Best Science Books of 2025

A girl believes she has been struck blind for stealing a kiss. A mother watches helplessly as each of her children is replaced by a changeling. A woman is haunted each month by the same four chords of a single song. In neurology, illness is inextricably linked with narrative, the clues to unraveling these mysteries hidden in both the details of a patient's story and the tells of their body. Stories are etched into the very structure of our brains, coded so deeply that the impulse for storytelling survives and even surges after the most devastating injuries. But our brains are also porous--the stories they concoct shaped by cultural narratives about bodies and illness that permeate the minds of doctors and patients alike. In the history of medicine, some stories are heard, while others--the narratives of women, of Black and brown people, of displaced people, of disempowered people--are too often dismissed. In The Mind Electric, neurologist Pria Anand reveals--through case study, history, fable, and memoir--all that the medical establishment has overlooked: the complexity and wonder of brains in health and in extremis, and the vast gray area between sanity and insanity, doctor and patient, and illness and wellness, each separated from the next by the thin veneer of a different story. Moving from the Boston hospital where she treats her patients, to her childhood years in India, to Isla Providencia in the Caribbean and to the Republic of Guinea in West Africa, she demonstrates again and again the compelling paradox at the heart of neurology: that even the most peculiar symptoms can show us something universal about ourselves as humans. -- Provided by the publisher.

From the author of The Shallows, a bracing exploration of how social media has warped our sense of self and society. From the telegraph and telephone in the 1800s to the internet and social media in our own day, the public has welcomed new communication systems. Whenever people gain more power to share information, the assumption goes, society prospers. Superbloom tells a startlingly different story. As communication becomes more mechanized and efficient, it breeds confusion more than understanding, strife more than harmony. Media technologies all too often bring out the worst in us. A celebrated commentator on the human consequences of technology, Nicholas Carr reorients the conversation around modern communication, challenging some of our most cherished beliefs about self-expression, free speech, and media democratization. He reveals how messaging apps strip nuance from conversation, how "digital crowding" erodes empathy and triggers aggression, how online political debates narrow our minds and distort our perceptions, and how advances in AI are further blurring the already hazy line between fantasy and reality. Even as Carr shows how tech companies and their tools of connection have failed us, he forces us to confront inconvenient truths about our own nature. The human psyche, it turns out, is profoundly ill-suited to the "superbloom" of information that technology has unleashed. With rich psychological insights and vivid examples drawn from history and science, Superbloom provides both a panoramic view of how media shapes society and an intimate examination of the fate of the self in a time of radical dislocation. It may be too late to change the system, Carr counsels, but it's not too late to change ourselves.

"The thrilling and terrifying seventy-year story of the physics that deciphered the atom and created the hydrogen bomb Although Henri Becquerel didn't know it at the time, he changed history in 1895 when he left photographic plates and some uranium rocks in a drawer. The rocks emitted something that exposed the plates: it was the first documented evidence of spontaneous radioactivity. So began one of the most exciting and consequential efforts humans have ever undertaken. As Frank Close recounts in Destroyer of Worlds, scientists confronting Becquerel's discovery had three questions: What was this phenomenon? Could it be a source of unlimited power? And (alas), could it be a weapon? Answering them was an epic journey of discovery, with Ernest Rutherford, Enrico Fermi, Irene Joliot-Curie, and many others jockeying to decipher the dance of particles in a decaying atom. And it was a terrifying journey as well, as Edward Teller and others pressed on from creating atom bombs to hydrogen bombs so powerful that they could destroy all life on Earth. The deep history of the nuclear age has never before been recounted so vividly. Centered on an extraordinary cast of characters, Destroyer of Worlds charts the course of nuclear physics from simple curiosity to potential Armageddon"-- Provided by publisher.

