Life

  1. Ecosystems

    After Invasions: Can an ant takeover change the rules?

    A rare before-and-after study of a takeover by an invasive ant species shows the interloper quickly disassembling the basic rules of the invaded community.

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  2. Ecosystems

    Lab ecosystems show signs of evolving

    An ambitious test of group selection considers whether natural selection can act on whole ecosystems as evolutionary units.

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  3. Paleontology

    Was it sudden death for the Permian period?

    The massive extinctions that came at the end of the Permian period could have occurred within a mere 8,000 years, which suggests a catastrophic cause for the die-offs.

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  4. Ecosystems

    Ultimate Sea Weed Loose in America

    The unusually invasive strain of seaweed that has been smothering coastal areas of the Mediterranean has shown up in a California lagoon, the first sighting of this ecologically devastating alga in the Americas.

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  5. Animals

    Sibling Desperado: Doomed booby chick turns relentlessly violent

    The first known case among nonhuman vertebrates of so-called desperado aggression—relentless attacks against an overwhelming force—may come from the underling chick in nests of brown boobies.

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  6. Animals

    He and she cooperate on anti-aphrodisiacs

    Scientists have for the first time identified a chemical that serves as a butterfly anti-aphrodisiac.

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  7. Animals

    Better Than Real: Males prefer flower’s scent to female wasp’s

    In an extreme case of sex fakery, an orchid produces oddball chemicals to mimic a female wasp's allure so well that males prefer the flower scent to the real thing.

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  8. Animals

    One-Two Poison: Scorpion starts with a cheap shot

    A South African scorpion economizes as it stings, injecting a simple mix first, followed by a venom that's more complicated to produce.

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  9. Paleontology

    Wings Aplenty: Dinosaur species had feathered hind limbs

    A team of Chinese paleontologists has discovered fossils of a small, feathered dinosaur that they say had four wings.

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  10. Animals

    Retaking Flight: Some insects that didn’t use it didn’t lose it

    Stick insects may have done what biologists once thought was impossible: lose something as complicated as a wing in the course of evolution but recover it millions of years later.

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  11. Ecosystems

    Why didn’t the beetle cross the road?

    Beetle populations confined to specific forest areas by roads seem to have lost some of their genetic diversity.

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  12. Animals

    Cicada Subtleties

    What part of 10,000 cicadas screeching don't you understand?

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