Nickel gallium sulfide (NiGa₂S₄) behaves as a highly unusual "liquid" magnetic material at near absolute zero, according to Japanese and US researchers. Read David Bradley's spin on the work in his chemistry news column.

Technical advances are making the already popular sports of cycling and mountain biking even more fun. Major improvements in cycling technology, notably in suspension and braking, mean a safer and more comfortable ride, but it is in the field of materials science where the real impact is felt. Science Writer Michael Marshall takes us on a smoother than smooth ride through the latest material gains in cycling technology read on in the latest issue of Elemental Discoveries.

This is interesting. NASA scientists are examining a seemingly magical way to produce high-quality crystals.

Perhaps a NASA laboratory is an unlikely setting for a magic show. Nevertheless, this is where Frank Szofran and colleagues are growing high-quality crystals using a method as amazing as any conjuring trick.

By carefully cooling a molten germanium-silicon mixture inside a cylindrical container, they coax it into forming a single large and extraordinarily well-ordered crystal. Such crystals have very few defects because, remarkably, they never touched the walls of the very container in which they grew.

You can read more about this on the NASA site.