SHAKING HISTORY
By Christie Aschwanden
At the end of the Bronze Age, over 50 Mediterranean cities fell during a 50-year period. Were earthquakes responsible?

UNDERSEA FLURRIES
By Mary Beckman
Illustration by Lori Eccher
Miniature habitats of ocean life fall like snow and feed the deep sea.

BREAKING THE ICE
By Brandon Brown
Illustration by Heidi Noland
An oceanographer comes ashore to study a mysterious Antarctic lake.

A WARMING ARGUMENT
By Lila Guterman
Illustration by Michelle Schwengel
Scientists who work with old plants and new computer models team up to understand Wyoming's warm winters of 55 million years ago.

THE DISTILLER OF DREAMS
By Michael Hagmann
Illustration by Christi Sobel
With a novel statistical system, a psychologist opens up a new avenue to the meaning of dreams.

SEX AND THE SINGLE X
By Karin Jegalian
Illustration by Jeremy Stoller
Differences among sex chromosomes in mammals are not flukes. They represent intermediate stages that chronicle the evolution of a developmental process.

WHUPPED WITH AN UGLY STICK
By Mitchell Leslie
Illustration by Carolyn Staehle
The fearsome visage of the Neandertal has puzzled anthropologists for a century. Now a scientist and an engineer at Stanford University may have found why the archetypal cave man had the face only a mother could love.

GETTING IT RIGHT
By Evelyn Strauss
Illustration by Brittany Denger
An unconventional geneticist explores how fruit fly embryos fix mistakes to develop properly.