Pollination: it's vital to life on Earth, but largely unseen by the human eye. Filmmaker Louie Schwartzberg shows us the intricate world of pollen and pollinators with gorgeous high-speed images from his film "Wings of Life," inspired by the vanishing of one of nature's primary pollinators, the honeybee.

Nearly 28,000 species of orchid grow all around the world, bearing every imaginable color, shape and pattern. There's a cunning purpose behind these elaborate displays: many orchids trick insects into pollinating, sometimes even into having sex with them. How do they deploy these deceptive tactics? Anne Gaskett dives into the surprisingly comple...

Honeybees have thrived for 50 million years, each colony 40 to 50,000 individuals coordinated in amazing harmony. So why, seven years ago, did colonies start dying en masse? Marla Spivak reveals four reasons which are interacting with tragic consequences. This is not simply a problem because bees pollinate a third of the world's crops. Could thi...

Scientists have been staking out a forest in Montana for an animal that's notoriously tricky to find. Camera traps haven't offered definitive evidence, and experts can't identify its tracks with certainty. But within the past decades, researchers have developed methods that can detect even the most elusive species. So how does it work? Hélène Mo...

Consider a bat that is infected with several deadly viruses, including ones that cause rabies, SARS, and Ebola. While this diagnosis would be lethal for other mammals, the winged wonder is totally unfazed, and may even spend the next 30 years living as if this were totally normal— because for bats, it is. So what's protecting bats from these dan...

Plants behave in some oddly intelligent ways: fighting predators, maximizing food opportunities ... But can we think of them as actually having a form of intelligence of their own? Italian botanist Stefano Mancuso presents intriguing evidence.

Bees have been rapidly and mysteriously disappearing from rural areas, with grave implications for agriculture. But bees seem to flourish in urban environments -- and cities need their help, too. Noah Wilson-Rich suggests that urban beekeeping might play a role in revitalizing both a city and a species.

In the past decade, the US honeybee population has been decreasing at an alarming and unprecedented rate. While this is obviously bad news for honeypots everywhere, bees also help feed us in a bigger way -- by pollinating our nation's crops. Emma Bryce investigates potential causes for this widespread colony collapse disorder. [Directed by Lilli...

Machine learning isn't just for simple tasks like assessing credit risk and sorting mail anymore -- today, it's capable of far more complex applications, like grading essays and diagnosing diseases. With these advances comes an uneasy question: Will a robot do your job in the future?

We've heard that bees are disappearing. But what is making bee colonies so vulnerable? Photographer Anand Varma raised bees in his backyard — in front of a camera — to get an up close view. This project, for National Geographic, gives a lyrical glimpse into a beehive, and reveals one of the biggest threats to its health, a mite that preys on bab...

About 10,000 years ago, humans began to farm. This agricultural revolution was a turning point in our history and enabled the existence of civilization. Today, nearly 40 percent of our planet is farmland. Spread all over the world, these lands are the pieces to a global puzzle we're all facing: in the future, how can we feed every member of a gr...

What if robots could build and optimize themselves -- with little to no help from humans? Computer scientist Emma Hart is working on a new technology that could make "artificial evolution" possible. She explains how the three ingredients of biological evolution can be replicated digitally to build robots that can self-assemble and adapt to any e...

From the glorious crested guinea fowl to the adulterous African jacana to vultures that can pick a zebra carcass clean in 30 minutes, Washington Wachira wants us all to get to know the marvelous species of birds that share the planet with us. If you're not already a fan of earth's feathermakers -- or concerned about their conservation -- you wil...

Botanical artist Nirupa Rao captures the spirit and beauty of nature in watercolor. With a portfolio of enchanting, scientifically accurate illustrations, she aims to reignite our emotional connection to the environment -- and open our eyes to an entire kingdom hidden in plain sight.

Imagine waking in the middle of the night to an elephant ripping the roof from your house in search of food. This is a reality in some communities in Africa where, as wild spaces shrink, people and elephants are competing for space and resources like never before. In this engaging talk, zoologist Lucy King shares her solution to the rising confl...

How can cities help save the future? Alex Steffen shows some cool neighborhood-based green projects that expand our access to things we want and need -- while reducing the time we spend in cars.

Every day, we use materials from the earth without thinking, for free. But what if we had to pay for their true value: would it make us more careful about what we use and what we waste? Think of Pavan Sukhdev as nature's banker -- assessing the value of the Earth's assets. Eye-opening charts will make you think differently about the cost of air,...

The deadliest severe weather phenomenon is something you might not realize: extreme heat. Eleni Myrivili, chief heat officer of the city of Athens, Greece, explains that extreme heat and heat waves are often overlooked because they're not as dramatic as flooding or hurricanes – and breaks down three approaches to keep cities cool in a time of ra...

How does knowledge grow? Sometimes it begins with one insight and grows into many branches; other times it grows as a complex and interconnected network. Infographics expert Manuel Lima explores the thousand-year history of mapping data -- from languages to dynasties -- using trees and networks of information. It's a fascinating history of visua...

How do you define "nature?" If we define it as that which is untouched by humans, then we won't have any left, says environmental writer Emma Marris. She urges us to consider a new definition of nature -- one that includes not only pristine wilderness but also the untended patches of plants growing in urban spaces -- and encourages us to bring o...

Accepting his 2008 TED Prize, author Dave Eggers asks the TED community to personally, creatively engage with local public schools. With spellbinding eagerness, he talks about how his 826 Valencia tutoring center inspired others around the world to open

In June 2022, TED's climate initiative, Countdown, launched its Dilemma Series: events designed to look at some of the "knots" in the climate change space, where diverging positions have stalled progress and solidified into an inability to collaborate across differences. The event focused on the question: Is there a role for carbon credits in th...

With well-being on a downtrend in communities across the country, holding steady is considered a success. But what about reversing the trend? Through inspiration from her personal experience, grassroots community health transformations, research on the longest living populations around the world, and lived experience from individuals throughout ...