From what little we know of them, they seem so different. Mysterious creatures that lived in the ocean half a billion years ago – headless, limbless things, seemingly alien to us in all respects.   Except they weren’t, new research suggests. In fact, the Ediacaran biota – a collection of ancient oceanic life-forms that dwelled

Regeneration is a fairly widespread ability in the animal kingdom – for increasing long-term survival chances, you simply can’t beat the option to regrow entire limbs or organs. But these two species of sacoglossan sea slug take it to the extreme.   They can decapitate themselves, and then regrow an entire new body from the

Scientists have found another piece in the puzzle of how echolocation evolved in bats, moving closer to solving a decades-long evolutionary mystery. All bats – apart from the fruit bats of the family Pteropodidae (also called flying foxes) – can “echolocate” by using high-pitched sounds to navigate at night.   An international study led by

After 200 years of European farming practices, Australian soils are in bad shape – depleted of nutrients and organic matter, including carbon. This is bad news for both soil health and efforts to address global warming.   The native Australian echidna may hold part of the solution. Echidnas dig pits, furrows, and depressions in the

Social distancing to stop the spread of COVID-19 might feel unnatural to us humans, but other animals intuitively do something similar, without the need for rules or regulations to keep them in line.   Staying away from others when you’re sick is a natural consequence of animal disease. Even when humans feel sick, the physical

An important new study suggests octopuses are likely to feel and respond to pain in a similar way to mammals – the first strong evidence for this capacity in any invertebrate.    The experience of pain is far more than a simple reflex to harmful stimuli or injury; it’s a complex emotional state, leading to

More than 17,000 earthquakes have been recorded in the south-west of Iceland, in the Reykjanes Peninsula, during the past week. People living in the area have been advised to be extra careful due to dangers of landslides and rockfall. Many of the larger earthquakes have even been felt in Iceland’s capital city, Reykjavik (where over

While most of us take the ground beneath our feet for granted, written within its complex layers, like pages of a book, is Earth’s history. Our history. Now researchers have found more evidence for a whole new chapter deep within Earth’s past – Earth’s inner core appears to have another even more inner core within

The Amazon moonflower (Selenicereus wittii) has one of the most elusive blooms in the plant kingdom. Each year, for just one night, this rare and unusual cactus opens its sepals to the night sky, releasing a gorgeous white flower and a sweet, jasmine-like fragrance into the swampy rainforest air.    By morning, it’s gone. Around

Three species of shark that inhabit the twilit depths of the ocean just turned out to have been bioluminescent this whole time. The kitefin shark, the blackbelly lanternshark, and the southern lanternshark have all been discovered to have softly glowing blue patterns on their skin, a first for sharks found in New Zealand waters.  

It might not look like it, but the arid expanses of Utah conceal an ancient volcanic complex, and this hidden underground system is still active far below the desert’s surface, scientists say.   According to a new study, a pair of recent earthquakes in 2018 and 2019 were not indicative of tectonic activity, but were

A new test of cephalopod smarts has reinforced how important it is for us humans to not underestimate animal intelligence. Cuttlefish have been put to a new version of the marshmallow test, and the results appear to demonstrate that there’s more going on in their strange little brains than we knew.   Their ability to

It may be a single-celled organism, but the slime mould Physarum polycephalum has some pretty fascinating tricks up its pretty yellow sleeves. Now new research has found that it seems to “remember” where it previously found sources of food – even without a brain or nervous system.   This could help explain how network organisms

There’s an old stereotype about the difference between cats and dogs. Dogs are loving and fiercely loyal, they say, while cats are aloof and indifferent. Most cat people probably disagree – I certainly find it hard to believe, with my cat purring away in my lap, that she doesn’t care about me.   Overall, cat

The coronavirus pandemic has had the world fixated on viruses like no time in living memory, but new evidence reveals humans never even notice the vast extent of viral existence – even when it’s inside us.   A new database project compiled by scientists has identified over 140,000 viral species that dwell in the human

If you’re in the right place at the right time, and you turn your eyes to the sky, you just might catch sight of something eerily beautiful: Wisps of cloud, high in the sky, glowing softly even though the Sun has already slipped below the horizon.   These are noctilucent, or night-shining, clouds, appearing at

