Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Plants
The Wood Detective
Alex Wiedenhoeft belongs to the elite profession of wood identifier, the person to call when a crime investigator, museum curator, archaeologist, or patent attorney with an unusual client really needs to know what that splinter really is.
- Animals
Pregnant—and Still Macho
Some of the basic theories of sexual behavior and sexual selection are getting attention thanks to a burst of new studies in the topsy-turvy social world of the seahorse, where the males get pregnant.
- Animals
Hormone still rules no-tadpole frogs
Coqui frogs may skip the tadpole stage, but within the egg, they undergo a metamorphosis ruled by thyroid hormone.
- Animals
Many fish run on empty
Many fish eat all the time, while some others spend their days going from brief feast to lengthy famine.
- Animals
Singing frog in China evokes whales, primates
A frog in China warbles and flutes with such versatility that its high-pitched calls sound like those of birds or whales.
- Ecosystems
No Way to Make Soup—Thirty-two tons of contraband shark fins seized on the high seas
Something looked suspicious. This former swordfishing vessel, out of Honolulu, was clearly heavy with cargo when discovered by U.S. law-enforcement officials 350 miles off of Acapulco, on Aug. 13. A boarding team found no fishing–just shark fins. However, under a new federal law, transporting fins collected by another fishing vessel constitutes illegal “fishing.” US Coast […]
- Animals
Ant Enforcers: To call in punishment, top ant smears rival
In Brazilian ant colonies where a female has to fight her way to the top, she stays in power through some judicious gang violence.
- Animals
Blame winter for the vanishing sparrows
Changes in winter farming practices may help explain a puzzling drop in number of rural house sparrows in southern England.
- Animals
Getting a Grip: How gecko toes stick
Scientists have pinned down the molecular basis of the gecko's astonishing ability to scamper up polished walls and hang from ceilings, paving the way for a new type of synthetic dry adhesive.
- Plants
Time Capsules: Seeds sprout 120 years after going underground
An experiment designed by a botany professor to last longer than his own life has demonstrated that seeds of two common flowers still sprout and blossom despite more than a century in a bottle.
- Animals
New frog-killing disease may not be so new
The skin disease that savaged amphibians in remote wildernesses in the 1990s has been linked to outbreaks in the 1970s.
- Animals
What’s the Mane Point? Foes and females both have role
The condition of a lion's mane apparently advertises high-quality mates to picky females and wards off male adversaries.
