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Categories: Offbeat: Plants and Animals, Space: Cosmology
Published Genetic mutation in a quarter of all Labradors hard-wires them for obesity
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source New research finds around a quarter of Labrador retriever dogs face a double-whammy of feeling hungry all the time and burning fewer calories due to a genetic mutation.
Published Do some electric fish sense the world through comrades' auras?
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source It would be a game-changer if all members of a basketball team could see out of each other's eyes in addition to their own. Biologists have found evidence that this kind of collective sensing occurs in close-knit groups of African weakly electric fish, also known as elephantnose fish. This instantaneous sharing of sensory intelligence could help the fish locate food, friends and foes.
Published Tiny worms tolerate Chornobyl radiation
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A new study finds that exposure to chronic radiation from Chornobyl has not damaged the genomes of microscopic worms living there today -- which doesn't mean that the region is safe, the scientists caution, but suggests that these worms are exceptionally resilient.
Published Fossils of giant sea lizard with dagger-like teeth show how our oceans have fundamentally changed since the dinosaur era
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Fossils of a strange new species of marine lizard with dagger-like teeth that lived 66 million years ago, show a dramatically more biodiverse ocean ecosystem to what we see today.
Published Fossil named 'Attenborough's strange bird' was the first in its kind without teeth
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A new fossil, named 'Attenborough's strange bird' after naturalist and documentarian Sir David Attenborough, is the first of its kind to evolve a toothless beak. It's from a branch of the bird family tree that went extinct in the mass extinction 66 million years ago, and this strange bird is another puzzle piece that helps explain why some birds -- and their fellow dinosaurs -- went extinct, and others survived to today.
Published Modeling the origins of life: New evidence for an 'RNA World'
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists provide fresh insights on the origins of life, presenting compelling evidence supporting the 'RNA World' hypothesis. The study unveils an RNA enzyme that can make accurate copies of other functional RNA strands, while also allowing new variants of the molecule to emerge over time. These remarkable capabilities suggest the earliest forms of evolution may have occurred on a molecular scale in RNA, and also bring scientists one step closer to re-creating autonomous RNA-based life in the laboratory.
Published Webb unlocks secrets of one of the most distant galaxies ever seen
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Looking deeply into space and time, astronomers have studied the exceptionally luminous galaxy GN-z11, which existed when our 13.8 billion-year-old universe was only about 430 million years old.
Published The crow's best friend: Humans
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A new study has found that when humans are suddenly absent from the urban environment, the activity of the crows and ringneck parakeets that 'live' in the area reduces significantly. Conversely, the graceful prinias, who are generally considered shy, increased their activity.
Published Orcas demonstrating they no longer need to hunt in packs to take down the great white shark
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source An orca (killer whale) has been observed, for the first-ever time, individually consuming a great white shark -- and within just two minutes.
Published New insights on how galaxies are formed
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Astronomers can use supercomputers to simulate the formation of galaxies from the Big Bang 13.8 billion years ago to the present day. But there are a number of sources of error. An international research team has spent a hundred million computer hours over eight years trying to correct these.
Published Dung beetles show their love by sharing the load
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Dung beetles share the load when it comes to showing their affection for each-other, when transporting a 'brood ball'.
Published Study identifies multi-organ response to seven days without food
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source New findings reveal that the body undergoes significant, systematic changes across multiple organs during prolonged periods of fasting. The results demonstrate evidence of health benefits beyond weight loss, but also show that any potentially health-altering changes appear to occur only after three days without food.
Published Scientists ID burned bodies using technique used for extracting DNA from woolly mammoths, Neanderthals
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A technique originally devised to extract DNA from woolly mammoths and other ancient archaeological specimens can be used to potentially identify badly burned human remains, according to research.
Published Slimming down a colossal fossil whale
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A 30 million year-old fossil whale may not be the heaviest animal of all time after all, according to a new analysis by paleontologists. The new analysis puts Perucetus colossus back in the same weight range as modern whales and smaller than the largest blue whales ever recorded.
Published Astronomers discover heavy elements after bright gamma-ray burst from neutron star merger
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source An international team of astronomers obtained observational evidence for the creation of rare heavy elements in the aftermath of a cataclysmic explosion triggered by the merger of two neutron stars.
Published 'Cosmic lighthouses' that cleared primordial fog identified with JWST
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists working with data from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have obtained the first full spectra of some of the earliest starlight in the universe. The images provide the clearest picture yet of very low-mass, newborn galaxies, created less than a billion years after the Big Bang, and suggest the tiny galaxies are central to the cosmic origin story.
Published Radio waves can tune up bacteria to become life-saving medicines
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists have found a new way to alter the DNA of bacterial cells -- a process used to make many vital medicines including insulin -- much more efficiently than standard industry techniques.
Published Creepy crawlies protect apples when flowers are planted on farms
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Bugs including hoverflies, lacewings and ladybirds play an important role in keeping Britain's apples healthy, a new study has shown.
Published Double trouble at chromosome ends
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source New findings suggest the end-replication problem, an old standby of biology textbooks, is twice as intricate as once thought.
Published Change in gene code may explain how human ancestors lost tails
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A genetic change in our ancient ancestors may partly explain why humans don't have tails like monkeys.