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Biology News Human Aging Gene Found In Flies - Scientists funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) have found a fast and effective way to investigate important aspects of human aging. May 13, 2008 When Bears Steal Human Food, Mom's Not To Blame - Researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) found that the black bears that become habituated to human food and garbage may not be learning these behaviors exclusively from their mothers, as widely assumed. May 12, 2008 Animal Interaction Behind Cambrian Explosion? - An event as simple as the world’s first bite may have sparked an ancient “explosion” of life 500 million years ago that led to the rise of the broad groups of animals that are still alive today. May 9, 2008 Dinosaur Bones Reveal Ancient Bug Bites - Paleontologists have long been perplexed by dinosaur fossils with missing pieces – sets of teeth without a jaw bone, bones that are pitted and grooved, even bones that are half gone. May 7, 2008 Scientists Discover Why Plague Is So Lethal - Bacteria that cause the bubonic plague may be more virulent than their close relatives because of a single genetic mutation, according to research published in the May issue of the journal Microbiology. May 6, 2008 Young Songbirds Babble Before They Learn To Sing - Young songbirds babble before they can mimic an adult's song, much like their human counterparts. May 5, 2008 Ancient Ecosystems Organized Much Like Our Own - Similarities between half-billion-year-old and recent food webs point to deep principles underpinning the structure of ecological relationships, as shown by researchers from the Santa Fe Institute, Microsoft Research Cambridge and elsewhere. May 2, 2008 Birds Can Detect Predators Using Smell - Many animal species detect and avoid predators by smell, but this ability has largely been ignored in the study of birds, since it was traditionally thought that they did not make use of this sense. April 30, 2008 T.Rex Has Clear Evolutionary Link To Birds - Putting more meat on the theory that dinosaurs' closest living relatives are modern-day birds, molecular analysis of a shred of 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex protein confirms that dinosaurs share common ancestry with chickens, ostriches, and to a lesser extent, alligators. April 29, 2008 Was Early Elephant An Amphibian? - Scientists studying two very ancient elephants surmised that they were probably semi-aquatic mammals, eating freshwater plants. April 28, 2008 Neanderthals Speak Again After 30,000 Years - Dr. Robert McCarthy, an assistant professor of anthropology in the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters at Florida Atlantic University, has reconstructed vocal tracts that simulate the sound of the Neanderthal voice. April 22, 2008 World's Oldest Living Tree Discovered In Sweden - The world's oldest recorded tree is a 9,550 year old spruce in the Dalarna province of Sweden. The spruce tree has shown to be a tenacious survivor that has endured by growing between erect trees and smaller bushes in pace with the dramatic climate changes over time. April 17, 2008 Ancient Komodo Dragon Has Space-age Skull - The fearsome Komodo dragon is the world's largest living lizard and can take very large animal prey: now a new international study has revealed how it can be such an efficient killing machine despite having a wimpy bite and a featherweight skull. April 15, 2008 Rats Can Discriminate Odors In Milliseconds - Using an ethologically relevant task - exploratory sniffing - Daniel Wesson and colleagues from Boston University discovered that rats are able to discriminate odors much more quickly than previously thought, in as little as 140 milliseconds. April 10, 2008 First Lungless Frog Discovered - Researchers have confirmed the first case of complete lunglessness in a frog, according to a report in the April 8th issue of Current Biology. April 9, 2008 How Dengue Virus Matures, Becomes Infectious - Biologists at Purdue University have determined why dengue virus particles undergo structural changes as they mature in host cells and how the changes are critical for enabling the virus to infect new host cells. April 1, 2008 Ant Guts Could Pave The Way For Better Drugs - Scientists have discovered two key proteins that guide one of the two groups of pathogenic bacteria to make ant's hardy outer shells - their defense against the world. March 28, 2008 Scientists Discover Clue To 2 Billion Year Delay Of Life On Earth - Scientists from around the world have reconstructed changes in Earth’s ancient ocean chemistry during a broad sweep of geological time, from about 2.5 to 0.5 billion years ago. March 27, 2008 How Bats Classify Plants According