562 results
- Animals
Chemical behind popcorn’s aroma gives a bearcat its signature scent
Bearcats smell like popcorn. Now scientists now why: The chemical responsible for popcorn’s alluring scent has been found in bearcat pee.
- Animals
Dog disease threatens Siberian tigers
Canine distemper virus poses a particular danger to small groups of the big cats.
- Health & Medicine
Chikungunya is on the move
The chikungunya virus, which wreaks havoc on joints, has spread via mosquitoes in tropical regions. Now it has found a way to hijack a second mosquito, posing a threat to people in Europe, North America and China.
- Animals
Tiger swallowtail genome gives clues to insect’s stinky defense
Clues within the genetic code of the Eastern tiger swallowtail butterfly (Papilio glaucus) explain how it developed a smelly defense against predators.
- Paleontology
300 million-year-old giant shark swam the Texas seas
Fossil find shows oldest known ‘supershark,’ about the size of a limo, prowled the ocean 300 million years ago.
- Life
Vaccines may offer defense against dengue, Zika and chikungunya
Mosquitoes carry several harmful viruses—dengue, Zika, chikungunya. Vaccines may be the best means of defense.
- Life
Tweaking the pattern equations
A more than 60-year-old theory about how patterns in nature form gets an update.
- Health & Medicine
Efforts to control mosquitoes take on new urgency
The major mosquito that is spreading Zika virus has quirks that make it one of the toughest to fight.
- Animals
Tortoises provide a window into the illegal wildlife trade
Tens of thousands of Indian star tortoises are poached every year, a new study finds.
- Animals
Ivory listings found on Craigslist as elephant poaching continues
Elephants are hunted by the thousands to meet demand for ivory products.
- Animals
Same math describes relationship between diverse predators and prey
From lions to plankton, predators have about the same relationship to the amount of prey, a big-scale ecology study predicts.
- Animals
On the importance of elephant poop
Asian elephants are key dispersers for tree seeds. A new study finds that buffalo and cattle can also disperse the seeds, but not nearly as well.
