Ecosystems

  1. Earth

    Warming dents corn and wheat yields

    Rising temperatures have decreased global grain production and may be partly responsible for food price increases.

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  2. Chemistry

    Plants and predators pick same poison

    Zygaena caterpillars and their herbaceous hosts independently evolved an identical recipe for cyanide.

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  3. Paleontology

    Supersized superbunny

    Fossils reveal a non-hopping giant rabbit that lived on the island of Minorca 5 million years ago.

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  4. Life

    Songbird’s testosterone surges at sight of thistle blooms

    Seeing the right flowers in summer temperatures triggers male goldfinches’ reproductive readiness.

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  5. Science & Society

    Methane from BP spill goes missing

    Latest sampling suggests either that microbes have already devoured the most abundant hydrocarbon produced by the leak — or that researchers have simply lost track of it.

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  6. Life

    Genes separate Africa’s elephant herds

    Genetic work reveals forest and savanna pachyderms as distinct species.

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  7. Earth

    Bugged forests bad for climate

    Trees savaged by pine beetles are slow to recover their ecological function as greenhouse gas sponges.

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  8. Earth

    Climate action could save polar bears

    Cutting fossil fuel emissions soon would retain enough sea ice habitat for threatened species, scientists say.

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  9. Ecosystems

    Climate’s link to plague

    Scientists have correlated changes in long-term Pacific Ocean temperature patterns with the incidence of a deadly bacterial pestilence, one spread by fleas living on and around mice and other rodents.

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  10. Ecosystems

    No ‘dead zone’ from BP oil

    As aquatic microbes dine, they consume oxygen. When too many congregate at some temporary smorgasbord of goodies, they can use up so much oxygen that a so-called dead zone develops — water with too little oxygen to sustain fish, mammals or shellfish. On Sept. 7, federal scientists reported that despite the massive release of oil from the damaged BP well in the Gulf of Mexico, no such dead zone developed.

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  11. Ecosystems

    Frogs leapt before they landed

    Jumping preceded mastery of the touchdown in amphibian evolution, a new study suggests.

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  12. Ecosystems

    Gut first

    A crawling caterpillar’s gut moves forward before the rest of its body does.

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