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Categories: Biology: Evolutionary, Offbeat: Computers and Math

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Researchers developed an augmented reality headset called X-AR that combines computer vision and wireless perception to find hidden objects in a room and then guide the wearer to retrieve the targeted item.

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What is the origin of the ancestors of present-day fish? What species evolved from them? A 50-year-old scientific controversy revolved around the question of which group, the 'bony-tongues' or the 'eels', was the oldest. A study has just put an end to the debate by showing through genomic analysis that these fishes are in fact one and the same group, given the rather peculiar name of 'Eloposteoglossocephala'. These results shed new light on the evolutionary history of fish.

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A tiny robot that could one day help doctors perform surgery was inspired by the incredible gripping ability of geckos and the efficient locomotion of inchworms.

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Biochemists have succeeded in resurrecting the ancestral genes of five detoxifying enzymes which are present in all tetrapods to show how their divergence in function has occurred.

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After more than 30 years, botanists have rediscovered Thismia kobensis, a type of mysterious-looking rare plant commonly referred to as 'fairy lanterns'. Thismia kobensis was presumed extinct and the surprise rediscovery of this Japanese variety has illuminated hidden aspects of fairy lanterns that have puzzled and fascinated botanists for centuries.

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By simulating early Earth conditions in the lab, researchers have found that without specific amino acids, ancient proteins would not have known how to evolve into everything alive on the planet today -- including plants, animals, and humans.

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Octopus arms coordinate nearly infinite degrees of freedom to perform complex movements such as reaching, grasping, fetching, crawling, and swimming. How these animals achieve such a wide range of activities remains a source of mystery, amazement, and inspiration. Part of the challenge comes from the intricate organization and biomechanics of the internal muscles.

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Modern birds capable of flight all have a specialized wing structure called the propatagium without which they could not fly. The evolutionary origin of this structure has remained a mystery, but new research suggests it evolved in nonavian dinosaurs. The finding comes from statistical analyses of arm joints preserved in fossils and helps fill some gaps in knowledge about the origin of bird flight.

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Scientists who study the origins and evolution of the plague have examined hundreds of ancient human teeth from Denmark, seeking to address longstanding questions about its arrival, persistence and spread within Scandinavia.

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Plants can move in ways that might surprise you. Some of them even show 'sleep movements,' folding or raising their leaves each night before opening them again the next day. Now, researchers offer convincing evidence for these nightly movements, also known as foliar nyctinasty, in fossil plants that lived more than 250 million years ago.

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The endangered Saimaa ringed seal is an Ice Age relict living in the highly labyrinthine Lake Saimaa, Finland. The newly published work shows that although individual seals have greatly reduced genetic variation, the loss of variation has been complementary, preserving the adaptive potential of the whole population.

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One of the striking aspects of the quantum world is that a particle, say, an electron, is also a wave, meaning that it exists in many places at the same time. Researchers make use of this property to develop a new type of tool -- the quantum twisting microscope (QTM) -- that can create novel quantum materials while simultaneously gazing into the most fundamental quantum nature of their electrons.

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Sensing a hug from each other via the internet may be a possibility in the near future. A research team recently developed a wireless, soft e-skin that can both detect and deliver the sense of touch, and form a touch network allowing one-to-multiuser interaction. It offers great potential for enhancing the immersion of distance touch communication.

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When scientists disabled a single regulatory gene in a species of sea anemone, a stinging cell that shoots a venomous miniature harpoon for hunting and self-defense shifted to shoot a sticky thread that entangles prey instead, according to a new study.

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Researchers have demonstrated a new hands-free approach to convey realistic haptic feedback in virtual reality (VR). Their 'multisensory pseudo-haptics' uses a combination of headset visuals and tactile feedback from a wrist bracelet to convey sensations of touch.

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A new model offers a possible solution to the scientific question of why neutral sequences, sometimes referred to as 'junk DNA', are not eliminated from the genome of living creatures in nature and continue to exist within it even millions of years later.

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Researchers have demonstrated a switch, analogous to a transistor, made from a single molecule called fullerene. By using a carefully tuned laser pulse, the researchers are able to use fullerene to switch the path of an incoming electron in a predictable way. This switching process can be three to six orders of magnitude faster than switches in microchips, depending on the laser pulses used. Fullerene switches in a network could produce a computer beyond what is possible with electronic transistors, and they could also lead to unprecedented levels of resolution in microscopic imaging devices.

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Geckos can use their tongue to differentiate their own odor from that of other members of their species, as researchers have shown in a new experimental study. The findings show that geckos are able to communicate socially, meaning that they are more intelligent than was previously assumed.

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Fish, the most biodiverse vertebrates in the animal kingdom, present evolutionary biologists a conundrum: The greatest species richness is found in the world's tropical waters, yet the fish groups that generate new species most rapidly inhabit colder climates at higher latitudes. A new study helps to explain this paradox. The researchers discovered that the ability of fish in temperate and polar ecosystems to transition back and forth from shallow to deep water triggers species diversification. Their findings suggest that as climate change warms the oceans at higher latitudes, it will impede the evolution of fish species.

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Bee researchers have identified a new gene in honeybees, which is responsible for the dimorphic eye differentiation between males and females of the species. The researchers have now presented this gene and the evolutionary genetic conclusions they have drawn from it.