News Feature in 2011

The race to detect dark matter has yielded mostly confusion. But the larger, more sensitive detectors being built could change that picture soon.

Why is it so hard to find a test to predict cancer?

In 1861, James Clerk Maxwell unified electricity, magnetism and light. Experiments under way today could inch physicists closer to combining everything else.

When Judy Mikovits found links between chronic fatigue syndrome and a virus, the world took notice. Now, she's caught between the patients who believe her work and the researchers who don't.

As the oceans rapidly grow more acidic, scientists are scrambling to discover how marine life is likely to react.

If dogma dictates that proteins need a structure to function, then why do so many of them live in a state of disorder?

American Indians have had some unhappy interactions with scientists in the past. Now, America's tribal colleges are rapidly expanding their own research.

In 1946, scientists started tracking thousands of British children born during one cold March week. On their 65th birthday, the study members find themselves more scientifically valuable than ever before.

Nearly one-quarter of biologists say they have been affected by animal activists. A Nature poll looks at the impact.

Researcher by day and activist by night, Joseph Harris was leading an untenable double life that eventually landed him in prison.

The Templeton Foundation claims to be a friend of science. So why does it make so many researchers uneasy?

If a camera snaps everything you eat, you can't lie about it later. That's why scientists are building high-tech gadgets to measure the human 'exposome'.

An obscure group of tiny creatures takes centre stage in a battle to work out the tree of life.

Theresa Deisher once shunned religion for science. Now, with renewed faith, she is fighting human-embryonic-stem-cell research in court.

Launched in 2009 to seek out worlds beyond the Solar System, the Kepler mission is exceeding expectations. Is it closing in on another Earth?

The search for planets outside our Solar System will always be pricey. But creative solutions are proving that it no longer has to break the bank.

After years of struggle on behalf of ocean science, Wang Pinxian is taking a key role in China's plans to expand marine research.

Researchers in Panama suffered under a dictatorship and were overshadowed by the United States. Now the country is attempting a scientific renaissance.

For scientists, collisions at the world's most powerful particle collider are just the start. Nature follows the torrent of data on its circuitous journey around the world.

There is more to the eye than rods and cones — the discovery of a third photoreceptor is rewriting the visual rulebook.