Animals

Sticking out your tongue while doing delicate work with your hands reveals a history of evolutionary relationships.

Genetic elements called Mavericks that have some viral features could be responsible for the large-scale smuggling of DNA between species.

The reshuffling of neurons during fruit fly metamorphosis suggests that larval memories don’t persist in adults.

Jellyfish and other aquatic creatures embody solutions to diverse problems in engineering, medicine and mathematics. John Dabiri, a fluid dynamics expert, talks with Steven Strogatz about what jellyfish can teach us about going with the flow.

New modeling work suggests why nature is more diverse than niche-based ecological theory predicts.

Changes in the 3D structure of their genome gave skates and rays their distinctive winglike fins and pancake flatness.

In all bilaterally symmetrical animals, from humans down to simple worms, nerves cross from one side of the body to the opposite side of the brain. Geometry may explain why.

On Mount Everest and in the Peruvian Andes, Tracie Seimon uses DNA to study how species and ecosystems respond to climate change, pathogens and other influences.

By replacing thousands of equations with just one, ecology modelers can more accurately assess how close fragile environments are to a disastrous “tipping point.”