Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Paleontology
Monkeys reached Americas about 36 million years ago
Peruvian fossils suggest ancient African primates somehow crossed the Atlantic Ocean and gave rise to South American monkeys.
- Plants
Huge, hollow baobab trees are actually multiple fused stems
The trunk of an African baobab tree can grow to be many meters in diameter but hollow inside. The shape, researchers say, occurs when several stems fuse together.
- Animals
Cockroach personalities can speed or slow group decisions
The mix of temperaments in an alarmed cluster of cockroaches changes how quickly they make group decisions.
- Humans
Baby brains undergo dramatic changes in utero
Developing human brains experience more than 28,000 changes in a molecular process that governs gene activity.
- Plants
Isaac Newton’s theory of how water defies gravity in plants
A passage in one of Isaac Newton’s journals reveals that he may have theorized basic plant hydrodynamics long before botanists.
- Animals
Migrating ibises take turns leading the flying V
During migration, ibises flying in a V formation cooperate and take turns flying in wake to save energy, a new study suggests.
- Climate
Warming Arctic will let Atlantic and Pacific fish mix
The ultra-cold, ice-covered Arctic Ocean has kept fish species from the Atlantic and Pacific separate for more than a million years — but global warming is changing that.
- Animals
How a spider spins electrified nanosilk
The cribellate orb spider (Uloborus plumipes) hacks and combs its silk to weave electrically charged nanofibers, a new study suggests.
- Neuroscience
Chicks show left-to-right number bias
Recently hatched chicks may have their own version of the left-to-right mental number line.
- Genetics
Pregnancy in mammals evolved with help from roving DNA
DNA that “jumped” around the genome helped early mammals shift from laying eggs to giving birth to live young.
- Neuroscience
Newly identified brain circuit could be target for treating obesity
In mice, specific nerve cells control compulsive sugar consumption, but not normal feeding, hinting at a new therapeutic target for treating obesity.
- Plants
Plant chemical weaponry may offer ammunition for pesticides
Chemicals produced by two plant species disrupt insect hormone pathways and could be developed in to efficient, safe pesticides.