"In 2019, John Green met Henry, a young tuberculosis patient at Lakka Government Hospital in Sierra Leone while traveling with Partners in Health. John became fast friends with Henry, a boy with spindly legs and a big, goofy smile. In the years since that first visit to Lakka, Green has become a vocal and dynamic advocate for increased access to treatment and wider awareness of the healthcare inequities that allow this curable, treatable infectious disease to also be the deadliest, killing 1.5 million people every year. In Everything is Tuberculosis, John tells Henry's story, woven through with the scientific and social histories of how tuberculosis has shaped our world and how our choices will shape the future of tuberculosis." -- Provided by publisher.

"From a brilliant longtime AI Insider with intimate access to the world of Sam Altman's OpenAI, an eye-opening account of arguably the most fateful tech arms race in history, reshaping the planet in real time, from the cockpit of the company that is driving the frenzy"--Dust jacket.

Superagency offers a roadmap for using AI inclusively and adaptively to improve our lives and create positive change. While acknowledging challenges like disinformation and potential job changes, the book focuses on AI's immense potential to increase individual agency and create better outcomes for society as a whole. Imagine AI tutors personalizing education for each child, researchers rapidly discovering cures for diseases like Alzheimer's and cancer, and AI advisors empowering people to navigate complex systems and achieve their goals. Hoffman and co-author, tech and culture writer Greg Beato envision a world where these possibilities, and many more, become a reality. Superagency challenges conventional fears, inviting us to view the future through a lens of opportunity, rather than fear. It's a call to action; to embrace AI with excitement and actively shape a world where human ingenuity and the power of AI combine to create something extraordinary.

"Off the beaten path, on unmarked trails, we are wired to explore. More than just a need to get outside, the search for the unknown is a specific, primal urge that has shaped the history of our species and continues to mold our behavior in ways we are just beginning to understand. In fact, the latest evolutionary neuroscience suggests that exploration is an essential ingredient of human life. Exploration, it turns out, isn't merely a hobby-it's our story. In this long-awaited follow-up to his New York Times bestseller Endure, Alex Hutchinson dives headfirst into a fascinating and provocative new field of research, examining how exploration is a fundamental part of what makes us human and revealing how, even in our fully mapped modern world, the pursuit of the unknown remains an indispensable mindset in all walks of life. And yet, it has never been easier to live an exploration-free life, without the struggle and uncertainty that true exploration-of places, experiences, and ideas-requires. With the digital world frequently exploiting the neural circuitry behind our drive to explore, we receive the illusion of novelty without accompanying growth. This despite mounting evidence that our lives are better-more productive, more satisfying, and more fun-when we ditch the maps on our phones and find our own way. From paddling the lost rivers of the northern Canadian wilderness to the ocean-spanning voyages of the Polynesians, The Explorer's Gene combines riveting stories of exploration with cutting-edge insights from behavioral psychology and neuroscience. The end result offers a singular approach to finding meaning in our past struggles, embracing the possibility of failure in our future, and crucially, recognizing when our present is good enough"-- Provided by publisher.

"Whether it's the mighty pyramids of Egypt or the majestic temples of Mexico, we have a good idea of what the past looked like. But what about our other senses: The tang of Roman fish sauce and the springy crust of Egyptian sourdough? The boom of medieval cannons and the clash of Viking swords? The frenzied plays of an Aztec ballgame... and the chilling reality that the losers might also lose their lives? History often neglects the tastes, textures, sounds, and smells that were an intimate part of our ancestors' lives, but a new generation of researchers is resurrecting those hidden details, pioneering an exciting new discipline called experimental archaeology. These are scientists gone rogue: They make human mummies. They investigate the unsolved murders of ancient bog bodies. They carve primitive spears and go hunting, then knap their own obsidian blades to skin the game. They build perilous boats and plunge out onto the open sea--all in the name of experiencing history as it was, with all its dangers, disappointments, and unexpected delights. Beloved author Sam Kean joins these experimental archaeologists on their adventures across the globe, from the Andes to the South Seas. He fires medieval catapults, tries his hand at ancient surgery and tattooing, builds Roman-style roads--and, in novelistic interludes, spins gripping tales about the lives of our ancestors with vivid imagination and his signature meticulous research. Lively, offbeat, and filled with stunning revelations about our past, Dinner with King Tut sheds light on days long gone and the intrepid experts resurrecting them today, with startling, lifelike detail and more than a few laughs along the way"-- Provided by publisher.

