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A popular school of thought, dramatized in the recent TV drama Lie to Me , is that a careful study of facial expressions--especially eye movements--tells investigators if a perp is dissembling. Reality is neither as dramatic nor as decisive. Even experienced investigators average only about a 65 percent success rate, according to researchers.

Three books suggest ways to improve your life.

You are covered with fungus right now. But wouldn't it be cooler if you did it on purpose

Anyone who has ever devoured a triple-chocolate brownie after an intense workout knows how tempting it can be to indulge after behaving virtuously.

The Advances section of Scientific American 's March issue discusses how reducing soot emissions could be a quick, if temporary, fix for global warming; explains why cramming for tests doesn't work; and examines physicists' latest efforts to make an object disappear. To learn more about these, and all our other stories, click on the links below

%excerpt% Read more: Making Gift-Giving a Cinch: BetterBoo

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By Susan Guyett and John D. [More]

Is it possible to use more of our brain? [More]

In 1912 airships and balloons, powered and unpowered, were being developed to explore, to entertain, to travel, and to wage war. Aerostats (any lighter-than-air craft) remained highly sensitive to weather and many were floated by flammable hydrogen (at least until the destruction of the Hindenburg in May 1937) but despite the limitations, great hopes were placed on these frail craft. [More]

March 1962 [More]

Storms are pushing into the southern Appalachians, bringing the potential for

UPDATE: See our latest skywatching tips to see Mars at opposition here: Mars Visible in Night Sky, But Its 2 Moons Are Hard to Spot [More]

Now's a great time to break out that backyard telescope. Because Saturday, March 3, is the Mars Opposition . It's one of the times that the Earth and Mars pass the closest to one another

By Edwin Cartlidge of Nature magazine The research on which this story is based has now been published in the New Journal of Physics . [More]