To Echoes - Researchers have developed a computer algorithm that can imitate the bat's ability to classify plants using echolocation. March 26, 2008 53 Million-year-old Rabbit's Foot Bones Found - One day last spring, fossil hunter and anatomy professor Kenneth Rose, Ph.D. was displaying the bones of a jackrabbit's foot as part of a seminar at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine when something about the shape of the bones looked oddly familiar. March 25, 2008 New Genus Of Prehistoric Aquatic Predator - One of the oldest and most complete plesiosaur fossils recovered in North America, and the oldest yet discovered from the Cretaceous Period, represents a new genus of the prehistoric aquatic predator. March 21, 2008 Gecko's 'Active' Tail Key to Preventing Falls and Aerial Maneuvers - How useful is an animal's tail? For the gecko, unlike most animals, it could be a matter of life or death, according to new research from the University of California, Berkeley. March 18, 2008 Mystery Behind The Strongest Creature In The World - The strongest creature in the world, the Hercules Beetle, has a colour-changing trick that scientists have long sought to understand. March 12, 2008 History Of Life Seen In The Structure Of Transfer RNA - Transfer RNA is an ancient molecule, central to every task a cell performs and thus essential to all life. A new study from the University of Illinois indicates that it is also a great historian, preserving some of the earliest and most profound events of the evolutionary past in its structure. March 11, 2008 Tree Of Animal Life Has Branches Rearranged - A study led by Brown University biologist Casey Dunn uses new genomics tools to answer old questions about animal evolution. March 7, 2008 Biologists Surprised To Find Parochial Bacterial Viruses - Biologists examining ecosystems similar to those that existed on Earth more than 3 billion years ago have made a surprising discovery: Viruses that infect bacteria are sometimes parochial and unrelated to their counterparts in other regions of the globe. March 5, 2008 Hungry Sharks Take Strange Walks To Find Food - Sharks and other marine animals find food using a similar search pattern to the way people may shop, according to one of the largest analyses of foraging behaviour attempted so far – and the first such analysis of marine predators. March 4, 2008 Butterfly Fish 'May Face Extinction' - A beautiful black, white and yellow butterflyfish, much admired by eco-tourists, divers and aquarium keepers alike, may be at risk of extinction, scientists have warned. February 27, 2008 Small Sea Creatures May Foretell Climate Change - As oceans warm and become more acidic, ocean creatures are undergoing severe stress and entire food webs are at risk, according to scientists at a press briefing this morning at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Boston. February 25, 2008 Mysterious Antarctic Sea Creatures - The return of the last of three Antarctic marine science research vessels marks the culmination of one of Australia's most ambitious International Polar Year projects, a census of life in the icy Southern Ocean known as the Collaborative East Antarctic Marine Census (CEAMARC). February 22, 2008 Identical Twins Not As Identical As Believed - Contrary to our previous beliefs, identical twins are not genetically identical. This surprising finding may be of great significance for research on hereditary diseases and for the development of new diagnostic methods. February 21, 2008 Giant Frog May Have Eaten Baby Dinosaurs - A giant frog fossil from Madagascar dubbed Beelzebufo or 'the frog from Hell' has been identified by scientists from UCL (University College London) and Stony Brook University, New York. February 20, 2008 Sumatran Tigers Are Being Sold Into Extinction - Laws protecting the critically endangered Sumatran Tiger have failed to prevent tiger body parts being openly sold in Indonesia, according to a new TRAFFIC report. February 15, 2008 Unique Mating Photos Of Wild Gorillas Face To Face - Scientists from the Wildlife Conservation Society and Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology have released the first known photographs of gorillas performing face-to-face copulation in the wild. February 14, 2008 Rare Form Of Chlorophyll Discovered In Newly Sequenced Bacterium - Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and Arizona State University have sequenced the genome of a rare bacterium that harvests light energy by making an even rarer form of chlorophyll, chlorophyll d. February 13, 2008 Oldest Horseshoe Crab Fossil Found - Few modern animals are as deserving of the title “living fossil” as the lowly horseshoe crab. Seemingly unchanged since before the Age of Dinosaurs, these venerable