Animals
- Animals
Female rats like a different kind of tickling than males
Female rats prefer gentler tickling, a finding that could reshape animal happiness research.
- Health & Medicine
Hantavirus questions grow in the wake of a cruise ship outbreak
Scientists still don’t know why Andes hantavirus is the only one shown to spread from person to person.
- 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.
- Paleontology
If wings came before flight, what were they for?
Scientists use simulated dinosaurs to trigger real insect brains and test how wings originally evolved.
- Archaeology
Neandertals used rhinoceros teeth as tools
Finds at sites in Spain and France suggest that Neandertals used the teeth of ancient rhinos for heavy-duty fabrication.
- 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.
- Health & Medicine
What to know about a rare hantavirus outbreak at sea
Public health officials are racing to find out how the sometimes deadly hantavirus got aboard a cruise ship and if there has been human-to-human spread.
- Life
Cows’ methane burps may be fueled by a newfound organelle in gut microbes
In cows’ guts, ciliates contain a tiny organelle called a hydrogenobody that may drive production of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.
- 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.
- Oceans
Got pesky, invasive corals? Blast ‘em away with air guns
Compressed air bids bye-bye to invasive sun corals in Brazil. The blasts obliterated soft tissue and fragments couldn't regenerate.
- Animals
This kea parrot is the first-known disabled alpha male
With half a beak, Bruce has developed an innovative fighting style that has won the kea top status in his flock, videos and documented interactions reveal.
