Preston’s style of journalism, he says, is the equivalent of climbing into a boiling pot to better understand soup. In this collection, Preston describes some of his close encounters with the subjects he has written about, telling, for example, how he donned a “spacesuit” to visit a high-security U.S. Army lab where researchers study Ebola virus (the subject of Preston’s celebrated thriller The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story). He goes on to describe how he climbed the tallest tree east of the Mississippi River, right after it had been killed by an invasive species — ...

Electron microscopes can now image single atoms of hydrogen.

Scientists show that cheap chemical dyes may one day help with the efficient capture of the sun's energy

Fossilized feathers of an early bird or dinosaur may retain evidence of pigment, offering a chance to animal colors of the Cretaceous.

A limited supply of vaccine shots, if targeted well, could stop the spread of disease.

An experiment may explain the origin of underwater waves that shape the sediment of continental slopes.

An optical trap lets atoms in but not out, and it can be used to study matter at ultracold temperatures.

Scientists reveal new details on how extendable jaws help fish capture prey.

Gold comes in many colors. Since ancient times, glass artists and alchemists alike have known how to grind the metal into fine particles that would take on hues such as red or mauve. At scales even smaller, clusters of just a few dozen atoms display even more outlandish behavior. Gold and certain other atoms often tend to aggregate in specific numbers and highly symmetrical geometries, and sometimes these clusters can mimic the chemistry of single atoms of a completely different element. They become, as some researchers say, superatoms. Recently researchers have reported successes i...

Light behaves like waves or particles, but it doesn’t know what it will do in advance.

Last summer, the Discovery Channel temporarily suspended airing its hit survivalist show Man vs. Wild. The producer admitted that the protagonist would get help from staff or spend nights in hotels — all along claiming to rough it alone in the world’s most inhospitable places. Yet, Man vs. Wild was not the first high-profile case of possible “frontier fakery.” In August 1913, Joseph Knowles, a former Boston Post illustrator, one-time trapper, hunting guide and Navy man, went into the Maine woods on a solitary retreat. Starting out with nothing, not even clothes, Knowles thrived for tw...