A variety of filamentary structures on the fossil of a small theropod dinosaur recently found in China may provide new insight into the evolution of feathers. (p. 262)

Construction of the Three Gorges Dam across the Yangtze River in China may lead to warmer temperatures in Japan, because any diversion of water for Chinese agriculture could initiate convection in the Japan Sea that brings warmer water to the surface. (p. 245)

New observations of the middle and upper atmosphere over Earth's polar regions may require scientists to revamp their mathematical models of temperature and other environmental conditions at high altitudes. (p. 215)

Scientists have found microorganisms within Kentucky shale that are eating the ancient carbon locked within the rock, a previously unrecognized dietary habit that could have a prevalent role in the weathering and erosion of similar sedimentary rock at many other locations. (p. 198)

Using tree-ring analysis, an international team of researchers has reconstructed the earliest record of annual climate variation. (p. 197)