Multiple teams announce complete draft of the maize genome, with a full plate of surprises that include hints about hybrid vigor.

Comparing the DNA in modern birds to that in ancient generations shows molecular evolution happens at varying rates, and that each species has its own rate of evolution.

Scientists measure the speed of recognizing, manipulating and producing speech in human brains.

A new study begins to decode pheromone messages and finds that the same chemicals that attract can also maintain the species barrier. (p. 10)

In a lab at MIT, a small black mouse named Buddy sleeps alone inside a box. A cone resembling a satellite dish sits atop his head. But the dish doesn’t receive signals from outer space. Instead it sends transmissions from deep inside Buddy’s brain to a bank of computers across the room. Scientists like Jennie Young eavesdrop on the transmissions, essentially reading Buddy’s mind, or at least that part of his mind occupied with a recent trip along a Plexiglas track littered with chocolate sprinkles. Young and her colleagues in Susumu Tonegawa’s laboratory are monitoring nerve cells i... (p. 16)

For many people, days just don’t seem long enough. In order to cram everything into one 24-hour period, something has to give. Judging by many surveys of Americans, it’s sleep. Sleep is regarded by some as unproductive, wasteful downtime. People who would rather hit the hay than the dance floor are told that only losers snooze and that they can sleep when they’re dead. But new data about sleep’s benefits suggest that losing sleep might speed up death’s arrival. Recent research also shows that people who don’t snooze enough face a higher risk of losing their health than those ... (p. 28)

Three scientists share the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of telomeres, which protect the ends of chromosomes, and the enzyme telomerase, which adds the structures to the ends of chromosomes. (p. 14)

Sleep deprivation leads to more Alzheimer’s disease plaques in the brains of genetically susceptible mice. (p. 11)