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Keeper of Pigments at Harvard Art Museums

Art is not an afterthought, Narayan Khandekar is often fond of saying. The Lascaux Caves in France, sometimes called the Sistine Chapel for Prehistoric Art, is his favorite example. Living on hunted bulls, bison, and reindeer, some early humans still took the time to grind...

The Curious Zookeeper of Extraordinary Organisms

In his backyard in Atlanta,Saad Bhamla, professor of chemical and biomolecular Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology, observed the glassy sharpshooter with interest. The lightweight insect was peeing for hours in droplets and proceeded to super-propel them into the distance. A high-speed camera would reveal...

Vibrant Pigments, Global Exchange

Against a field of deep blue, sword‑bearing demons surge toward a sacred fire. Ram — yellow‑clad, rendered in blue — lets loose a rain of arrows, with Lakshmana steady at his side. Vermilion blood spills from the demons as the ritual tilts toward battle. Demons...

City Lights, Vanishing Stars

One December evening I climbed up to the mottai-madi, the bare terrace atop my parents’ four-floor apartment building in Chennai and waited for darkness to descend. The sun still hung low—an orange-red orb in the distance. Overhead, rose-ringed parakeets zipped towards their nightly roosts, squawking...

The Madras Hedgehog

For the longest time, I thought hedgehogs were simply critters from British children’s books. But three different species of hedgehogs — living, breathing mammals — inhabit the Indian subcontinent alone. Of these, we know very little about the Madras Hedgehog (Paraechinus nudiventris), says Dr. Brawin Kumar,...

Virtual Therapeutics

Phantom limb pain is a neurological paradox: a limb that no longer exists can still hurt. For many amputees, the sensation is intense, persistent, and unmistakably real. The sensation has been described in medical literature as far back as in the 16th century and has...