"An award-winning mathematician shows how we prove what's true, and what to do when we can't. How do we establish what we believe? And how can we be certain that what we believe is true? And how do we convince other people that it is true? For thousands of years, from the ancient Greeks to the Arabic golden age to the modern world, science has used different methods-logical, empirical, intuitive, and more-to separate fact from fiction. But it all had the same goal: find perfect evidence and be rewarded with universal truth. As mathematician Adam Kucharski shows, however, there is far more to proof than axioms, theories, and laws: when demonstrating that a new medical treatment works, persuading a jury of someone's guilt, or deciding whether you trust a self-driving car, the weighing up of evidence is far from simple. To discover proof, we must reach into a thicket of errors and biases and embrace uncertainty-and never more so than when existing methods fail. Spanning mathematics, science, politics, philosophy, and economics, this book offers the ultimate exploration of how we can find our way to proof-and, just as importantly, of how to go forward when supposed facts falter"-- Provided by publisher.

"Hailed in the New York Times as "a naturalist who can unfurl a sentence with the breathless ease of a master angler," Robert Macfarlane brings his glittering style to a profound work of travel writing, reportage, and natural history. Is a River Alive? is a joyful, mind-expanding exploration of an ancient, urgent idea: that rivers are living beings who should be recognized as such in imagination and law. Macfarlane takes readers on three unforgettable journeys teeming with extraordinary people, stories, and places: to the miraculous cloud-forests and mountain streams of Ecuador, to the wounded creeks and lagoons of India, and to the spectacular wild rivers of Canada--imperiled respectively by mining, pollution, and dams. Braiding these journeys is the life story of the fragile chalk stream a mile from Macfarlane's house, a stream who flows through his own years and days. Powered by dazzling prose and lit throughout by other minds and voices, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, challenge perspectives, and remind us that our fate flows with that of rivers--and always has." -- Provided by publisher.

"An illuminating tour through the manufacturing world and its seismic influence on our lives, from internationally renowned expert Tim Minshall. We live in a manufactured world. Unless you are floating naked through space, you are right now in direct contact with multiple manufactured products, including furniture, technology, clothing, and even food. And yet the processes by which these things appear in our lives are virtually invisible. How often do we stop to think: Where do the things we buy actually come from? How are they made, and how do they make their way into our hands? The answers can be found in How Things Are Made, which traces the surprising paths taken by everyday items to reach consumers, from design to creation to delivery. Innovation expert Tim Minshall takes us on a journey through the manufacturing world, from the smallest job shops to mega-factories, from global shipping hubs to local delivery at your door, revealing the inner workings of the system that runs 24-7-365 to make and deliver the things we need-or want-to live our daily lives, including cars, cakes, phones, planes, drugs, and medical devices. Along the way, he explores how we can improve the fragility of our global manufacturing system and the impact it has on the natural world, presenting a path to a truly sustainable future. Brimming with energy and lively examples, How Things Are Made maps the awe-inspiring global system of manufacturing that enables virtually every aspect of our existence. By making sense of this surprising and hidden world, we are able to make better choices for ourselves, our communities, and the planet."-- Provided by publisher.

"From a neurologist and award-winning author of The Sleeping Beauties, a meticulous and compassionate exploration of how our culture of medical diagnosis can harm, rather than help, patients. I'm a neurologist. Diagnosis is my bread and butter. So why then would I, an experienced medical doctor, be very careful about which diagnosis I would pursue for myself or would be willing to accept if foisted upon me? We live in an age of diagnosis. The advance of sophisticated genetic sequencing techniques means that we may all soon be screened for potential abnormalities. The internet provides a vast array of information that helps us speculate about our symptoms. Conditions like ADHD and Autism are on the rapid rise, while other new categories like Long Covid are driven by patients themselves. When we are suffering, it feels natural to seek a diagnosis. We want a clear label, understanding, and, of course, treatment. But is diagnosis an unqualified good thing? Could it sometimes even make us worse instead of better? Through the moving stories of real people, neurologist Suzanne O'Sullivan explores the complex world of modern diagnosis, comparing the impact of a medical label to the pain of not knowing. With scientific authority and compassionate storytelling, she opens up new possibilities for how we might approach our health and our suffering"-- Provided by publisher.