sea creatures can now claim a history that reaches back almost half-a billion years. February 11, 2008 Transparent Fish To Make Human Biology Clearer - Zebrafish are genetically similar to humans and are good models for human biology and disease. Now, researchers at Children's Hospital Boston have created a zebrafish that is transparent throughout its life. February 8, 2008 New Species Of Giant Elephant-shrew Discovered - When Francesco Rovero first saw the image captured by one of his automatic cameras in a remote Tanzanian forest, he knew he’d never seen anything quite like it. February 4, 2008 E. Coli Bacteria A Future Source Of Energy - For most people, the name "E. coli" is synonymous with food poisoning and product recalls, but a professor in Texas A&M University's chemical engineering department envisions the bacteria as a future source of energy, helping to power our cars, homes and more. February 1, 2008 World's Weirdest Creatures Just Got Weirder - A gigantic, ancient relative of the newt, a drawing-pin sized frog, a limbless, tentacled amphibian and a blind see-through salamander have all made it onto a list of the world’s weirdest and most endangered creatures. January 28, 2008 Captive Carnivores Not Up To Wild Living - A study by the University of Exeter has highlighted the problems of reintroducing animals to the wild for conservation projects. January 24, 2008 Ebola Virus Disarmed By Excising A Single Gene - The deadly Ebola virus, an emerging public health concern in Africa and a potential biological weapon, ranks among the most feared of exotic pathogens. January 23, 2008 Genes Linked To Lupus In Women Identified - An international consortium of scientists has identified multiple genes that are linked to systemic lupus erythematosus, a devastating autoimmune disease that affects between 1 million and 2 million Americans. January 22, 2008 Does Your Pet Seem Almost Human? - New research at the University of Chicago finds evidence for a clever way that people manage to alleviate the pain of loneliness: They create people in their surroundings to keep them company. January 21, 2008 Record Warm Summers Cause Extreme Ice Melt In Greenland - An international team of scientists, led by Dr Edward Hanna at the University of Sheffield, has demonstrated that recent warm summers have caused the most extreme Greenland ice melting in 50 years. January 17, 2008 Unusual Fish-eating Dinosaur Had Crocodile-like Skull - An unusual dinosaur has been shown to have a skull that functioned like a fish-eating crocodile, despite looking like a dinosaur. It also possessed two huge hand claws, perhaps used as grappling hooks to lift fish from the water. January 15, 2008 Ancient Cave Bears Were As Omnivorous As Modern Bears - Rather than being gentle giants, new research reveals that Pleistocene cave bears ate both plants and animals and competed for food with the other contemporary large carnivores of the time: hyaenas, lions, wolves, and our own human ancestors. January 11, 2008 Amber Fossils Reveal Ancient France Was A Jungle - Research on a treasure trove of amber has yielded evidence that France once was covered by a dense tropical rainforest with trees similar to those found in the modern-day Amazon. January 9, 2008 How One Pest Adapted To Life In The Dark - A type of beetle that lives its entire life burrowing through stored grain has been found to lack full colour vision, and what's more the vision it does have breaks the rules. January 7, 2008 Parents Show Bias In Sibling Rivalry, Says Study - Most parents would hotly deny favouring one child over another but new research suggests they may have little choice in the matter. January 3, 2008 Photo-monitoring Whale Sharks - Up to 20 meters long and weighing as much as 20 tons, its enormous size gives the whale shark (Rhincodon typus) its name. Known as the 'gentle giant' for its non-predatory behavior, this fish, with its broad, flattened head and minute teeth, eats tiny zooplankton, sieving them through a fine mesh of gill-rakers. January 1, 2008 Flies Need Two 'Noses' To Navigate Well - Animals and insects communicate through an invisible world of scents. By exploiting infrared technology, researchers at Rockefeller University just made that world visible. December 31, 2007 Scientist On Quest For Disappearing Eel - A Queen’s environmental scientist will head a new international study to determine whether American eels – the slimy, snake-like fish considered worldwide to be a food delicacy – are dying from chemical pollution in Lake Ontario. December 28, 2007 Argentine Ants' Success Linked To Diet Shifts - The Argentine ant, Linepithema humile, is one of the most successful invasive species in the world, having colonized parts of five continents in addition to