While some physicists ponder the grand design of the universe, others delve to the atomic scale. That microrealm was the focus of most of the 5300 researchers specializing in biological and condensed-matter physics and in materials science who gathered in Pittsburgh two weeks ago for the annual March meeting of the American Physical Society (APS). Among the more than 5000 papers presented at the meeting were descriptions of building and measuring micromagnets, making atomic movies, and studying sand grains for clues to why some dunes roar.