Having dominated the planet’s surface for hundreds of millions of years, dinosaur diversity came to a dramatic conclusion some 66 million years ago at the hot end of an asteroid impact with what is today Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula.   It’s a theory so swollen with data that it’s hard to imagine any room for doubt remains that

A team of US scientists has demonstrated that the offspring of huge carnivorous dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus rex, who grew from the size of house cats to towering monsters, reshaped their ecosystems by outcompeting smaller rival species.   Their study, published in the journal Science on Thursday, helps answer an enduring mystery about the 150-million-year rule

Researchers have discovered organic molecules trapped in incredibly ancient rock formations in Australia, revealing what they say is the first detailed evidence of early chemical ingredients that could have underpinned Earth’s primeval microbial life-forms.   The discovery, made in the 3.5-billion-year-old Dresser Formation of Western Australia’s Pilbara Craton, adds to a significant body of research

Vampire squid have been lurking in the dark corners of the ocean for 30 million years, a new analysis of a long-lost fossil finds.  Modern-day vampire squid (Vampyroteuthis infernalis) can thrive in deep, oxygen-poor ocean water, unlike many other squid species that require shallower habitat along continental shelves.   Few fossil ancestors of today’s vampire squid survive,

A whitetail deer was found stumbling through the streets of Farragut, Tennessee, with thick hair growing out of both of its eyeballs.  The hair protruded from discs of flesh covering both the buck’s cornea — the transparent part of the eye that covers the iris and pupil.   The bizarre condition, called corneal dermoids, has been documented

Dogs might not be able to recognise themselves in a mirror, but that doesn’t mean our pets don’t have some level of self-awareness. Recent research has shown dogs can recognise the unique smell of their own odour, sort of like looking in an ‘olfactory mirror’, and now a new study suggests they might also have

A global period of upheaval 42,000 years ago was the result of a reversal in Earth’s magnetic field, new research has found. According to radiocarbon preserved in ancient tree rings, several centuries’ worth of climate breakdown, mass extinctions, and even changes in human behaviour can be directly linked to the last time Earth’s magnetic field

The severe winter storm raging through the southern US brought such extreme cold that it confused weather satellites monitoring the situation. On Tuesday, the cold air advancing south from the Arctic chilled the ground so much that one monitoring satellite mistook the ground for tops of clouds, which are usually much colder than surface temperatures.

Male and female wood roaches are one of the few insect couples suspected of truly mating for life. The secret to one species’ long-lasting love? A bit of mutual cannibalism. In a revelry of post-coital bliss, mating cockroaches (Salganea taiwanensis) have been filmed chowing down on each other’s wings for days on end, taking turns

In a feat right at the limits of our scientific capabilities, an international team of geneticists has recovered and sequenced the oldest DNA to date. From the teeth of three ancient mammoths that roamed Siberia between 700,000 and 1.2 million years ago, the researchers extracted extremely degraded DNA, and pieced it back together to reveal

Russian state laboratory Vektor on Tuesday announced it was launching research into prehistoric viruses by analysing the remains of animals recovered from melted permafrost. The Siberia-based lab said in a statement that the aim of the project was to identify paleoviruses and conduct advanced research into virus evolution.   The research in collaboration with the

The way that the songs of fin whales echo back from the seabed could become a useful tool for scientists studying the sediment and rock that make up Earth’s crust, according to new research carried out in the northeast Pacific Ocean.   These songs are some of the strongest and most far-reaching vocalisations in the

The waters below Antarctica are amongst the most inhospitable environments on our planet – or so we thought. It’s pitch dark, and temperatures are subzero; yet, when scientists drilled through an Antarctic ice shelf far from light or warmth, they found a seafloor boulder that’s home to several species we may have never seen before.