its native range in South America. December 26, 2007 Skin Color In Humans And Fish Genetically Similar - When humans began to migrate out of Africa about 100,000 years ago, their skin color gradually changed to adapt to their new environments. And when the last Ice Age ended about 10,000 years ago, marine ancestors of ocean-dwelling stickleback fish experienced dramatic changes in skin coloring as they colonized newly formed lakes and streams. December 19, 2007 Two New Mammals Found In Indonesian 'Lost World' - A tiny possum and a giant rat were recorded by scientists as probable new species on a recent expedition to Indonesia’s remote and virtually unknown Lost World in the pristine wilderness of western New Guinea’s Foja Mountains. December 18, 2007 Penguins In Peril As Climate Warms - The penguin population of Antarctica is under pressure from global warming, according to a WWF report. December 17, 2007 Massive Dinosaur Discovered In Antarctica Sheds Light On Life - A new genus and species of dinosaur from the Early Jurassic has been discovered in Antarctica. The massive plant-eating primitive sauropodomorph is called Glacialisaurus hammeri and lived about 190 million years ago. December 13, 2007 Generosity May Be Genetically Programmed - Are those inclined towards generosity genetically programmed to behave that way? A team of researchers, including Dr. Ariel Knafo of the Psychology Department at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, believes that this could very well be the case. December 12, 2007 Toward a Rosetta Stone for Microbes' Secret Language - Scientists are on the verge of decoding the special chemical language that bacteria use to “talk” to each other, British researchers report in a commentary article that appeared in the November issue of ACS Chemical Biology, a monthly journal. December 11, 2007 Human Language Gene Affects Songbird Learning - Do special "human" genes provide the biological substrate for uniquely human traits, like language? December 7, 2007 Sperm Inspire Nanobot Energy System - The biological pathway that powers sperm to swim long distances could be harnessed to nanotech devices, releasing drugs or performing mechanical functions inside the body, according to new research. December 6, 2007 Rodent Fossils Provide Data On Climate Six Million Years Ago - How did the rodents which inhabited the south of the Iberian Peninsula live six million years ago? December 4, 2007 How Our Ancestors Were Like Gorillas - New research shows that some of our closest extinct relatives had more in common with gorillas than previously thought. December 3, 2007 Canines Can Classify Complex Photos - Like us, our canine friends are able to form abstract concepts. Friederike Range and colleagues from the University of Vienna in Austria have shown for the first time that dogs can classify complex color photographs and place them into categories ... November 30, 2007 Petrified Velvet Worms From 425 Million Years Ago - University of Leicester Geologist Dr Mark Purnell, with Canadian colleagues, reported, in the journal Geology, a new, exceptionally preserved deposit of fossils in 425 million year old Silurian rocks in Ontario. November 27, 2007 Fat Hormone May Contribute To Longevity - Both humans and mice that manage to live to a ripe, old age show a clear change in their glucose metabolism, but it's unclear whether this change alone can increase lifespan. November 26, 2007 Extensively Drug-resistant Tuberculosis Strain Decoded - An international collaboration led by researchers in the US and South Africa have announced the first genome sequence of an extensively drug resistant (XDR) strain of the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis ... November 23, 2007 Giant Fossil Sea Scorpion Bigger Than Man - The discovery of a giant fossilised claw from an ancient sea scorpion indicates that when alive it would have been about two and a half meters long, much taller than the average man. November 22, 2007 New Evidence For Female Control In Reproduction - Adding another layer of competition to the mating game, scientists are reporting possible biochemical proof that the reproductive system of female mammals can "sense" the presence of sperm and react to it by changing the uterine environment. November 21, 2007 Melatonin Could Hurt Memory Formation At Night - What do you do when a naturally occurring hormone in your body turns against you? What do you do when that same hormone – melatonin – is a popular supplement you take to help you sleep? November 20, 2007 Changing Environment Organizes Genetic Structure - What is the fundamental creative force behind life on Earth? It's a question that has vexed mankind for millennia, and thanks to theory and almost a year's worth of