturist, Big Ideas and other special collections. Kick back with long articles, best of the week, and entertainment guides galore.

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Culture
'The Future Of Literature': Whiting Awards Celebrate 10 Emerging Writers
NPR - Colin Dwyer
Fair warning: It may be tough to find some of the 2019 Whiting Award winners on the shelves of your local bookstore. Most of the emerging writers have little more than a single widely published book to
Game of Thrones
TV Addicts
flipboard.com - Entertainment Weekly
Follow for the latest TV news, reviews and behind-the-scenes scoops.
Music
Lizzo And Missy Elliott Trade Off On The Scorching-Hot 'Tempo'
NPR - Joshua Bote
Truly, a Lizzo and Missy Elliott collaboration is a real-life fable; a cherished rap icon and a soon-to-be-coronated, years-in-wait talent coming in hot with a track that flows freely with their combined
Hulu
Hulu’s The Act Is Horrifying, Human, and Hard to Stop Watching
Glamour
Natalie Portman
‘Lucy in the Sky’ First Trailer: Natalie Portman Unravels After Space Mission
indiewire.com - Zack Sharf
The astronaut drama is the feature directorial debut of "Legion" and "Fargo" showrunner Noah Hawley. Natalie Portman has nailed the art of unraveling …
“Hotel Mumbai” and the Problem with Terrorism Movies
The New Yorker - Anthony Lane
Like other recent dramatizations of atrocity, the film, about the 2008 Islamist attacks in India, manipulates narrative tension to excite us, but the bleakness of historical facts produces a different
Business
What jumped out from new Theranos documentary "The Inventor"
Axios - Dan Primack
Last night I watched a screener copy of The Inventor, an upcoming HBO documentary from Alex Gibney on the rise and fall of Elizabeth Holmes and her …
The Arts
This Is Lupita Nyong’o. Hollywood, Please Keep Up.
The New York Times - By REGGIE UGWU
AUSTIN, Tex. — When she was around 11, Lupita Nyong’o’s parents brought home a cassette tape that changed her life. It was of the song “Regulate” by the West Coast hip-hop dynasts Warren G and Nate Dogg.
Technology
NASA's Mission to Bennu the Asteroid Stuns Scientists
The Atlantic - Marina Koren
A NASA spacecraft reached a space rock and found it orbited by tiny moons—a phenomenon that “has never been seen before in any solar-system object.” Billions of years ago, something—perhaps the vibrations
Science
The Giant Medusavirus Turns Victims to ‘Stone’
The Atlantic - Sarah Zhang
A newly discovered giant virus turns its victims to “stone.” The very first giant virus was discovered in a water-cooling tower in 2003. As the name suggests, giant viruses are unusually large and their
Environment
Tree rings contain secrets from the forest
Popular Science - By Marlene Cimons
These wooden cores could help us better understand climate change. Neil Pederson’s introduction to tree rings came from a “sweet and kindly” college instructor, who nevertheless was “one of the most boring
Magnetism
Humans—like other animals—may sense Earth’s magnetic field
sciencemag.org - Kelly Servick
A study published today offers some of the best evidence yet that humans, like many other creatures, can sense Earth’s magnetic field. But it doesn’t …
Physics
Quantum Machine Appears to Defy Universe’s Push for Disorder
Quanta Magazine - Marcus Woo
One of the first quantum simulators has produced a puzzling phenomenon: a row of atoms that repeatedly pops back into place. Physicists have been …
Fission
Biologists Discover Unknown Powers in Mighty Mitochondria
Quanta Magazine - Diana Kwon
Mitochondria are most famous as sources of metabolic energy. But by splitting and combining, they can also release chemical signals to regulate cell …
Hubble Space Telescope
Everything you wanted to know about stars
National Geographic
Science & InnovationExplainer These luminous balls of gas helped ancient explorers navigate the seas and now help modern-day scientists navigate the universe. 4 Minute Read Gently singing Twinkle, twinkle,
Edinburgh University
'Super-smeller' helps develop swab test for Parkinson's disease
The Guardian - Ian Sample Science editor
Distinctive musky odour of people with Parkinson’s could lead to earlier diagnosis Scientists have developed a test for Parkinson’s disease based on its signature odour after teaming up with a woman who
Vaccination
Key to saving lives of newborns lies in half a teaspoon of blood, study claims
The Guardian - Karen McVeigh
Research reveals striking changes in babies’ immune development that could form the basis for lifesaving vaccines A groundbreaking study has claimed that the key to saving the lives of newborns is found
Science
China clones 'Sherlock Holmes' police dog to cut training times: state media
Reuters - by David Stanway
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Scientists in southwest China's Yunnan province have cloned what they called the "Sherlock Holmes of police dogs" in a program they hope will help cut training times and costs for
Science
Science Says: Tiny 'water bears' can teach us about survival
Associated Press - BY SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) — Earth's ultimate survivors can weather extreme heat, cold, radiation and even the vacuum of space. Now the U.S. military hopes these tiny critters called tardigrades can teach us about
Science
Chop Up a Worm. It Will Regenerate. Scientists Figured Out Why.
