Marinus effessyou-ous? Oceanography doctoral student Lori Bouck was stumped. The tiny marine animal she was studying looked considerably different under the microscope than it did in textbook pen-and-ink drawings, which purportedly described the wee beast, a common inhabitant of the sand lying at the bottom of saltwater bays.

 Blood Magnets Improbable as it may seem, magnets and leeches have something in common--they both draw blood. Leeches' ghoulish habits have been known for centuries, but only recently have scientists begun to appreciate how human blood can be influenced by magnetic fields.

In Remembrance: Our Man on Mars The announcer calmly read the weather report for the Red Planet:
"Light winds from the east in the late afternoon, changing to light winds from the southwest after midnight. Maximum wind, 15 miles per hour. Temperatures from minus 122 degrees to minus 22 degrees Farenheit. Pressure steady at 7.70 millibars."

Short-Cut to C A discovery this summer by two FSU researchers may some day drop the price on Americans’ favorite vitamin supplement. 

Archaeology in Depth Global warming may bring the waterfront to many Floridian doorsteps. But considering that the Sunshine State’s Gulf of Mexico shoreline has shifted north and eastward over the past 8,000 years, forcing prehistoric populations to move several hundreds of miles inland, this phenomenon should not come as a surprise.

Tearing Down the House When a virus invades a cell, it uses some pretty clever tricks in biology, chemistry and physics to do it. When scientists study viral behavior, they typically use tools built from the basics of biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and--now more than ever--computational science.