number-crunching on a supercomputer, Rice University physicist and bioengineer Michael Deem thinks he has the answer: A changing environment may organize the structure of genetic information itself. November 16, 2007 Yellowstone Viruses 'Jump' Between Hot Pools - A population study of microbes in Yellowstone National Park hot pools suggests viruses might be buoyed by steam to distant pools. November 15, 2007 Scorpion Toxin Makes Fungus Deadly to Insect Pests - University of Maryland entomology professor Raymond St. Leger has discovered how to use scorpion genes to create a hypervirulent fungus that can kill specific insect pests, including mosquitoes that carry malaria and a beetle that destroys coffee crops, but does not contaminate the environment as chemical pesticides do. November 13, 2007 How Well Do Dogs See At Night? - A lot better than we do, says Paul Miller, clinical professor of comparative ophthalmology at University of Wisconsin-Madison. November 12, 2007 Direct Gaze Makes You More Attractive - Looking directly at someone makes you more attractive to them according to research published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. November 8, 2007 Fluorescence In Key Marine Creature Discovered - Fluorescent proteins found in nature have been employed in a variety of scientific research purposes, from markers for tracing molecules in biomedicine to probes for testing environmental quality. November 7, 2007 Evidence Of 'Memory' In Cells And Molecules - New research provides evidence that some molecular interactions on cell surfaces may have a "memory" that affects their future interactions. November 5, 2007 Domestic Cat Genome Sequenced - The DNA of a 4-year-old Abyssinian cat named Cinnamon, whose well-documented lineage can be traced back several generations to Sweden, has been sequenced. November 2, 2007 Fossilized Spider, 50 Million Years Old, Clear As Life - A 50-million-year-old fossilised spider has been brought back to life in stunning 3D by a scientist at The University of Manchester. November 1, 2007 Big Fossil 'Raptor' Tracks Show Group Behavior - Everyone knows that “raptor” dinosaurs walked with their deadly sickle-shaped foot claws held off the ground and that they moved in packs ... right? After all, it was in “Jurassic Park.” October 30, 2007 Colorful View For First Land Animals - When prehistoric fish made their first forays onto land, what did they see? October 29, 2007 Scientists Alter Sexual Orientation In Worms - University of Utah biologists genetically manipulated nematode worms so the animals were attracted to worms of the same sex - part of a study that shows sexual orientation is wired in the creatures’ brains. October 26, 2007 Earliest Evidence Of Modern Humans Detected - Evidence of early humans living on the coast in South Africa, harvesting food from the sea, employing complex bladelet tools and using red pigments in symbolic behavior 164,000 years ago, far earlier than previously documented, is being reported in the journal Nature. October 18, 2007 Fish Get Insomnia, Eyes Wide Open, Say Sleep Researchers - Scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine have hooked a fish that suffers from insomnia in their quest to understand the genetics behind sleep disorders. October 17, 2007 Why Is The Ocean Salty? - The saltiness of the sea comes from dissolved minerals, especially sodium, chlorine, sulfur, calcium, magnesium, and potassium, says Galen McKinley, a UW-Madison professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences. October 16, 2007 Why Is A Pathogen A Pathogen? - That question may be answered as scientists study the recently mapped genetic makeup of a fungus that spawns the worst cereal grains disease known and also can produce toxins potentially fatal to people and livestock. October 11, 2007 In Dogs, A Shortcut To Mapping Disease Genes - Nearly two years ago, Broad Institute researchers and their colleagues announced they had successfully decoded the genome of the domestic dog, a species coaxed into hundreds of distinct types through selective breeding by humans over the past two centuries. October 8, 2007 Do Migratory Birds 'See' The Magnetic Field? - A visual pathway links brain structures active during magnetic compass orientation in migratory birds. October 2, 2007 New Animal And Plant Species Found In Vietnam - World Wildlife Fund scientists have just announced the discovery of 11 new animal and plant species in a remote area in central Vietnam. September 28, 2007 New Light Shed On The 'Hobbit' - An international team of researchers led by the Smithsonian Institution has completed a new study on Homo floresiensis, commonly referred to as the "hobbit," a 3-foot-tall, 18,000-year-old hominin skeleton, discovered four years ago on the