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Metamaterials are a new class of artificial substances with properties unlike anything found in the natural world. Some have been designed to act as invisibility cloaks; others as superlenses, antenna systems or highly sensitive detectors. Now, researchers at MIT and elsewhere have found a way to use metamaterials to absorb a wide range of light with extremely high efficiency, which they say could lead to a new generation of solar cells or optical sensors.

If you've saddled yourself with a restrictive, faddish detox diet this new year, you'll want to hear nutritionist Keri Glassman's number one rule of detoxing, the natural way: EAT!

Entire television channels broadcast the wonders of the natural world. To gain viewers and sell ads, they rely on lions hauling down zebras, aerial tracking shots of the icy grandeur of Antarctica or more prosaic film of a bear ambling through the woods

Fans use an enormous amount of the world's electricity.

A designer metamaterial has shown it can engineer emitted "blackbody" radiation with an efficiency beyond the natural limits imposed by the material's temperature, a team of researchers led by Boston College physicist Willie Padilla report in the current edition of Physical Review Letters.

Once, while lecturing 150 freshmen about the value of the natural world in which we live I paused and asked, "How many of you can tell me the current phase of the moon?” None could. [More]

Our first day in Palau made me realize that, unlike the United States where the environment is often an afterthought, this is a place where people take pride in their connection to the natural world and work hard to protect it. [More]

Photography by Lisa Charles Watson; Styling by Charles W. BumgardnerSome of the most creative jewelry designers are exploring a wilder side of the natural world, combining elements from rough lava rock to liquid freshwater pearl with more traditional precious metals and stones.

In the last few years NASA has built and launched two world-class climate satellites, both of which promised invaluable new data on the natural and human influences on Earth's changing climate. Neither of them, however, will ever deliver the data that climate scientists so eagerly expected from them.