A balloon-borne experiment circling Antarctica has measured the curvature of the universe and revealed that it's perfectly flat. (p. 276)

Enriching the diet with calcium, especially from dairy products, can switch the body's fat cells from storing calories to burning them. (p. 277)

Gene therapy to repair mutations that thwart development of essential immune cells has helped three babies to overcome severe combined immunodeficiency, in which a child is born without a functional immune system. (p. 277)

FDA clinical trials suggest that placebos provide substantial relief to depressed patients, but debate continues about whether it's ethical to use placebos in studies of antidepressant drugs. (p. 278)

A textbook example of mutualism—birds that ride around picking ticks off big African mammals—may not be mutually beneficial at all. (p. 278)

A study of cloned cows provides reassurance that cloned animals won't die prematurely and may even live extra-long. (p. 279)

A novel suspended device chilled near absolute zero demonstrates the existence of a basic unit, or quantum, of heat conductance—the first evidence of quantum mechanics in mechanical structures. (p. 279)

Baboon intimacy and detachment present vexing clues. (p. 280)

Computers are unscrambling genomes to reveal the secrets in DNA codes. (p. 284)

Marmots are coming out of hibernation earlier, while chipmunks and ground squirrels sleep longer-effects that could be attributed to global warming. (p. 282)

More than 5,000 years ago, the Botai people of central Asia had ritual practices that appeared in many later cultures. (p. 287)

Human ancestors may have learned to control fire 1.7 million years ago in eastern Africa. (p. 287)

Researchers demonstrated that they can use a scanning tunneling microscope to position atoms in microscopic patterns at room temperature. (p. 287)

An orbiting electron accelerated to relativistic velocities by a laser in a strong magnetic field can behave like a ring-shaped electron cloud spinning around the nucleus. (p. 287)