Ice crystals compress into sapphire.

FORBES: Go with the Floe

The three screenwriters (Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy, and Billy Ray) may have been trying to compress too much into two hours.

NEWYORKER: State of Play

These lasers use a novel switching system to compress their power into the tiny but immensely energetic bursts needed to explode the carbon-containing molecules.

ECONOMIST: Diamonds

When you are forced to compress your message into fewer words, each word works harder, carries more meaning on its shoulders and, accordingly, becomes more important and interesting.

WSJ: David Gelernter: The Pros and Cons of Cyber-English

The new primary schedule will compress the nomination process into about four weeks, with more than half America's states and three-quarters of its population voting in a feverish eight-day spell in March.

ECONOMIST: The California primaries