"The bestselling author of Your Inner Fish takes readers on an epic adventure to the North and South Poles to uncover the secrets locked in the ice and profoundly shift our understanding of life, the cosmos, and our future on the planet. For three decades, renowned scientist Neil Shubin has made extraordinary discoveries by leading scientific expeditions to the sweeping ice landscapes of the Arctic and Antarctic. He's survived polar storms and faced the limits of human endurance to explore questions of how life survived and adapted, and what our future on a changing planet may hold. Scientific discoveries at Earth's polar regions have changed the way we see the world and these insights are becoming ever more urgent. These landscapes are the epicenter for rapid change to our planet, with ice retreating, animal species moving toward the equator or going extinct, Indigenous communities confronting dramatic environmental changes, and political battles heating up for newly accessible mineral and gas resources. In the end, what happens at the poles does not stay in the poles--events there in the coming years will affect all life and every nation on the planet. The book blends travel, science, and environmental writing to deepen our understanding of animal and plant life, the history of our ice ages, the age of dinosaurs, the history of Western exploration, and the clues meteorites preserved at the poles contain about the cosmos. Written with infectious enthusiasm and irresistible curiosity, Shubin shares lively adventure stories from the field to reveal just how far scientists will go to understand polar regions and to reveal the poles' impact on the rest of life on the planet"-- Provided by publisher.

"The riveting account of a community from the remote mountains of Colombia whose rare and fatal genetic mutation is unlocking the secrets of Alzheimer's disease In the 1980s, a neurologist named Francisco Lopera traveled on horseback into the mountains seeking families with symptoms of dementia. For centuries, residents of certain villages near Medellín had suffered memory loss as they reached middle age, going on to die in their fifties. Lopera discovered that a unique genetic mutation was causing their rare hereditary form of early onset Alzheimer's disease. Over the next forty years of working with the "paisa mutation" kindred, he went on to build a world-class research program in a region beset by violence and poverty. In Valley of Forgetting, Jennie Erin Smith brings readers into the clinic, the laboratories, and the Medellín trial center where Lopera's patients receive an experimental drug to see if Alzheimer's can be averted. She chronicles the lives of people who care for sick parents, spouses, and siblings, all while struggling to keep their own dreams afloat. These Colombian families have donated hundreds of their loved ones' brains to science and subjected themselves to invasive testing to help uncover how Alzheimer's develops and whether it can be stopped. Findings from this unprecedented effort could hold the key to understanding and treating the disease, though it is unclear what, if anything, the families will receive in return. Smith's immersive storytelling brings this complex drama to life, inviting readers on a scientific journey that is as deeply moving as it is engrossing"-- Provided by publisher.

"Daughter. Duhitár-. Dustr. Dukte. Listen to these English, Sanskrit, Armenian and Lithuanian words, all meaning the same thing, and you hear echoes of one of history's most unlikely journeys. All four languages-along with hundreds of others, from French and Gaelic, to Persian and Polish-trace their origins to an ancient tongue spoken as the last ice age receded. This language, which we call Proto-Indo-European, was born between Europe and Asia and exploded out of its cradle, fragmenting as it spread east and west. Its last speaker died thousands of years ago, yet Proto-Indo-European lives on in its myriad linguistic offspring and in some of our best loved works of literature, including Dante's Inferno and the Rig Veda, The Lord of the Rings and the love poetry of Rumi. How did this happen? Acclaimed journalist Laura Spinney set out to answer that question, retracing the Indo-European odyssey across continents and millennia. With her we travel the length of the steppe, navigating the Caucasus, the silk roads and the Hindu Kush. We retrace the epic journeys of nomads and monks, warriors and kings - the ancient peoples who carried these languages far and wide. In the present, Spinney meets the scientists on a thrilling mission to retrieve the lost languages and their speakers: the linguists, archaeologists and geneticists who have reconstructed that ancient diaspora. What they have learned has profound implications for our modern world, because people and their languages are on the move again. Proto is a revelatory portrait of world history in its own words."-- Publisher.

