Life

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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.

  1. Life

    Asteroid barrage, ancient marine life boom not linked

    Impacts from asteroid debris probably didn’t trigger the boom in marine animal diversity around 471 million years ago during the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event.

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  2. Paleontology

    Baby dinosaurs took three to six months to hatch

    Growth lines on teeth indicate a surprisingly long incubation period.

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  3. Life

    What a mosquito’s immune system can tell us about fighting malaria

    Immune system messengers carried in microscopic sacs help mosquitoes fend off malaria, new research suggests.

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  4. Animals

    How desert ants navigate walking backward

    Desert ants appear to use a combination of visual memory and celestial cues to make it back to the nest walking butt-first, researchers find.

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  5. Animals

    Desert ants look to the sky, rely on memory to navigate backward

    Desert ants appear to use a combination of visual memory and celestial cues to make it back to the nest walking butt-first, researchers find.

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  6. Ecosystems

    In debate over origin of fairy circles, both sides might be right

    Odd bare spots called fairy circles in African grasslands might be caused by both termites and plants.

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  7. Life

    A message to rock climbers: Be kind to nature

    Scientists are only just starting to figure out the impacts that the sport of rock climbing is having on cliff ecosystems.

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  8. Earth

    Coastal waters were an oxygen oasis 2.3 billion years ago

    Coastal waters contained enough oxygen to support complex life-forms including some animals hundreds of millions of years before fossils of such life first appear.

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  9. Life

    Here’s how earwax might clean ears

    Science seeks inspiration in earwax for dreams of self-cleaning machinery.

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  10. Neuroscience

    How mice use their brain to hunt

    Messages from the brain’s amygdala help mice chase and kill prey.

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  11. Life

    Shimmering soap bubbles have a dark side

    Merging dark spots are indicators that a bubble is about to burst.

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  12. Animals

    It takes guts for a sea spider to pump blood

    Most sea spiders have hearts, but what really gets their blood flowing are gut contractions.

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