Feature

  1. Planetary Science

    Forgotten Planet

    Mercury: The solar system's inner frontier.

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  2. Earth

    Electronic Jetsam

    Oceanographers are developing and deploying a variety of seafaring probes—including drifters, gliders, and scientific torpedoes—that will enable them to explore and monitor the ocean remotely.

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  3. Earth

    Why the Mercury Falls

    Certain pollutants can foster the localized fallout of mercury, a toxic heavy metal, from the atmosphere.

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  4. Raising Trust

    Some forager groups may nurture a sharing sense in their offspring.

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  5. Health & Medicine

    Getting the Bugs Out of Blood

    Researchers are developing methods for inactivating all sorts of pathogens that could be found in blood, including West Nile virus, an emerging infection recently brought to the United States from Africa.

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  6. Astronomy

    Planet Formation on the Fast Track

    New computer simulations suggest that planets as massive as Jupiter may have formed in only a few hundred years rather than several million years, as the leading theory of planet formation requires.

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  7. Earth

    The Case for DDT

    What do you do when a dreaded environmental pollutant saves lives?

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  8. Chemistry

    Delivering the Goods

    Experimental gene-delivery therapies generally use viruses to shuttle genetic material into cells, but some researchers are devising ways to avoid using the sometimes-risky viruses.

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  9. Anthropology

    Southern Reindeer Folk

    Western scientists make their first expeditions to Mongolia's Tsaatan people, herders who preserve the old ways at the southernmost rim of reindeer territory.

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  10. Animals

    Cicada Subtleties

    What part of 10,000 cicadas screeching don't you understand?

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  11. Animals

    Camelid Comeback

    The future of vicuñas in South America and wild camels in Asia hinges on decisions being made now about their management.

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  12. Tech

    A Shot in the Light

    Bullet replicas that look on a microscopic level like they've been fired from a gun—even though they haven't—enable forensics specialists to fine-tune as never before instruments to automatically match bullets from crime scenes.

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