All Stories by Jake Buehler
- Animals
Territorial conflict may explain male primates’ large size
Male primates may be larger than females partly because of pressure from rival groups, not just competition with males inside their own group.
- Animals
Singing mice puff up air sacs to make their sweet songs
To serenade with their high-pitched songs, singing mice inflate a throat sac — a use for air sacs seemingly unknown in any other animal.
- Animals
Giant, kraken-like octopuses may have ruled the Cretaceous deep
Some octopuses that lived over 72 million years ago were as long as whales. These huge predators may have been the largest invertebrates ever.
- Animals
Humidity makes these bees turn green
North American sweat bees change color depending on the surrounding humidity. It might be a more widespread phenomenon among insects.
- Paleontology
The ‘oldest fossil octopus’ is probably another animal
In 2000, researchers thought they found the oldest fossil octopus, which lived over 300 million years ago. But it may just be a half-rotten nautilus.
- Paleontology
Fossils reveal many complex animals existed before the Cambrian explosion
Hundreds of Chinese fossils from the dawn of animal evolution may change how scientists think of this critical period of prehistory.
- Paleontology
Early apes may not have evolved in East Africa
Fossil jaw remains found in Egypt suggest that the earliest modern apes evolved in North Africa, not in East Africa where most fossils have been found.
- Animals
Mosquitoes get the ‘I’m full’ signal from their butts, not their brains
Mosquitoes stop feeding because signals from rectal cells tell them they’re full, offering a target for preventing human bites.
- Animals
A koala population’s rapid rebound may let it escape inbreeding’s perils
As koalas in southern Australia have grown from a few hundred to almost half a million, the marsupials show signs of regaining lost genetic variation.
- Animals
Keeping a beat wins caterpillars friends in low places
Finding a caterpillar with rhythm was “mind-blowing,” suggesting it might be a more widespread part of animal communication than thought.
- Animals
Some dog breeds carry a higher risk of breathing problems
Research reveals more short-snouted dogs besides pugs and bulldogs that struggle with breathing. Pekingese and Japanese Chins topped the study's list.
- Health & Medicine
Genes may shape how long we live more than once thought
New research challenges the view that human life span depends mostly on lifestyle. Genes may account for half the factors that determine longevity.
