All seems serene at the legendary bell labs headquarters in murray hill, n.j. broad green lawns highlight copper roofs aging into an eye-pleasing aqua-green. A beautiful Japanese-style garden graces an interior courtyard.

But behind this tranquillity lies a poorly understood odyssey of upheaval, transformation-and renaissance. The lab's glorious history-eight Nobel laureates, some 35,000 patents and a tsunami of world-changing inventions from the transistor to information theory-once led many to consider it a national asset. Almost as well documented is the period of "decline," spurred by a much-lamented and highly criticized 1990s makeover that has seen the lab scale back fundamental science and emphasize applied projects and meeting business objectives.