Physicist Johnpierre Paglione works in a kitchen of sorts: He precisely blends ingredients, heats his mixtures to just the right temperature and cools them to get the perfect product. But rather than only edible ingredients, his recipes call for toxic chemicals, such as arsenic, and metals — especially iron. His ovens, which line the shelves of his lab at the University of Maryland in College Park, reach 1,700˚ Celsius before he carefully cools his concoctions over days or weeks. When the timer finally dings, out pops a silvery-black pebble with one flat, shiny surface. The newly made... (p. 18)

Mosquito genome number three could lead to new pesticides to fight the adaptable pests.

A new X-ray microscope technique peers inside materials to reveal their inner nature. (p. 8)

An exquisitely preserved dinosaur from central Spain has a hump on its back and suggestions of featherlike appendages on its arms. The primitive carnivore lived about 125 million years ago and may push back the first known instance of feathers on the dinosaur family tree. (p. 16)

E. coli bacteria fight antibiotics with help from drug-resistant neighbors. (p. 9)

The latest advances from the field of DNA nanotechnology include nanobot ‘spiders’ learning how to walk and even do some work. (p. 18)

A new study may yield new insights into behavior and life-span in ants and other animals.

A meteorite’s age has pushed back the estimated time of the solar system’s formation by almost 2 million years.

New pictures expand evidence of the moon’s shrinkage over the past billion years. (p. 11)