In Nature this week

1. On the mundane applications of metamaterials: Katharine Sanderson feels that notwithstanding all the brouhaha surrounding metamaterials, their applications, if any, as and when they are found, will be rather mundane. Ouch!
2. Piers Coleman feels that the nexus between biology and physics will be found somewhere between the nano- and micro-metre scales;
3. Based on a paper of C R Hickenbroth et al on biasing chemical pathways using mechanical forces, Brad M Rosen and Virgil Percec, in a news and views piece, argue that mechanochemistry — triggering and controlling chemical reactions by the application of mechanical stress — holds a great promise.
4. Andrew Holmes pays tributes to the conducting polymers pioneer Alan Graham MacDiarmid, who passed away recently.

Have fun!