Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Ecosystems
Cryptic Invasion: Native reeds harbor aggressive alien
A mild-mannered reed native to the United States is getting blamed for the mayhem caused by an evil twin.
- Paleontology
Dinosaur tracks show walking and running
A single trail of dinosaur footprints found in a British limestone quarry preserves a record of two different walking styles in the same animal, a tantalizing clue that some types of lumbering, bipedal dinosaurs could also run if the need arose.
- Ecosystems
Biodiversity Hot Spots: Top 10 sea locales make sobering list
Biologists have identified the world's most vulnerable coral reefs, each with organisms found nowhere else and threatened by human influence.
- Animals
Yellower blue tits make better dads
The yellow feathers on a male blue tit's breast could tell females that he'll be a good provider for the chicks.
- Plants
Tropical plants grow cool flowers
Tropical plants that position their flowers in the general direction of the sun are keeping the temperature comfortable for pollinators.
- Plants
Petite pollinators: Tree raises its own crop of couriers
A common tropical tree creates farms in its buds, where it raises its own work force of tiny pollinators.
- Ecosystems
Genetic lynx: North American lynx make one huge family
A new study of lynx in North America suggests the animals interbreed widely, sometimes with populations thousands of kilometers away.
- Plants
Shower power: Raindrops shoot seeds out with a splat
In a seed-dispersal mechanism scientists have never seen before in flowering plants, rain plops into a capsule and makes seeds shoot out the corners.
- Ecosystems
Tadpole Science Gets Its Legs . . .
The amazingly complex tadpole now shines in ecological studies.
- Animals
Hanging around Mom’s web helps everybody
For nearly grown spiderlings, lingering in their mother's web instead of setting off on their own turns out to be a boon for the mom, as well as themselves.
- Ecosystems
Mistletoe, of all things, helps juniper trees
A mistletoe that grows on junipers may do the trees a favor by attracting birds that spread the junipers' seeds.
- Animals
Unknown squids—with elbows—tease science
Glimpses from around the world suggest that the ocean depths hold novel, long-armed squids that belong in no known family.
