Now that one group has finished a rough draft of the genome, other groups are working to remain in the Neandertal sequencing game— but first they need to find well-preserved Neandertal DNA.

For better and for worse, Phoenix often wandered from its scripted mission on Mars but there was some groundbreaking science behind the often distracting headlines.

Mathematicians explored the mathematics of fractal billiards, in which a point-mass cue ball rattles around inside a shape whose boundary seemingly consists of nothing but corners, at the Joint Mathematics Meetings.