The New York Times - By HEATHER MURPHY
An essential rite of passage for many an otherwise nonviolent child involves cutting an earthworm down the middle and watching as the two halves squirm. One half — the one with the brain — will typically
Contract Bridge
For the first time, mathematics' most prestigious prize has been awarded to a woman, Karen Uhlenbeck
CNN - By AJ Willingham, CNN
(CNN) — Karen Uhlenbeck, a mathematician and professor at the University of Texas, has been awarded this year's Abel Prize, a mathematics prize modeled after the Nobels. It's the first time the prize gone
Food Companies
The First Gene-Edited Food Is Now Being Served
WIRED - Megan Molteni
Not long after Calyxt moved into its shiny new steel and glass headquarters on the outskirts of Minneapolis last summer, a woman pulled her car into …
Health Care
Heart attacks are no longer a death sentence in the US
Quartz - Chase Purdy
In the US in the 1990s, having a heart attack was basically a death sentence for some 20% of the people who suffered one. The country’s medical community has spent the last three decades or so working
Science
In a first, fossil bird found with unlaid egg
National Geographic
Science & Innovation “I couldn’t even sleep at night,” the lead paleontologist says of her reaction to the discovery. 4 Minute Read About 115 million years ago in what's now northwest China, a female was
Animals
Mysterious ocean ‘blob’ may have led to fewer baby whales
National Geographic - Tim Vernimmen
Animals A persistent mass of warm water in the Arctic provided a preview of how climate change may impact humpback whales. 3 Minute Read Just a few years ago, it looked as if humpback whale populations
Yellowstone National Park
How dangerous are supervolcanoes? Get the facts.
National Geographic
Science & InnovationExplainer Though supervolcanoes like Yellowstone pose real dangers, their threats are often misunderstood and greatly exaggerated. Science & InnovationExplainer 5 Minute Read Supervolcanoes
Health Information
Just 10 Minutes of Exercise a Week May Be Enough to Extend Your Life, Study Says
TIME - Jamie Ducharme
Exercising for just 10 minutes a week is linked to a longer life, according to a new study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. Several recent studies have found that even low-intensity
Business
Pesticides in food: Strawberries, spinach, kale have the most residue, a new report finds
USA TODAY Money - Zlati Meyer
If you're looking for another reason not to eat spinach or kale, you now have one. The leafy greens are ranked second and third, respectively, on Environmental Working Group's Dirty Dozen, a list of the
Saltwater
Scientists can turn regular seawater into hydrogen fuel
Engadget - Amrita Khalid
The ocean may soon be a valuable source of renewable energy. A team of scientists at Stanford have figured out a way to make hydrogen fuel out of saltwater. The discovery could open up the world's oceans
Immune System
Women's Pain Is Different From Men's—the Drugs Could Be Too
WIRED - michele cohen marill
Men and women can’t feel each other’s pain. Literally. We have different biological pathways for chronic pain, which means pain-relieving drugs that …