A closer look at the stacks of stable pointed curves
  In the theory of the moduli-stacks of n-pointed stable curves, there are two fundamental functors, contraction and stabilization. These functors are constructed in [4], where they are used to show that the various \bar{M_{g,n}}'s are DM-stacks. We give here a more elementary and more complete proof of the fact that stabilization, as it is defined in [4], is a functor. The fact that contraction is a functor inverse to the stabilization-functor we think is satisfactorily treated in [4]. In a very recent publication [1] there is a proof based on the proof in [4], but it is adapted to the case of moduli stacks over the complex numbers. In this note we work in the most general setting, i.e. over the integers. 
Finn F. Knudsen
math.AG