Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Ecosystems
At a Snail’s Place: Rock climbing cuts mollusk diversity
As rock climbing soars in popularity, some cliff-side snail populations may be crashing.
- Animals
Costly Sexiness: All that flash puts birds at extra risk
Distinctive his-and-her plumages increase the chance that a bird species will go extinct locally, according to an unusually far-ranging study.
- Ecosystems
Cultivating Weeds
Some formerly mild-mannered plants turn into horticultural bullies when planted far outside their native range.
- Plants
Team corners culprit in sudden oak death
After 5 years of mystery, California pathologists announced they may have identified the cause of a new tree disease called sudden oak death.
- Animals
Careful Coots: Do birds count their eggs before they hatch?
A coot may tally the eggs in her nest, a rare example of an animal counting in the wild, suggests a new study.
- Paleontology
Family Meal: Cannibal dinosaur known by its bones
Analyses of the gnaw marks on bones of Majungatholus atopus, a carnivorous dinosaur from Madagascar, indicate that the creatures routinely fed on members of their own species.
- Paleontology
Fossils of early salamanders found
A recent discovery of fossilized salamanders pushes back a milestone in amphibian evolution by more than 100 million years.
- Paleontology
Fine Toothcomb: New fossils add to primate-origins debate
The discovery of 40-million-year-old teeth and jaw fragments belonging to ancient forms of lorises and bushbabies doubles the age of the fossil record for a major primate group.
- Animals
Secret Signal: Fish allurement that predators don’t see
In a rare demonstration of secret messaging in animals, a swordtail fish uses ultraviolet courtship signals that are invisible to a predator.
- Animals
At last, a bird that nails killer chicks
For the first time, researchers have found a bird species—Australia's superb fairy-wren—that reacts when all its own chicks disappear and a giant imposter takes their place.
- Animals
Techno Crow: Do birds build up better tool designs?
Researchers surveying tool use by New Caledonian crows propose that the birds may be the first animals besides people shown to ratchet up the sophistication of their technology by sharing design improvements.
- Paleontology
Was T. rex just a big freeloader?
A new study suggests that an ecosystem like today’s African savanna could provide sufficient carrion to nourish a scavenger the size of a Tyrannosaurus rex.
