For California, probabilistic principles can be applied to the short-term forecasting of further ground-shaking following an earthquake. How such predictions will be used by the public remains to be seen.

After a first inconclusive sighting, the search for exotic particles that consist of five quarks has been hotly pursued in the past few years. But the weight of evidence is now shifting against their existence.

Interactions between trapped neutral atoms have prevented their use as the ultimate frequency standard in optical clocks. A clever trapping scheme circumvents this problem and may push timekeeping to new limits.