"An anthropologist and hotshot firefighter's gripping firsthand account of a record-setting fire season. Eighteen of California's largest wildfires on record have burned in the past two decades. Scientists recently invented the term "megafire" to describe wildfires that behave in ways that would have been impossible just a generation ago, burning through winter, exploding in the night, and devastating landscapes historically impervious to incendiary destruction. Wildland firefighters must navigate these new scales of destruction in real time. In When It All Burns, Jordan Thomas recounts a single, brutal six-month fire season with the Los Padres Hotshots-the special forces of America's firefighters. Being a hotshot is among the most difficult jobs on Earth. Their training is as grueling as any Navy SEAL's, and the social induction is even tougher. As Thomas viscerally renders his crew's attempts to battle flames that are often too destructive to contain, he uncovers the hidden cultural history of megafires. He investigates how a social system that prioritizes profit over people and nature has turned humanity's symbiotic relationship with wildfire into a war-and what can be done to change it back. Thomas weaves ecology and the history of indigenous oppression, federal forestry, and the growth of the fire industrial complex into an expansive, riveting narrative of a new phase in the climate crisis. Above all, he immerses readers in a story of friendship and community in the most perilous of circumstances, told with humor, humility, and affection"-- Provided by publisher.

"One of the most respected, celebrated, and influential medical researchers in the world gives a guided tour of the revolution in longevity science that is exploding now. This is an evidence-based approach to longevity in a market drenched in snake oil-Eric Topol doesn't promise a silver bullet to magically stop the aging process, he shows how preventing the development of killer chronic diseases like obesity, heart disease, cancer and neurodegeneration is completely changing what "old age" can be. And we can start long before middle age-or long after. Dr. Topol shows how and why you can deal with chronic problems now instead of waiting until it is too late. Breakthrough treatments have been developed from new tools, new understanding of how our personal genomes work, and what AI can see in our health data. We can now engineer cells, build proteins and find drugs that make us live longer, better. Many of these treatments are on the shelf now-or soon will be-and improving fast. Our author is the ultimate guide because he participated in developing and testing many of them. The first part of the book "The New Age of Healthspan" describes inspiring patients aged 90+, sets out the dimensions of the new advances in the treatments of age related diseases, and details an expanded definition of what a healthy lifestyle means now-good sleep, diet, exercise, sure, but much beyond. He calls it Lifestyle+. He then turns to the "Chronic Killers"-Obesity/Diabetes, Heart Disease, Cancer, and Neurodegeneration. Parts on the "Big Collateral Implications" and "Thinking Ahead" follow and include ways we might eventually come to reverse the aging process itself"-- Provided by publisher.

"Cardiac, smooth, skeletal--these three different types of muscles in our bodies make our hearts beat; push food through our intestines, blood through our vessels, babies out the uterus; attach to our bones and allow for motion. Tsui also traces how muscles have defined beauty--and how they have distorted it--through the ages, and how they play an essential role in our physical and mental health."-- From publisher's description.

"Darwin considered humans one part of the web of life, not the apex of a natural hierarchy. Yet today many maintain that we are the most intelligent, virtuous, successful species that ever lived. This flawed thinking enables us to exploit the earth towards our own exclusive ends, throwing us into a perilous planetary imbalance. But is this view and way of life inevitable? The Arrogant Ape shows that human exceptionalism is an ideology that relies more on human culture than our biology, more on delusion and faith than on evidence. Harvard primatologist Christine Webb has spent years researching the rich social, emotional, and cognitive lives of our closest living relatives. She exposes the ways that many scientific studies are biased against other speciesand reveals underappreciated complexities of nonhuman life-from the language of songbirds and prairie dogs, to the cultures of chimpanzees and reef fishes, to the acumen of plants and fungi. With compelling stories and fresh research she gives us a paradigm-shifting way of looking at other organisms on their own terms, one that is revolutionizing our perception both of them and of ourselves. Critiques of human exceptionalism tend to focus on our moral obligation towards other species. They overlook what humanity also stands to gain by dismantling its illusions of uniqueness and superiority. This shift in perspective fills us with a sense of awe and satisfies one of our oldest and deepest desires to belong to the larger whole we inhabit. What's at stake isa better, sustainable way of life with the potential to heal and rejuvenate our shared planet"-- Provided by publisher.

