R.K. Pachauri, an engineer and economist by training, is director-general of The Energy and Resources Institute in New Delhi, India, and a corecipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his role as chief of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC periodically issues consensus reports on the science of climate change. Senior editor Janet Raloff spoke with him about changes he hopes to see from the Obama administration. (p. 32)

It appears that another physicist with Nobel ties is set to become the primary Obama adviser on science.

A new federal rule makes it harder to destroy protected forests.

News nuggets on climate-imperiled corals, nanotech worries, and soft drinks bearing pesticides.

Edward O. Wilson of Harvard University has written and lectured widely in fields ranging from sociobiology and evolutionary psychology to conservation biology. He spoke recently on “sustainability” at Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea, Ohio. Wilson believes that too much emphasis has been placed on trying to reduce energy consumption and avert climate change—what he calls the “physical environment”—and too little on preserving habitat and biodiversity, or the “living environment.” For Wilson, preserving the living environment means protecting areas of the world...

Warmer winter temperatures are altering the snowpack, squelching the rodents’ population booms.

Tales of the black band: Clues to a 4,200-year-old mystery lie frozen in icy records stored atop Mt. Kilimanjaro.

Even jet-lagged, the world's lead climate negotiator took time out to brief a few reporters.

Myth often cited by global warming skeptics debunked. (p. 5)

Featured blog: As glaciers continue to dry up, so does any hope of gleaning information from them about the past climate record.

Unusual data let scientists test predictions that global warming drives species up slopes.

Featured blog: Switching to light bulbs that contain mercury might, surprisingly, reduce overall mercury releases to the environment. Plus, what to do when you break your fluorescent bulb.