Christopher Marshall was a titan of cancer research. On 8 August he died of the very disease that he strived to understand. This was only 3 months after the unexpected death of his longtime friend and colleague, Alan Hall. Author: Richard Marais

HUMAN+, a new, ambitious, and sharply curated exhibition at the Centre for Contemporary Culture in Barcelona, delves into the contemporary meaning of being human. Hosting more than 50 works created by artists and scientists, the collection explores the technological strategies that we might use to transcend bodily and mental limits, our place in nature, and our social interactions, as well as redefinitions of birth and death. In this review, Giovanni Frazzetto highlights some of the exhibition's challenging and provocative exhibits. Author: Giovanni Frazzetto

Database of Dreams tells the story of the enormous effort and expense that went into creating a once popular, but now long-forgotten archive of social science data. Tracing the archive's origins and evolution, reviewer Laura Stark describes how the archive's greatest virtue was also, ultimately, it's fatal flaw. Praising the book as "humane, hilarious, and smart," Stark distills lessons that are relevant to many of today's "big data" initiatives. Author: Laura Stark

In Thing Explainer, xkcd creator Randall Munroe sets out to demystify a wide range of complex systems and natural phenomena using only the thousand most common words in the English language.

A listing of books received at Science during the week ending 20 November 2015.

Authors: Hudson T. Pinheiro, Fabio Di Dario, Leopoldo C. Gerhardinger, Marcelo R. S. de Melo, Rodrigo L. de Moura, Roberto E. Reis, Fábio Vieira, Jansen Zuanon, Luiz A. Rocha

Author: Rana Dajani

Author: Patrick Schloss

At the AAAS symposium, researchers searched for new avenues of public engagement to address the gap in climate change beliefs Author: Gavin Stern

This year's winners included stories on the health impacts of urban violence, local signs of global climate change, and West Africa's Ebola epidemic Author: Earl Lane

Author: Robert L. Last

Author: Kristen L. Mueller

Author: Sacha Vignieri

Author: Brent Grocholski

Author: Guy Riddihough

Author: Stella M. Hurtley

Author: Gilbert Chin

Author: Phil Szuromi