Animals
- Paleontology
Museum fossil links snakes to lizards
Scientists have discovered the fossilized remains of the first four-legged snake. The fossil bridges the gap between snakes and lizards.
- Animals
Boas kill by cutting off blood flow, not airflow
Boas actually kill by constricting blood flow of their prey, not suffocating them, as scientists previously suspected.
- Animals
Sea level rise threatens sea turtles
Sea level rise is causing coastal areas to be inundated with water. Even short periods of being wet can kill sea turtle eggs, a new study finds.
- Animals
Eyewitness account of a dolphin birth takes a dark turn
Scientists witnessed the first wild birth of a bottlenose dolphin — and an attempt at infanticide.
- Animals
Polar bears’ ‘walking hibernation’ not much of an energy saver
Summer’s “walking hibernation” doesn’t shut down polar bears as much as winter does.
- Life
Good luck outsmarting a mosquito
Mosquitoes use their senses in sophisticated combinations and sequences to find you.
- Animals
Birds learn what danger sounds like
In just two days, superb fairy-wrens learned to recognize an unfamiliar alarm call as a sign that a predator loomed.
- Animals
Feeding seabirds may give declining populations a boost
Supplementing the diets of kittiwakes with additional food might give fledglings a head start, a new study finds.
- Paleontology
50-million-year-old fossil sperm discovered
Ancient worm sperm preserved in 50-million-year-old cocoons from Antarctica set age record.
- Animals
Some animals’ internal clocks follow a different drummer
Circadian clocks in some animals tick-tock to a different beat.
- Life
A downy killer wages chemical warfare
The common fungus Beauveria bassiana makes white downy corpses of its victims.
- Animals
Children’s classic ‘Watership Down’ is based on real science
The novel ‘Watership Down’ is the tale of a bunch of anthropomorphized rabbits. Their language may be unreal, but the animals’ behavior was rooted in science.
