A single chemical made by mole-rat queens enforces the social order. Naked mole rats are weird. They spend their lives […]
Category: Biology
Dragonflies maneuver like fighter pilots
Credit: Samuel T. Fabian et al., 2026 Credit: Samuel T. Fabian et al., 2026 Male dragonflies are known to engage […]
Artificial cell manages a few rounds of cell division
It’s (probably not) alive! It only works for a few divisions thanks to a lot of added materials. SpudCells in […]
Early land animals skipped the tadpole phase
Current amphibian development may not have been typical of early land vertebrates. For decades, biologists thought that early tetrapods, ancient […]
Cockroaches scurry around with thousands of pieces of bacterial genomes
Skip to content Transferring genes across species doesn’t just happen in microbes. Last week, we looked at a new study […]
The first complex cells had genes from a complex mix of species
Our ancestors’ genomes were built through successive waves of gene transfers. We tend to view ourselves and the complex cells […]
Bumblebees can spontaneously solve problems, study finds
Skip to content Scientists in Finland found bees could solve an insect version of the classic “box-and-banana” problem. Despite having […]
Beans use an immune receptor to call in airstrikes on caterpillars
When they’re being eaten, bean plants release chemicals that draw in parasitic wasps. For decades, scientists have understood that plants […]
Male bowerbirds hope to dazzle females with bright human-made items
Skip to content “It’s a reminder of how human activity is changing the natural world in unanticipated ways.” “Hey baby, […]
Severed sea cucumber appendages don’t seem to die
They seem to reorganize their tissues and then just keep living. Organs, arms, appendages, and other complex tissues usually decay […]