Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Plants
Oops, missed that tree
Until now, an acacia common in its African homeland had no scientific name
- Animals
Ants do real estate the simple way
Tracking ants with anti-shoplifter RFID tags has inspired a new, simplified view of how a colony finds a home
- Earth
A little air pollution boosts vegetation’s carbon uptake
Aerosols bumped up world’s plant productivity by 25 percent in the 1960s and 1970s, new research suggests.
- Earth
Fossil of a walking seal found
A fossil skeleton discovered in the Canadian Arctic could represent a missing link in pinniped evolution.
- Life
Fossil evidence for a Goldilocks tyrannosaur
A newly described species of tyrannosaur helps fill in details about the fearsome meat-eating dinosaurs.
- Life
New neurons don’t heal
New neurons produced in the brain after a stroke don’t grow into all the cell types needed to heal the wound.
- Earth
An earlier appearance for the first land plants
Fossilized pollen could show that modern land plants evolved earlier than thought.
- Planetary Science
Antarctic ecosystem holds unusual microbes
Long isolated deep under a glacier, life thrives in dark, salty water by breathing iron and eating sulfates.
- Health & Medicine
Seemingly misplaced DNA acts as lenses
Nocturnal animals orient DNA in retinal cells to focus light.
- Life
Lizards sunbathe for another reason
Panther chameleons may regulate their vitamin D levels by lounging in the sun.
- Plants
Yo, aphid, I’m red and I’m bad
Apple trees support the idea that red fall colors are a warning signal to insects.
- Life
Early land arthropods sported shells
Ancient ocean-dwelling arthropods may have worn shells to enable their transition to land.
