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Categories: Biology: Zoology, Offbeat: Earth and Climate

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Scientists are amazed at the discovery of a bristle worm with such sharp-seeing eyes that they can measure up to those of mammals and octopuses. The researchers suspect that these marine worms may have a secretive language, which uses UV light only seen by their own species. The advanced vision of such a primitive creature helps to finally settle an epic debate about the evolution of eyes.

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A new reconstruction of the 375-million-year-old fossil fish Tiktaalik -- a close relative of limbed vertebrates -- used micro-CT to reveal bones still embedded in matrix. The reconstruction shows that the fish's ribs likely attached to its pelvis, an innovation thought to be crucial to supporting the body and for the eventual evolution of walking.

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A new study calls into question Bergmann's rule, an 1800s-era scientific principle stating that animals in high-latitude, cooler climates tend to be larger than close relatives living in warmer climates.

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In a recent study, researchers found that 78% of the world's bird species do not thrive in the most modified human-dominated environments. These species are also most likely to have declining populations.

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Researchers have shown that levels of anisakid worms -- a common marine parasite -- rose in two salmon species in the Gulf of Alaska and Bristol Bay over a 42-year period. The team discovered this by studying salmon caught, killed and canned from 1979 to 2021. Since anisakid worms have a complex life cycle involving multiple types of hosts, the researchers interpret their rising numbers as a potential sign of ecosystem recovery, possibly driven by rising numbers of marine mammals thanks to the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act.

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During archaeological excavations in the Schoningen open-cast coal mine in 1994, the discovery of the oldest, remarkably well-preserved hunting weapons known to humanity caused an international sensation. Spears and a double-pointed throwing stick were found lying between animal bones about ten meters below the surface in deposits at a former lakeshore. In the years that followed, extensive excavations have gradually yielded numerous wooden objects from a layer dating from the end of a warm interglacial period 300,000 years ago. The findings suggested a hunting ground on the lakeshore.

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Human activity is changing the way water flows between the Earth and atmosphere in complex ways and with likely long-lasting consequences that are hard to picture. Researchers enlisted water scientists from around the globe to write story-based scenarios about the possible futures humanity is facing but perhaps can't quite comprehend yet. The results are part of a creative pathway to understand atmospheric water research with an eye towards the potential economic and policy issues that may be just beyond the horizon.

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Many marine protected areas are falling short of their most basic purpose: to rebuild struggling fish populations. In a new study, scientists looked at the age breakdown of reef fish in marine protected areas for the first time. They discovered in almost all of them, adult fish populations -- vital to spawning the next generation -- have either flatlined or declined.

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It may be possible to change the purchasing behavior of consumers noticeably using some simple strategies. At least this is what a new study indicates. The researchers investigated the effect of nudging on the sale of products produced with high animal welfare standards in a virtual supermarket. Nudges are gentle prods or pushes designed to promote certain behaviors -- such as placing some products in more visible positions.

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Researchers have discovered a new bacterial killer that can target common lung infection caused by Burkholderia bacteria that has exciting potential for biotechnological applications.

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A fungus devastating frogs and toads on nearly every continent may have an Achilles heel. Scientists have discovered a virus that infects the fungus, and that could be engineered to save the amphibians.

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A new study has found that birds that are more social are more likely to use novel sources of food.

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There is room for just one small bottle in the world's first refrigerator that is cooled with artificial muscles made of nitinol, a nickel-titanium alloy. But the mini-prototype is groundbreaking: it shows that elastocalorics is becoming a viable solution for practical applications. This climate-friendly cooling and heating technology is far more energy-efficient and sustainable than current methods.

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A group of scholars calculated the amount of energy used by AI tools for the tasks of writing and illustrating and compared it to the average amount of energy humans use for the same processes. Their results showed artificial intelligence results in hundreds of times less carbon emissions than humans. This does not mean, however, that AI can or should replace humans in those tasks, simply that its energy usage is less. The better approach is a partnership between humans and AI, the authors write.

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New research suggests animals can thrive in human-dominated environments by being expert judges of risk. Researchers examined the behavior of great-tailed grackles, a bird species successfully invading much of urban North America, showing that the dispersing males shy away from risk, which is a characteristic the researchers show is well-suited to chaotic environments like cities. These findings provide unique insight into how and why animals and humans can coexist.

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An international team of scholars present the earliest clear archaeological and biomolecular evidence for the raising of chickens for egg production, based on material from 12 archaeological sites spanning one and a half millennia. The research indicates that the domestic chicken, now a staple in diets around the world, is not as ancient as previously thought.

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Genomic anamolies dating back to the time of the dinosaurs misled scientists about the evolutionary history of birds.

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Using cutting-edge computational methods and supercomputing infrastructure, researchers have built the largest and most detailed bird family tree to date -- an intricate chart delineating 93 million years of evolutionary relationships between 363 bird species, representing 92% of all bird families. The updated tree reveals sharp increases in effective population size, substitution rates and relative brain size in early birds in the aftermath of the mass extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. And by closely examining one of the branches of this tree, researchers found that flamingos and doves are more distantly related than previous genome-wide analyses had shown.

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Researchers upend the notion that the iconic great gray owl -- known as the phantom of the North -- lives far from cities, towns and other markers of human density.

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Through DNA sequencing of Tasmanian devils and their tumors, researchers have tracked the genomic interactions between the animals and the cancer.