A long-standing puzzle over the craftsmanship behind Viking bracelets and necklaces has finally been solved--mathematically.

The beautiful bracelets and necklaces made by Viking artisans leave archaeologists with something of a conundrum. These objects are made from rods of gold and silver which have twisted together into double helices. The puzzle is the regularity of these helices, which are remarkably similar in jewelry found in places as diverse as Ireland, Scotland, the Orkney Islands and Scandinavia.

Microbes may have eaten away at BP's oil in deep water; now the marshland needs help.

Microbes may become the heroes of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill by gobbling up oil more rapidly than anyone expected. Now some experts suggest we ought to artificially stimulate such microbes in stricken marshland areas to aid their cleanup.

Research suggests that search engines could tap into users' need to be entertained.

Search engines are designed to help people get things done: find a local business, plan a vacation, or understand an unfamiliar concept. This focus is demonstrated by how search businesses measure their own performance--by how quickly a user find the page they were looking for. It's considered bad if someone clicks the back button to return to the search results.

A helicopter equipped with a robotic hand picks up small objects.

A robotic hand attached to a small helicopter can successfully and autonomously grip objects while the helicopter is hovering, as demonstrated by a group at Yale University led by Aaron Dollar, one of this year's TR35s.

A spatial variation in the fine structure constant has profound implications for cosmology.

Over the years, many physicists have wondered whether the fundamental constants of nature might have been different when the universe was younger. If so, the evidence ought to be out there in the cosmos where we can see distant things exactly as they were in the past.

A technology intended for Mars missions may find use on solar installations in the deserts on Earth.

One of the best places to put a solar panel is in the desert, where it's sunny. But deserts are also dusty, which means the panels have to be washed frequently so the dust doesn't stop them from capturing sunlight. New technology could provide a solution--by letting solar panels clean themselves.

The results of a two-year study are as good as those achieved with donor corneas.

Patients with impaired vision because of a damaged cornea could soon regain their sight without need of a human donor transplant. Instead, such patients could be aided by an artificial but biosynthetic implant. One such implant has now been tested in patients over two years, and the results are as good as, or even better than, those achieved with donor corneas.

A researcher describes a potential new source of renewable energy.

Lightning is a powerful manifestation of the electrical charge that can accumulate in the atmosphere. New research, presented at the ACS meeting in Boston on Wednesday, suggests that it might be possible to harness that electrical charge.

Researchers call the experimental drug a major success for targeted cancer therapies.

An experimental drug designed to block the effects of a genetic mutation often found in patients with malignant melanoma, a deadly cancer with few existing treatments, significantly shrank tumors in about 80 percent of those who carried the mutation. The findings, published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, signal a major success for so-called targeted cancer therapies, which are designed to block the effects of genetic mutations that drive the growth of cancer cells.

DoD research wing wants to make everything from tanks to bombers in "fabs."

The private company has taken another step toward carrying astronauts to the International Space Station.

Gmail users can now make and receive calls.

Google is shaping Gmail into the ultimate communications hub. Today, the company announced that United States users will be able to make and receive calls within Gmail, providing they install the company's voice and video plug-in.