Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
Simple, versatile and just four millimetres long, a new ‘soft-bodied’ robot developed at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Stuttgart in Germany is capable of navigating tight and challenging terrain, both on land and in water. The small device is controlled by magnets and looks like little more than a miniature strip of gum, but it can jump, wriggle and swim through just about any small space. Its size and adaptability has its creators hopeful that it can succeed where other small robots have, thus far, mostly failed: performing tasks inside the human body. Read more about the robot in Nature.
Video by Nature
video
Meaning and the good life
Why Orwell urged his readers to celebrate the spring, cynics be damned
11 minutes
video
Making
On the Norwegian coast, a tree is transformed into a boat the old-fashioned way
6 minutes
video
Animals and humans
One man’s quest to save an orphaned squirrel, as narrated by David Attenborough
14 minutes
video
Computing and artificial intelligence
A future in which ‘artificial scientists’ make discoveries may not be far away
9 minutes
video
History
Hags, seductresses, feminist icons – how gender dynamics manifest in witches
13 minutes
video
Earth science and climate
Images carved into film form a haunting elegy for a disappearing slice of Earth
3 minutes
video
Biology
Butterflies become unrecognisable landscapes when viewed under electron microscopes
4 minutes
video
War and peace
Two Ukrainian boys’ summer unfolds just miles from the frontlines
22 minutes
video
Nature and landscape
California’s landscapes provide endless inspiration for a woodcut printmaker
10 minutes