Researchers at UC Riverside have discovered the oldest ancestor of almost all animals, including humans. This worm fills in a long-missing gap of the evolutionary biology puzzle. Continue reading Researchers Discover Oldest Ancestor of Almost Every Animal
by Rebecca Silberman figures by Aparna Nathan Seen through the harsh, unsentimental lens of evolutionary biology, menopause doesn’t make sense. Why don’t women live like giraffes, like tarantulas, like pigeons, reproducing throughout their lives in order to maximize each person’s “fitness,” or reproductive success? Even in other long-lived, social species like elephants, females don’t stop having children before the end of their lives, and while … Continue reading An Evolutionary Argument for why Grandmas Rule
by Catherine Gutierrez figures by Aparna Nathan Forty-nine years ago, President Richard Nixon launched a “War on Cancer”. That war has not ended—it rages on today, with cancer right behind heart disease as the leading cause of death in the United States. Nearly 1.8 million new cases of cancer are expected in 2020 in the U.S. alone, and rising rates of cancer risk factors such … Continue reading Cancers Evolve – Tagging and Tracking Can Help Us Understand How
Researchers at Max Planck Institute for Brain Research have discovered a mammalian claustrum in reptiles, believed to impact decision-making and consciousness. The study hints at the claustrum’s prehistoric existence, in mammals, reptiles, and possibly their common ancestor. Continue reading Study finds a classically mammalian brain region in reptilian brains
A bird known for “brood parasitism”, laying its eggs in other birds’ nests, also has a strong preference for more brightly colored offspring. A new study shows that the two behaviors are unrelated. Continue reading Playing favorites: a new study investigates parental preferences in American Coot
40 new species of fish have been found in Lake Mweru in East Africa. Breeding of related lineages may have allowed the cichlids to rapidly evolve to fill different ecological niches. Continue reading New Fish Species and Rapid Evolution Found in African Lake
CRISPR genome editing has been used to study the biology of a number of species, but its use in reptiles has been difficult to achieve. Scientists have now figured this out, and albino lizards are the product! Read Ben Andreone’s article to learn more! Continue reading Albino Lizards are the First Ever Genome Edited Reptiles
Brazil’s Amazon rainforest is home to a dizzying array of life, from colorful poisonous frogs to deadly jaguars. One resident is the Araguaian river dolphin, which was only recently discovered by scientists in 2014. Unlike playful ocean dolphins, the Araguaian river dolphin is relatively solitary. Mother dolphins interact frequently with their baby calves, but rarely do adults interact with each other. Because of the river … Continue reading River Dolphins Have a Surprisingly Large Vocabulary
In 2007, during an excavation on the island of Luzon in the Philippines, archeologist Armand Salvador Mijares discovered a 67,000-year-old foot bone that led scientists to rethink the history of human evolution. The bone had features resembling hominins—a subfamily of primates comprised of modern Homo sapiens and others closely related human species. The finding provided the earliest direct evidence of human presence in the Philippines, … Continue reading Evidence of an Ancient Human Species Unearthed in the Philippines
While you are likely familiar with the annoying experience of being a mosquito’s ‘meal of the day’, more is going on behind the scenes of that insect bite than meets the eye. Mosquitoes, which are drawn to human scent and breath, require proteins from the blood of their victims to develop their eggs and reproduce. This sounds harmless enough, but mosquitoes also excel at picking … Continue reading New Drug May Prevent Mosquitoes From Wanting to Bite You