The largest dust storm observed on Mars in 25 years is now engulfing the Red Planet. (p. 53)

The sharpest radar image ever of an asteroid shows features on 1999 KW4 as small as 7.5 meters—about the length of a stretch limo. (p. 57)

Gamma rays detected by the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft after it landed on asteroid 433 Eros add to evidence that the rock is unaltered since the birth of the solar system. (p. 38)

A new study reveals that the Andromeda galaxy, the nearest large galaxy to the Milky Way, is a cannibal, devouring its tiny galactic neighbors. (p. 5)

The first data from a new Canadian detector of particles called neutrinos not only resolve a 30-year-old puzzle about how the sun works, but also revise estimates of mysterious "dark" matter in the universe and strengthen a key challenge to the prevailing theory of particle physics. (p. 388)

A new microscope for peering at magnetic materials provides the first glimpses of how such materials behave on a scale of only tens of atoms. (p. 374)

Observations of warm dust swaddling a young, nearby star suggest that astronomers may have found evidence of a massive asteroid belt outside the solar system. (p. 375)

Early reports from the most mammoth sky surveys ever conducted are yielding a trove of findings, including the two most distant quasars known in the universe, new knowledge about the large-scale clumping of galaxies, and more evidence about the size and distribution of asteroids in our solar system. (p. 356)

Two experiments examining the detailed structure of the cosmic microwave background, the relic radiation from the Big Bang, have confirmed the basic model of how cosmologists believe the universe evolved. (p. 261)

Measurements with a magnetometer aboard the NEAR-Shoemaker spacecraft a few days after it landed on the asteroid 433 Eros confirmed a major puzzle: The rock has no detectable magnetic field. (p. 341)