In an effort to help preserve biodiversity, negotiators from 130 nations crafted rules of conduct for international trade in living, genetically engineered organisms. (p. 84)

A map of a now-flooded region charts the path that Asians may have taken to first reach the Americas. (p. 85)

Whirling clouds of atoms may swallow light the way black holes do, possibly giving scientists a way to test the general theory of relativity in the lab, not just in outer space. (p. 86)

Japanese researchers have confirmed that some patients with type 1 diabetes have a novel form of the disease that's not caused by immune cells attacking the pancreas. (p. 86)

Injecting into fish eggs an estrogen-mimicking form of the pesticide DDT transforms genetically male medaka fish into apparent females able to lay eggs that produce young. (p. 87)

After decades of work, scientists crack two problems of how bees navigate: reading bee odometers and mapping training flights. (p. 87)

Increasing numbers of people with less-than-perfect vision can now wear contact lenses, thanks to innovations in lens design and materials. (p. 88)

Astronomers propose that 150 billion corpses of sunlike stars may blanket the visible disk of the galaxy. (p. 91)

A brain region linked to face recognition may foster expertise at identifying items in any category a person strives to master. (p. 91)

Cell connections in a part of the brain's frontal lobe appear to dwindle in people with schizophrenia. (p. 91)

In the past 20 years, researchers studying sound communication in ants have discovered a sort of ant-ernet, zinging with messages about lost relatives, great food, free rides for hitchhikers, caterpillars in search of ant partners, and impending doom. (p. 92)

An elliptical stem gives daffodils an unusual liveliness in the wind compared with tulips. (p. 95)

Male butterflies live longer in Madeira, where females are available year-round, than in Sweden, where females mature in one burst. (p. 95)

A Harvard researcher calculates that roads directly influence the ecology of a fifth of U.S. land area. (p. 95)

The X chromosome's gastrin-releasing peptide receptor gene is turned on by nicotine to produce a protein that promotes lung cancer, a combination of factors that could explain why women are more susceptible to the disease than men are. (p. 95)

The recently discovered protein angiopoietin-1 appears to protect blood vessels from leaking, a finding with implications for research into diseases that involve swelling, such as arthritis and asthma. (p. 95)