An Italian scientist makes the controversial suggestion that the original source of the legend of the Loch Ness Monster, as well as blame for many of the modern encounters with the supposed beast, may be seismic activity beneath the lake. (p. 5)

A new map of the magnetic anomalies in Antarctica and the seafloor surrounding the continent is giving researchers a fresh tool to use in analyzing geologic features that lie hidden beneath thousands of feet of ice or storm-tossed seas. (p. 358)

A tiny fossil skull found in 195-million-year-old Chinese sediments provides evidence that crucial features of mammal anatomy evolved more than 45 million years earlier than previously thought. (p. 324)

Chunks of fossil charcoal found in ancient sediments in north central Pennsylvania suggest that cycles of wildfire plagued Earth more than 360 million years ago. (p. 309)

When Hurricanes Dennis, Floyd, and Irene pummelled North Carolina in the fall of 1999, they delivered a three-punch sequence that may, for years to come, disrupt fishing in the Atlantic Ocean. (p. 293)