AUSTIN, TEXAS — Cities have become great unintentional experiments in evolution. Urban life can alter the basic biological traits of its plant and animal residents, down to the taste of leaves or the stickiness of toes, researchers reported at the 2016 Evolution conference. For white clover (Trifolium repens), leaf taste matters as a defense against […]
ORLANDO, FLA. — What some people view as a flaw in a new genetic-engineering tool might actually be a safety feature, a study suggests. CRISPR/Cas9 gene drives, as the new tools are called, are molecular cut-and-paste machines that can break regular rules of inheritance and get passed to more than 50 percent of offspring (SN: […]
On December 3, 2000, at Cape Shirreff, near the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, a female Antarctic fur seal experienced a personal tragedy: She gave birth to a dead male pup. For the next day or so, the seal, numbered “12” by scientists watching her group, nuzzled her baby and vocalized to him. Nearby on […]
Ancient Chinese tales and writings about a massive flood of the Yellow River that led to civilization’s rise in East Asia appear to hold water, researchers say. A section of the Yellow River dammed by an earthquake-caused landslide broke open about 3,936 years ago, says a team led by geologist Qinglong Wu of China’s Nanjing […]
Instead of destroying its leafy hosts, one common plant virus takes a more backhanded approach to domination. It makes infected plants more attractive to pollinators, ensuring itself a continued supply of virus-susceptible plant hosts for generations to come. The strategy might be a way for the virus to discourage resistance from building up in the […]
The link between pollinator problems and neonicotinoids, a group of agricultural pesticides commonly associated with declines in honeybees, continues to build with two new studies published this week. Butterflies of Northern California join the ranks of honeybees, bumblebees, moths and other organisms that may be feeling the effects of the infamous insecticides. Butterfly species in […]
A few Tasmanian devils have started a resistance movement against a contagious cancer that has depleted their numbers. Since devil facial tumor disease was first discovered in 1996, it has wiped out about 80 percent of the Tasmanian devil population. In some places, up to 95 percent of devils (Sarcophilus harrisii) have succumbed to facial […]
It’s official: The southern tidewater goby is a thing. And it’s chubbier and nubbier than its northern cousin. Endangered tidewater gobies live in California’s seaside lagoons. Ranging roughly the entire length of the state, the fish used to be considered one species. But a new study confirms that gobies living in Northern and Southern California […]
In growing brains, billions of nerve cells must make trillions of precise connections. As they snake through the brain, nerve cell tendrils called axons use the brain’s stiffness to guide them on their challenging journey, a study of frog nerve cells suggests. The results, described online September 19 in Nature Neuroscience, show that along with […]
Jeremy Freeman loves clean, simple lines. To see his bent toward aesthetic minimalism, you need look no further than his spare, calm website that slowly shifts colors. In the past, this fixation with style has occasionally veered toward the extreme. In graduate school at New York University, “he decided that capital letters were ugly,” says […]