Life

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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.

  1. Animals

    Young penguins follow false food cues

    Juvenile African penguins are being trapped in barren habitats, led astray by biological cues that are no longer reliable because of human activity.

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  2. Animals

    How hydras know where to regrow their heads

    Regenerating pond animals called hydras inherit structural patterns from their original forms, researchers find.

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  3. Animals

    How hydras know where to regrow their heads

    Regenerating pond animals called hydras inherit structural patterns from their original forms, researchers find.

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  4. Genetics

    Number of species depends how you count them

    Genetic evidence alone may overestimate numbers of species, researchers warn.

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  5. Ecosystems

    Zika virus ‘spillback’ into primates raises risk of future human outbreaks

    Spillback of Zika virus into monkeys may complicate eradication efforts.

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  6. Neuroscience

    Mysteries of time still stump scientists

    The new book "Why Time Flies" is an exploration of how the body perceives time.

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  7. Climate

    Hot nests, not vanishing males, are bigger sea turtle threat

    Climate change overheating sea turtle nestlings may be a greater danger than temperature-induced shifts in their sex ratios.

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  8. Animals

    A diet of corn turns wild hamsters into cannibals

    Female European hamsters fed a diet of corn eat their young — alive. They may be suffering from something similar to the human disease pellagra.

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  9. Animals

    Pectoral sandpipers go the distance, and then some

    Even after a long migration, male pectoral sandpipers keep flying, adding 3,000 extra kilometers on quest for mates.

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  10. Earth

    Oxygen flooded Earth’s atmosphere earlier than thought

    The Great Oxidation Event that enabled the eventual evolution of complex life began 100 million years earlier than once thought, new dating of South African rock suggests.

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  11. Animals

    For calmer chickens, bathe eggs in light

    Shining light on incubating eggs leads to calmer adult chickens, a study suggests.

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  12. Animals

    ‘Cannibalism’ chronicles grisly science of eating your own

    In "Cannibalism", a zoologist explores a grisly topic that scientists have only recently begun to study seriously.

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