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evolution

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Photo showing the glow of a forest fire and bush fire in the Blue Mountains of Australia.
biodiversity

Wildfires of Varying Intensity Can Be Good for Biodiversity

By Carrie Arnold
November 29, 2021
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The spate of furious wildfires around the world during the past decade has revealed to ecologists how much biodiversity and “pyrodiversity” go hand in hand.

Photo of the freshwater sponge Spongilla.
evolution

Sponge Genes Hint at the Origins of Neurons and Other Cells

By Viviane Callier
November 4, 2021
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A new study of gene expression in sponges reveals the complex diversity of their cells as well as some possibly ancient connections between the nervous, immune and digestive systems.

Micrograph of snowflake yeast.
evolution

Single Cells Evolve Large Multicellular Forms in Just Two Years

By Veronique Greenwood
September 22, 2021
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Researchers have discovered that environments favoring clumpy growth are all that’s needed to quickly transform single-celled yeast into complex multicellular organisms.

A detailed photo of a fruit fly wing in silhouette.
developmental biology

Mathematical Analysis of Fruit Fly Wings Hints at Evolution’s Limits

By Elena Renken
September 20, 2021
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A painstaking study of wing morphology shows both the striking uniformity of individuals in a species and a subtle pattern of linked variations that evolution can exploit.

An artist’s conception of the ways that functional capacities have been mapped to regions of the brain.
neuroscience

The Brain Doesn’t Think the Way You Think It Does

By Jordana Cepelewicz
August 24, 2021
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Familiar categories of mental functions such as perception, memory and attention reflect our experience of ourselves, but they are misleading about how the brain works. More revealing approaches are emerging.

Photo of a rove beetle standing on a leaf and arching its abdomen.
evolution

How Do New Organs Evolve? A Beetle Gland Shows the Way.

By Viviane Callier
August 16, 2021
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The evolution of a defensive gland in beetles shows how organs can arise from novel cells carving out new functional niches for their neighbors.

Photo of crows.
cognitive science

Animals Count and Use Zero. How Far Does Their Number Sense Go?

By Jordana Cepelewicz
August 9, 2021
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Crows recently demonstrated an understanding of the concept of zero. It’s only the latest evidence of animals’ talents for numerical abstraction — which may still differ from our own grasp of numbers.

Photograph of two female red deer, fighting with their front hooves.
evolution

Mating Contests Among Females, Long Ignored, May Shape Evolution

By Jake Buehler
August 2, 2021
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Showy male competitions over mating privileges have grabbed scientists’ attention more often, but new work hints that sexual selection is also widespread among females.

Electron microscopy of T4 bacteriophages.
molecular biology

DNA Has Four Bases. Some Viruses Swap in a Fifth.

By Jordana Cepelewicz
July 12, 2021
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The DNA of some viruses doesn’t use the same four nucleotide bases found in all other life. New work shows how this exception is possible and hints that it could be more common than we think.


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