Is it too early for science story of the year nominations? This one seems to have it all: rats tripping on acid, the seedy world of underground chemists in Europe, and a spiraling number of murder victims.

...well, maybe they are murder victims. It's hard to say.

This is the story of David Nichols, who studies the way psychedelics act in the brains of rats. One side effect of Dr. Nichols's published findings is that black market labs decipher the recipes for "cheap and marginally legal recreational drugs." Some of these recipes have been involved in deaths.