1,931 results
- Animals
Birds large and small hop over obstacles in similar ways
Bipedal birds, from tiny quail to huge ostriches, tackled a step in a similar way, minimizing energy cost and maximizing safety.
- Life
Epic worldwide effort explores all of insect history
A whopper of a genetic analysis fits all living orders of insects into one genealogical evolutionary tree.
- Astronomy
Gamma-ray bursts may repeatedly wipe out life
Brief bursts of high-energy radiation may sterilize most planets across the universe, hampering the chances for widespread intelligent life.
- Earth
How the Chicxulub impact made acid rain
Using lasers to accelerate materials to asteroid-like impact velocities, scientists have shown how the Chicxulub asteroid impact, which happened roughly 65 million years ago, could have created a mass extinction in the oceans.
- Animals
Slow, cold reptiles may breathe like energetic birds
Finding birdlike air patterns in lungs of crocodilians and in more distantly related lizards raises the possibility that one-way airflow evolved far earlier than birds themselves did.
- Plants
Fossil fern showcases ancient chromosomes
Fossil nuclei and chromosomes seen in a 180-million-year-old fern reveals that the plants have stayed mostly the same.
- Paleontology
Oldest known T. Rex relative found in Utah
Researchers say the animal — named the gore king of the southwest — was an early member of the tyrannosaur family.
- Life
Dinosaur embryos were restless, speedy growers
Hundreds of fossils found in China suggest some unhatched dinos kicked their legs.
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- Paleontology
Fossil muddies the origin of birds
New specimen may be a feathered dinosaur — or the earliest avian yet discovered
- Earth
The Sixth Extinction
On only five occasions in Earth’s long history has a large fraction of the planet’s biodiversity disappeared in a geological instant. But, journalist Kolbert reminds us in her new book, we are well on our way to making it six.
- Paleontology
My Beloved Brontosaurus
On the Road with Old Bones, New Science, and Our Favorite Dinosaurs by Brian Switek.
