Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Paleontology
Fossil leaves yield extinction clues
Analyses of fossil leaves provide more evidence that the mass extinctions that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago were sudden and probably brought about by an extraterrestrial impact.
- Paleontology
Into the Gap: Fossil find stands on its own four legs
A fossil originally misidentified as an ancient fish turns out to be the nearly intact remains of a four-limbed creature that lived during an extended period noted for its lack of fossils of land animals.
- Animals
Wasp Painting: Do insects know each other’s faces?
A researcher who dabbed tiny stripes on the faces and abdomens of paper wasps says that she's found the first evidence that the insects can recognize individuals by their markings.
- Paleontology
Rain Forest Primeval? Colorado fossils show unexpected diversity
The size, shape, and riotous variety of fossil leaves unearthed at a site in central Colorado suggest that the region may have been covered with one of the world's first tropical rain forests just 1.4 million years after the demise of the dinosaurs.
- Animals
Butterfly ears suggest a bat influence
Researchers have found the first bat-detecting ear in a butterfly and suggest that the threat of bats triggered the evolution of some moths into butterflies.
- Animals
Oops. Woodpecker raps were actually gunshots
The knock-knock noises recorded last winter that raised hopes for rediscovering the long-lost ivory-billed woodpecker in Louisiana turn out to have been gunshots instead of bird noises.
- Ecosystems
The Buzz over Coffee
Most people consider the continued spread of Africanized honeybees in the Americas as horrifying news. Nicknamed killer bees, these notorious social insects rile into stinging mobs with little provocation. But new research finds evidence that these irritable insects have been performing a hitherto unrecognized service for people around the world. They’ve helped keep down the […]
- Animals
Who’s on first with hummingbird bills
A survey of 166 hummingbird species links sex differences in bill length to sex differences in plumage and to breeding behavior.
- Animals
Marine Mules: Near-sterile hyrids boost coral diversity
Reef corals that spawn in great mixed-up soups of many species may be maintaining their diversity because their hybrids are sterile mules.
- Plants
Mirror Image: Flowers with opposite styles have a fling
Scientists have discovered a gene that controls whether flowers lean to the left or the right.
- Animals
Bay leaves may make rat nests nicer
Wood rats may be fumigating their nests with bits of California bay leaves, sprigs that killed flea larvae in lab tests.
- Paleontology
All mixed up over birds and dinosaurs
A bit of fossil fakery snookered a team of paleontologists
