Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Paleontology
Ancient Buzzing: German site yields early hummingbird fossils
Excavations in Germany have yielded the only known fossils of hummingbirds from the Old World and by far the oldest such fossils unearthed anywhere.
- Animals
Toxin Takeout: Frogs borrow poison for skin from ants
Scientists have identified formicine ants as a food source from which poison frogs acquire their chemical weapons.
- Animals
Din among the Orcas: Are whale watchers making too much noise?
Whale-watching boats may be making so much noise that killer whales off the coast of Washington have to change their calls to communicate over the racket.
-
- Paleontology
Early Biped Fossil Pops Up in Europe
A newly described, nearly complete 290-million-year-old fossil of an ancient reptile pushes back the evidence for terrestrial bipedalism by 60 million years.
- Animals
Shielded cells help fish ignore noise
Fish can sort out the interesting ripples from the background rush of water currents through sensors shielded in canals that run along their flanks.
- Animals
Male spiders amputate organs, run faster
Tiny male spiders of a species common to the southeastern United States routinely remove one of their two oversize external sex organs, enabling them to run faster and longer.
- Animals
Hooking the Gullible
Research into fish behavior often reveals ways that bait designers can trick a fish into biting odd-looking lures, but angler appeal can also be an important marketing consideration.
- Paleontology
Listening to fish for extinction clues
Tiny fossils from fish that survived worldwide extinctions about 34 million years ago may reveal that cooler winters caused the die-off.
- Animals
Dull birds and bright ones beat so-so guys
The plumage of yearling male lazuli buntings shows signs of a rare form of evolutionary pressure called disruptive selection.
- Animals
Flex That Bill: Hummingbirds’ surprising insect-catching style
High-speed videos of hummingbirds catching insects reveal that their lower bills are unexpectedly flexible.
- Plants
A Frond Fared Well: Genes hint that ferns proliferated in shade of flowering plants
Analyses of genetic material from a multitude of fern species suggest that much of that plant group branched out millions of years after flowering plants first appeared, a notion that contradicts many scientists' views of plant evolution.