Indonesian island of Flores. September 27, 2007 New Dinosaur Species Found In Montana - A dinosaur skeleton found 24 years ago near Choteau has finally been identified as a new species that links North American dinosaurs with Asian dinosaurs. September 25, 2007 Velociraptor Had Feathers - A new look at some old bones have shown that velociraptor, the dinosaur made famous in the movie Jurassic Park, had feathers. The discovery was made by paleontologists at the American Museum of Natural History and the Field Museum of Natural History. September 21, 2007 Primate Behavior Explained By Computer 'Agents' - The complex behaviour of primates can be understood using artificially-intelligent computer 'agents' that mimic their actions. September 18, 2007 Sea Ice Is Getting Thinner - Large areas of the Arctic sea-ice are only one metre thick this year, equating to an approximate 50 percent thinning as compared to the year 2001. September 17, 2007 New Evidence On The Role Of Climate In Neanderthal Extinction - The mystery of what killed the Neanderthals has moved a step closer to resolution after an international study led by the University of Leeds has ruled out one of the competing theories - catastrophic climate change - as the most likely cause. September 14, 2007 Alex, The Renowned African Grey Parrot, Dies At 31 - Alex, the world renowned African Grey parrot made famous by the ground-breaking cognition and communication research conducted by Brandeis scientist Irene Pepperberg, Ph.D., died at the age of 31 on September 6, 2007. September 13, 2007 Sharks' Bite Force Under The Spotlight - While sharks instill fear in beachgoers worldwide, they instill a deep sense of curiosity in UT assistant professor and shark expert Dan Huber. September 12, 2007 Study Reveals Predation-evolution Link - The fossil record seems to indicate that the diversity of marine creatures increased and decreased over hundreds of millions of years in step with predator-prey encounters, Virginia Tech geoscientists report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. September 11, 2007 Bacteria From Sponges Make New Pharmaceuticals - Thousands of interesting new compounds have been discovered inside the bodies of marine sponges according to scientists. September 10, 2007 'Alien' Jaws Help Moray Eels Feed - Moray eels have a unique way of feeding reminiscent of a science fiction thriller, researchers at UC Davis have discovered. September 7, 2007 Fighting Malaria By Tricking Mosquito's Sense Of Smell - By mapping a specialized sensory organ that the malaria mosquito uses to zero in on its human prey, an international team of researchers has taken an important step toward developing new and improved repellents and attractants that can be used to reduce the threat of malaria ... September 6, 2007 Male Deer Are Born To Live Fast, Die Young - In the September issue of The American Naturalist, Juan Carranza and Javier Pérez-Barbería offer a new explanation for why males of ungulate species subjected to intense competition are born with lower survival expectancies than females. September 5, 2007 Inside The Brain Of A Crayfish - Voyage to the bottom of the sea, or simply look along the bottom of a clear stream and you may spy lobsters or crayfish waving their antennae. Look closer, and you will see them feeling around with their legs and flicking their antennules ... September 4, 2007 Weird 'Engine Of The Reef' Revealed - A team of coral researchers has taken a major stride towards revealing the workings of the mysterious ‘engine’ that drives Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, and corals the world over. September 3, 2007 Cats Do Suffer From Arthritis, Study Shows - New research at the University of Glasgow has found that arthritis in cats is far more common than previously thought. August 31, 2007 World's Oldest Bacteria Found Living In Permafrost - A research team has for the first time ever discovered DNA from living bacteria that are more than half a million years old. Never before has traces of still living organisms that old been found. August 30, 2007 Monkeys Use 'Baby Talk' To Interact With Infants - Female rhesus monkeys use special vocalizations while interacting with infants, the way human adults use motherese, or "baby talk," to engage babies' attention, new research at the University of Chicago shows. August 29, 2007 Elephantnose Fish 'See' With Their Chin - Originating in Central Africa, Peters' elephantnose fish (Gnathonemus petersii), finds its bearings by means of weak electrical fields. Scientists from the University of Bonn have now been able to show how well this works. August 27, 2007 Pages: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | NEXT

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