1,393 results
- Animals
Water bears’ genetic borrowing questioned
A new analysis of tardigrade DNA suggests that water bears don’t swap many genes with other organisms after all.
- Animals
An island in the Maldives is made of parrotfish poop
Coral-eating parrotfish create much of the sediment that a reef island is made of, a new study finds.
- Animals
Invasive rabbitfish team up to raze algal forests
Tropical rabbitfish have expanded into temperate Mediterranean waters, where they destroy algae forests by gobbling both young and adult algae.
- Animals
No eyes, no problem for color-sensing coral larvae
Switching colors of underwater light can switch preferences for where staghorn corals choose their forever homes.
- Earth
Ocean’s plastics offer a floating fortress to a mess of microbes
Microbes take up residence on ocean plastics, potentially causing changes in ocean environments.
- Life
Genetic mutation quenches quantum quirk in algae
Studying algae that can and cannot use quantum coherence to harvest light could lead to better organic solar cells and quantum-based electronic devices.
- Genetics
Feng Zhang: Editing DNA
Scientist Feng Zhang has developed a system to easily and precisely edit genomes.
- Life
Near reefs, microbial mix dictated by coral and algae
A reef’s dominant organism, coral or algae, may determine what kind of bacteria live there.
- Animals
Some animals ‘see’ the world through oddball eyes
Purple urchins, aka crawling eyeballs, are just one of several bizarre visual systems broadening scientists’ view of what makes an eye.
- Animals
When swimming with manatees, mind the herd
Manatees hang out in Florida’s Crystal River; tourists can choose a mindful visit or a harmful one
- Paleontology
Strange fossils from China hint at early multicellular life
New fossils of strange, oblong organisms that lived 600 million years ago are giving scientists hints to how living things may have moved from being single- to multi-celled.
- Life
The tree of life gets a makeover
Biology’s tree of life has morphed from the familiar classroom version emphasizing kingdoms into a complex depiction of supergroups, in which animals are aligned with a slew of single-celled cousins.
