Search Results for: Arachnid
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Animals
Bright yellow spots help some orb weaver spiders lure their next meal
Experiments with cardboard arachnids suggest that orb weaver spiders have evolved yellow colorations on their undersides to attract bees and moths.
By Yao-Hua Law -
Animals
A year after Australia’s wildfires, extinction threatens hundreds of species
As experts piece together a fuller picture of the scale of damage to wildlife, more than 500 species may need to be listed as endangered.
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Astronomy
Questions about solar storms, slingshot spiders and more reader feedback
Readers had questions about solar storms, a robotic gripper, slingshot spiders and more.
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Animals
Peacock spiders’ superblack spots reflect just 0.5 percent of light
By manipulating light with tiny structures, patches on peacock spiders appear superblack, helping accentuate the arachnids’ bright colors.
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Animals
Dancing peacock spiders turned an arachnophobe into an arachnologist
Just 22, Joseph Schubert has described 12 of 86 peacock spider species. One with a blue and yellow abdomen is named after Van Gogh’s Starry Night.
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Materials Science
Bacteria can be coaxed into making the toughest kind of spider silk
Lab-altered bacteria have made a copy of a spider’s strongest silk strands, which could one day be used to make more sturdy materials.
By Jeremy Rehm -
Science & Society
‘End Times’ explores the catastrophic events that could kill us all
A new book looks at the threats that could wipe out humankind and what can be done to counteract them.
By Kyle Plantz -
Life
This spider slingshots itself at extreme speeds to catch prey
By winding up its web like a slingshot, the slingshot spider achieves an acceleration rate far faster than a cheetah’s.
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Animals
Australian fires have incinerated the habitats of up to 100 threatened species
Hundreds of fires that are blazing across the continent’s southeast have created an unprecedented ecological disaster, scientists say.
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Animals
Soaring spiders may get cues from electric charges in the air
Spiders can sense atmospheric electric fields, which might give them cues to take to the air.
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Animals
This sea slug makes its prey do half the food catching
Nudibranchs’ stolen meals blur classic predator-prey levels.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
How spiders mastered spin control
Scientists reveal a new twist on the unusual properties of spider silk.