"A deeply reported and wide-ranging look at the people, and the technology, predicting and tracking weather in order to raise public awareness to keep one step ahead of extreme weather. For millennia, humans have tried to understand and predict the weather. In the 1950s and 60s, the Space Age helped usher in satellites and radar, while computers made it possible to plug all that data into complex equations that predicted the atmosphere's future behavior. Now a new wave of forecasting advances is unfolding, driven by artificial intelligence, drones, and new types of satellites. The Internet of Things has turned everything from cellphones to cars into ubiquitous weather sensors. Equally significant are new efforts to understand how people respond to forecasts and warnings. Scientists and government officials are realizing that how people get their weather information, and how they use it, are crucial to the outcomes of weather events. Among other things, some inequities, such as economic and health issueas, as well as language barriers, can put vulnerable groups at increased risk due to weather. In CLOUD WARRIORS, veteran journalist Thomas E. Weber takes us on a fascinating tour of how meteorologists, scientists, and officials track and prepare for major weather events, such as hurricanes, tornados, floods, forest fires, extreme heat, and winter storms. As climate change is altering our planet and making weather events more extreme, readers will meet those on the front lines of weather preparation and prediction. We travel from coast-to-coast, to space and back, from National Weather Service to AccuWeather, meeting TV meteorologists and storm chasers, city planners and backyard weatherman. This is a book about the weather-and the power of being able to see it coming"--Provided by publisher.

"At the age of twenty-one, college student Ben Weissenbach set out into the Alaskan wilderness armed with little more than inspiration from his literary heroes and a growing interest in climate change. What meets him there is a landscape both stark and awe-inspiring-a part of the world seen by few outside a small contingent of scientists with big personalities. There's Roman Dial, the larger-than-life field scientist who leads him on a five week journey into the Alaskan backcountry. There's Kenji Yoshikawa, the isolated researcher who leaves Ben alone for eleven days to care for his remote cabin, where temperatures at night drop to -49 degrees Fahrenheit. And there's Matt Nolan, the independent glaciologist who flies planes onto glaciers. As Ben's mental and physical resilience is tested, he discovers far more than his own limits; struck by the landscape's staggering beauty and sheer indifference to humanity, Ben emerges from each experience with a new perspective on our modern relationships to technology-and a deep sense of wonder for our natural world"-- Provided by publisher.

"In 2023, hundreds of AI luminaries signed an open letter warning that artificial intelligence poses a serious risk of human extinction. Since then, the AI race has only intensified. Companies and countries are rushing to build machines that will be smarter than any person. And the world is devastatingly unprepared for what would come next. For decades, two signatories of that letter ; Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soares ; have studied how smarter-than-human intelligences will think, behave, and pursue their objectives. Their research says that sufficiently smart AIs will develop goals of their own that put them in conflict with us ; and that if it comes to conflict, an artificial superintelligence would crush us. The contest wouldn't even be close. How could a machine superintelligence wipe out our entire species? Why would it want to? Would it want anything at all? In this urgent book, Yudkowsky and Soares walk through the theory and the evidence, present one possible extinction scenario, and explain what it would take for humanity to survive. The world is racing to build something truly new under the sun. And if anyone builds it, everyone dies." -- Provided by publisher.

"The fascinating, untold story of the air we breathe; what lives in it and can make us sick; and the men and women who devoted their lives to showing us how"-- Provided by publisher.