Every year, billions of songbirds migrate thousands of miles between Europe and Africa – and then repeat that same journey again, year after year, to nest in exactly the same place that they chose on their first great journey.   The remarkable navigational precision displayed by these tiny birds – as they travel alone over

Pigs might not be able to fly, but they can play video games. In a new study, researchers from Purdue University in Indiana have shown that pigs can use a digital screen and joystick, operated by their snout, to move a cursor around for rewards.   This is a complex task. The animals need to

The Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula) is already a fascinating enough plant, but scientists have discovered something else amazing about it: It generates measurable magnetic fields as its leaves snap shut.   And going way beyond D. muscipula, the latest research could teach us a lot about how plant life uses magnetic field signalling to communicate

Just because you’re done with a Prozac pill, it doesn’t mean the pill is done. In fact, when you swallow something like an antidepressant, that’s not the end of the drug’s journey in the world. It’s the beginning.   Most pharmaceutical drugs, including psychoactive medications such as fluoxetine (made famous under the Prozac brand), are only

Even as a hollow ball of embryonic cells, developing fish and mammals are not entirely defenceless. The very first tissue, formed on the surface of a vertebrate blastula, has been shown to possess an innate immune response.   Incredible new research has shown that long before the development of organs or specialized immune cells, this

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In 1938, a living relic, thought 65 million years long extinct, was accidentally captured in a trawl net off the coast of South Africa. The 2-metre (6.5-foot) long coelacanth (Latimeria chalumnae) turned out to be one of our closest fish relatives – looking largely unchanged since its most recent appearance in the fossil record back

The tectonic plates that cover Earth like a jigsaw puzzle move about as fast as our fingernails grow, but over the course of a billion years that’s enough to travel across the entire planet – as a fascinating new video shows.   In one of the most complete models of tectonic plate movements ever put

Like humans, marmosets – tiny monkeys with Einstein-like ear tufts native to Brazil – eavesdrop on conversations between others, and prefer to approach individuals they view positively, a study in the journal Science Advances showed Wednesday.   While behavioral research has built up knowledge around the social lives of primates, it has tended to lack

When sperm race, it’s for keeps. So it comes as little surprise that in some species, the competition over who reaches the egg first can get a little dirty. A variant in mice genes has been found to give sperm that possess it a clear advantage by poisoning its peers while they’re still in development,

In a fascinating discovery, a widespread virus that usually harms plants from the cabbage family, such as broccoli and cauliflower, has been seen actually benefiting its hosts in times of crisis.   During periods of drought, researchers have found the turnip mosaic virus can switch from a hindrance to a help, altering its host’s circadian

A 38-foot-long (11.5 meters) whale that washed ashore in the Florida Everglades in January 2019 turns out to be a completely new species. And it’s already considered endangered, scientists say.   When the corpse of the behemoth washed up along Sandy Key – underweight with a hard piece of plastic in its gut – scientists

Tangle-web spiders are little creatures with big appetites. New research has found some species of this family can tweak their silk traps to lift extremely large prey – sometimes up to 50 times heavier than themselves – suspending their meal many centimetres off the ground.   Considering the size of these hunters, many of which

The pitter-patter of little feet in a child’s bedroom is a joyous sound – except perhaps when those feet belong to hundreds of baby huntsman spiders. “Gaaaahhhhhhhh, a friend of mine in Sydney just walked into her daughter’s room and found this,” Hobart, Australia resident Peta Rogers tweeted on Jan. 27.   Rogers’ Sydney friend, who asked not

To be a scorpion mama is to have a heavy weight on your shoulders… the weight of up to 100 of your kiddos getting a free ride. We first discovered this quirk of parenting after seeing an Instagram post about about the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum’s baby bark scorpions (Centriroides exilicauda) on our favourite baby animal

The world’s smallest male reptile can fit right on your fingertip – if its massive genitals don’t get in its way. Meet Brookesia nana, an extremely tiny species of chameleon from the rainforests of northern Madagascar.   Researchers recently described one male and one female of the species in a study published January 28 in the journal Scientific Reports,

A four-year-old girl stunned paleontologists after she found a perfectly-preserved dinosaur footprint that dates back 220 million years. Lily Wilder made the discovery on January 23 while walking along a beach in South Wales with her father and dog. The family was on their way to the supermarket when Wilder saw the footprint imprinted on

An international team of scientists in South China accidentally discovered the oldest terrestrial fossil ever found, about three times more ancient than the oldest known dinosaur.   Investigations are still ongoing and observations will need to be independently verified, but the international team argues the long thread-like fingers of this ancient organism look a lot

Biologists are accustomed to hearing stories of microbes manipulating their host – a fungus that turns ants into suicidal zombies, a protozoan that makes rats seek out cat urine – but there are few examples of hosts turning the tables on their microbes.   My colleagues and I just published a paper that demonstrated that