A blackish-purple frog species whose ancestors evolved in the shadow of dinosaurs has been discovered burrowing into the remote mountains of southern India. Described by scientists as so unique that it warrants a new family of frogs, the amphibian surfaces for only two weeks a year, during monsoon season.

China successfully launched its first manned space mission today. Carrying a single astronaut, the Szenzhou 5 rocket blasted off from northwest China. It will orbit Earth 14 times before returning. Despite the national pride associated with it, the launch was shrouded in secrecy.

Swedish stonecutters excavated limestone from the quarry in Dalarna for nearly 50 years. But since 1993, a different kind of rock has poured forth—along with opera and blues. With near-perfect acoustics and a spectacular natural setting, the defunct quarry now serves as a 4,000-seat amphitheater.

Machines, medicines, and materials a mere fraction the width of a human hair may one day store trillions of bits of information, detect the onset of cancer, and restore a paralyzed limb. George Whitesides, a chemist at Harvard University, will be awarded the 2003 Kyoto Prize for Lifetime Achievement in Advanced Technology for laying the foundation for such technology.

Energy derived from the moon now trickles into a village near the Arctic tip of Norway via a novel underwater windmill-like device powered by the rhythmic slosh of the tides.

Europe's eels are heading towards extinction, scientists warn. Stocks there declined an estimated 99 percent since the 1970s. The collapse has spurred a Europe-wide action plan to conserve the species and save related jobs.

A new study of cosmic background radiation data only recently available hints that the universe is finite and bears a rough resemblance to a soccer ball. If proven by further evidence and scrutiny, the model would represent a major discovery about the nature of the cosmos.

In a windowless New York City lab, scientists are simulating conditions that triggered two of the most explosive volcanic events in recent history: the eruption of Mount Mazama and Mount Vesuvius. The project seeks to better understand and predict volcanic eruptions.

A pair of Argentine paleontologists have discovered numerous 90-million-year-old fossils of a new type of sphenodontian—an ancient lizard-like reptile thought to have gone extinct about 120 million years ago except for a few relicts that live today in New Zealand, the tuatara.

Undersea noise from naval exercises appears to give beaked whales the bends. Scientists for years have suspected a link between sonar activities and mass strandings of marine mammals. Autopsies performed on a group of beaked whales that stranded themselves on beaches in the Canary Islands four hours after military sonar activities commenced there support this connection.

The advent of canopy walkways, the networks of elevated bridges and platforms that tower high in the treetops, has allowed scientists to study ecosystems that were once out of reach. Today, tourists are increasingly taking to these aerial sidewalks to peer eye-to-eye with canopy-dwelling creatures and glimpse rare blooms.

About 100,000 years ago the top of Volcano Alcedo in the Galápagos Islands exploded in a violent eruption that smothered the region in pumice and blew away all but one lucky lineage of the giant tortoises that lived there, according to a new study.

An ambitious new NASA research project aims to answer perhaps the most vexing and profound of scientific mysteries: How did life on Earth begin? Using space probes and telescopic observations, scientists hope to better understand how organic molecules form in interstellar clouds and how comets might deliver them to planets.

Bomb-sniffing dogs may be next in line to lose their job to machines. Researchers have developed a miniature mechanical "nose" capable of detecting TNT vapor. The device, which can detect less than a billionth of a gram of explosive vapor, may surpass the ability of dogs.

Think your job stinks? You're not alone. Wildlife biologists make a living by locating feces of endangered species—treasure troves of information about the density and health of the animals. Now they're getting help from specially trained dogs that seem to revel in the smelly task.