4+ week, 2+ day ago   (250+ words) Scientists in the past interpreted the horseshoe crab’s long history of external fertilization as indicative of its evolutionary consistency. However, James Lamsdell and colleagues recently discovered a new fossil species of horseshoe crab in the 450 million-year-old Big Hill Formation in…...

1+ mon, 1+ week ago   (217+ words) Read Time: 8 minutes Once the researchers created a model, they needed to find fossilized mammal melanosomes to predict their fur color. Mammal fossils are rare, and pieces of cells are only preserved in the most immaculate fossil deposits. In fact,…...

2+ mon, 3+ day ago   (281+ words) In March 2021, the carcasses of at least 260 marine organisms from 81 species, including large animals called megafauna, washed ashore in South Africa. Scientists questioned whether this event was the result of an extreme temperature drop that can happen when deep, cold…...

2+ mon, 3+ week ago   (175+ words) To determine when the Naashoibito Member formed, the scientists measured the decay of radioactive elements within its mineral grains over time, a technique called radiometric dating. The scientist reasoned that these mineral grains must have crystallized before being transported and…...

4+ mon, 3+ week ago   (137+ words) Read Time: 7 minutes To test whether higher temperatures affected ant defense, the researchers pinned a leaflet of an ear tree at the base of the acacia trunk and counted how often ants interacted with it. They found that ant colonies…...

6+ mon, 2+ week ago   (219+ words) Read Time: 7 minutes We generally assume that an organism’s offspring are of the same species. However, the species known as the European ant, Messor ibericus, doesn’t always comply. Researchers in evolutionary ecology discovered that some ants from the Messor genus…...

7+ mon, 3+ day ago   (366+ words) Read Time: 8 minutes But what if you could feed these microbes a boost of energy by giving them a tasty carbon source like sugar, providing a proverbial all-you-can-eat buffet? Would this bonus allow them to consume more carbon in the…...

8+ mon, 2+ week ago   (262+ words) Read Time: 6 minutes A main cause of death in dogs is cancer, which affects about 1 in 4 dogs at certain life stages. Despite recent advancements in veterinary oncology, treatment based on a patient’s genetics, also known as precision medicine, is still…...

9+ mon, 2+ week ago   (183+ words) Read Time: 7 minutes The team conducted weekly checks on the colonies, including monitoring the development and emergence of their offspring. Specifically, they observed the eggs transition into adult males and used genetic and physical analyses to identify their species. The…...