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Categories: Biology: Evolutionary, Engineering: Robotics Research

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The better a songbird is at working its way around obstacles to retrieve a snack, the more complex its vocal learning ability will be.

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Researchers have developed small robotic devices that can change how they move through the air by 'snapping' into a folded position during their descent. Each device has an onboard battery-free actuator, a solar power-harvesting circuit and controller to trigger these shape changes in mid-air.

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A new study by researchers from the University of Bath (UK) and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (Mexico) shows that flowering plants escaped relatively unscathed from the mass extinction that killed the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Whilst they suffered some species loss, the devastating event helped flowering plants become the dominant type of plant today.

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Peppers are a versatile, flavorful, and widely popular crop, used not only as a healthy food source but also for their medicinal properties. Scientists have now sequenced the genomes of key cultivated and wild pepper species, offering unprecedented insights into pepper evolution, domestication, and genetic diversity.

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Biologists have found evidence for evolutionary 'syndromes'-- sets of traits that occur together -- that help to explain how tomatoes first evolved their distinctive blend of color, sweetness, acidity and aroma. The research not only shines a light on how fruits evolve in the wild, but will also be valuable to crop-improvement efforts aimed at breeding more nutritious and appealing varieties of fruits.

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A new study presents genomic evidence of hybridization between two closely related species of sea stars -- Asterias rubens, the common starfish, and Asterias forbesi, known as Forbes' sea star.

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Researchers who created a soft robot that could navigate simple mazes without human or computer direction have now built on that work, creating a 'brainless' soft robot that can navigate more complex and dynamic environments.

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An international consortium of scientists is using an unprecedentedly large database of canine DNA to take an unbiased look at how our furry friends evolved into the various breeds we know and love.

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Researchers have investigated how the behavior of an individual wheat plant under limiting light conditions influences the performance of the whole community. They assessed morphological and biomass phenotypes of single plants grown in mixtures under sunlight and a simulated canopy shade, and the relevance of these phenotypes for the monoculture community in the field.

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Researchers report that the flexible shoulders and elbows that allow us to throw a football or reach a high shelf may have evolved as a natural braking system that let our primate ancestors get out of trees without dying. The researchers used sports-analysis software to compare the climbing movements of chimpanzees and small monkeys called mangabeys. While the animals climb up trees similarly, the researchers found that the shallow, rounded shoulder joints and shortened elbow bones that chimps have -- similar to humans -- allow them to fully extend their arms above their heads when climbing down, holding onto branches like a person going down a ladder to support their greater weight. When early humans left forests for the grassy savanna, these versatile appendages would have been essential for gathering food and using tools for hunting and defense. The findings are among the first to identify the significance of 'downclimbing' in the evolution of apes and early humans.

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A team of scientists developed a new machine learning model for discovering critical-element-free permanent magnet materials based on the predicted Curie temperature of new material combinations.

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A new study has uncovered intriguing insights into the evolution of plant biology, effectively rewriting the history of how they evolved over the past billion years.

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More than 100 years of observations in nature have revealed a universal pattern of species abundances: Most species are rare but not very rare, and only a few species are very common. These so-called global species abundance distributions have become fully unveiled for some well-monitored species groups, such as birds. For other species groups, such as insects, however, the veil remains partially unlifted. A new study demonstrates how important biodiversity monitoring is for detecting species abundances on planet Earth and for understanding how they change.

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An international team of marine scientists has studied the DNA of family groups from four different whale species to estimate their mutation rates. Using the newly determined rates, the group found that the number of humpback whales in the North Atlantic before whaling was 86 percent lower than earlier studies suggested.

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An artificial intelligence with the ability to look inward and fine tune its own neural network performs better when it chooses diversity over lack of diversity, a new study finds. The resulting diverse neural networks were particularly effective at solving complex tasks.

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The day when robots can cook dinner, clear the kitchen table and empty the dishwasher is still a long way off. First, robots need to be able to recognize the many items of different sizes, shapes and brands in our homes. A team has now made a significant advance toward that technology with a robotic system that uses artificial intelligence to help robots better identify and remember objects.

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As climate change continues to pose severe challenges to ensuring sustainable food supplies around the world, scientists are looking for ways to improve the resilience and nutritional quality of potatoes. Scientists have assembled the genome sequences of nearly 300 varieties of potatoes and its wild relatives to develop more nutritious, disease-free, and weather-proof crop. A team has now created a potato super pangenome to identify genetic traits that can help produce the next super spud.

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Plant species from certain geographic regions are more successful in spreading outside their native ranges than others -- but why? Ecologists provide answers by exploring how the ecological and evolutionary histories of plants can influence their relationships with humans and their success as invaders.

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Researchers generated large scale gene expression data to investigate the molecular networks that operate in one of the closest algal relatives of land plants, a humble single-celled alga called Mesotaenium endlicherianum.

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Research teams have detailed a pioneering breakthrough in medical device technology that could lead to intelligent, long-lasting, tailored treatment for patients, thanks to soft robotics and artificial intelligence.