E=MC3

By Amanda Bower, Randy Hartwell, Ellin Martens, Julie Rawe, Joel Stein, Chris Taylor, Mitch Frank and Josh Tyrangiel

WEIRD SCIENCE Last week it was revealed that a middle school science textbook used a photo of singer Linda Ronstadt to illustrate a silicon crystal doped with an arsenic impurity. For those who may have failed science, this was a mistake, a simple production error. But a new study from North Carolina State has found hundreds of flaws in more than a dozen texts. Hydrogen appears twice on a periodic table and is described as a nonmetal and an alkali metal. In another book, sound travels faster through warm air on page 422; 12 pages later, it's swifter in cold. Above left, east and west are flipped on a compass ; center, the equator runs through the U.S.; in a prism setup, right, the result shown is impossible. Confused? So are your kids.