How does the Great Barrier Reef work, and coral worldwide? Why do they bleach and die and how will they respond to climate change?

Scientists at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, James Cook University and the University of Queensland have compiled the world’s first detailed gene expression library for Symbiodinium, the microscopic algae that feed the corals – and so provide the primary energy source for the entire Reef.

“Symbiodinium uses sunlight to convert CO2 into carbohydrates for the corals to feed on. At the same time there’s evidence the corals control its output, suggesting that they are farming their captive plants” Professor David Yellowlees explains.

The Spallation Neutron Source, the Department of Energy's $1.4 billion research facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has established a new record as the world's most powerful accelerator based source of neutrons for scientific research.

The SNS surpassed the previous record for beam power 160 kilowatts, held by the United Kingdom's ISIS facility, while operating at 183 kilowatts. As the SNS ramps up toward an eventual 1.4 megawatts of power, the beams will produce up to 10 times more neutrons than any existing pulsed neutron source.

A trio of Tennessee lawmakers -- Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Maryville), Rep. Bart Gordon (D-Murfreesboro) and Rep.

How much more would you pay to be near people like you? What about education?

Using restricted-access Census data, a new study examines a quarter-million households on a block-by-block basis to yield new results about the correlation between household attributes and school quality. The researchers find that, conditional on income, households prefer to self-segregate on the basis of both race and education.

“Economists have long been interested in estimating household preferences for school and neighborhood attributes, given their relevance to many central issues in applied economics,” write Patrick Bayer (Duke University and NBER), Fernando Ferreira (University of Pennsylvania), and Robert McMillan (University of Toronto and NBER) in the Journal of Political Economy.

Bacterial parasites are a lot more creative than we thought. It turns out one species, Wolbachia, can insert almost its entire genome into the genomes of members of one host species (a fly called Drosophila ananassae), and can insert parts of its genome into the genomes of members of several other host species.

"We've found at least one species where the parasite's entire or nearly entire genome has been absorbed and integrated into the host's," says Jack Werren of the University of Rochester, principle investigator of the study and a world-leading authority on the Wolbachia parasite.

Scientists for the first time have observed elusive oscillations in the sun's corona, known as Alfvén waves, that transport energy outward from the surface of the sun. The discovery may give researchers more insight into solar magnetic fields, eventually leading to a better understanding of how the sun affects Earth's atmosphere and the entire solar system.

By tracking the speed and direction of the waves, researchers will be able to infer basic properties of the solar atmosphere, such as the density and direction of magnetic fields.

It's the climate cat and dog fight of the decade. When Al Gore alleged that Hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming, it set off a firestorm in the atmospheric science community. A few prominent experts disputed it and the websites and email campaigns took over from there

A trip of NASA/Goddard researchers say that storms may at least be impacted by global warming.

Previous climate model studies have shown that heavy rainstorms will be more common in a warmer climate, but the model developed by researchers Tony Del Genio, Mao-Sung Yao, and Jeff Jonas is the first to successfully simulate the difference in strength between land and ocean storms and includes how the strength will change in a warming climate.