Popular Science articles about Biology & Nature

Unexpected large monkey population discovered

A WCS report reveals surprisingly large populations of two globally threatened primates in a protected area in Cambodia.

Caltech scientists discover why flies are so hard to swat

Over the past two decades, Michael Dickinson has been interviewed by reporters hundreds of times about his research on the biomechanics of insect flight. One question from the press has...

Life under the laser

Researchers at The University of Nottingham have developed a unique technology that will allow scientists to look at microscopic activity within the body's chemical messenger system for the very first...

Iowa State University researcher shows proteins have controlled motions

Iowa State University researcher Robert Jernigan believes that his research shows proteins have controlled motions.

Study: DNA barcoding in danger of 'ringing up' wrong species

DNA barcoding is a movement to catalog all life on earth by a simple standardized genetic tag, similar to stores labeling products with unique barcodes. The effort promises foolproof food...

Why wind turbines can mean death for bats

Power-generating wind turbines have long been recognized as a potentially life-threatening hazard for birds. But at most wind facilities, bats actually die in much greater numbers. Now, researchers reporting in...

Ecological Society of America criticizes administration's overhaul of the Endangered Species Act

The Ecological Society of America today criticized the Bush administration's Aug. 15 proposal to reinterpret the Endangered Species Act, which would impose regulatory changes eliminating the requirement for federal projects...

Stem cells stand up for themselves

Adult stem cells are not pampered pushovers. O'Reilly et al. report that certain stem cells take charge of their surroundings, molding their environment to control their division and differentiation.

Even seaweeds get sunburned

Healthy red algae (<i>Devaleraea ramentacea</i>).It is red, it burns and itches: a sunburn on our skin. However, too much sun is not only bad for humans. Many plants react sensitively to an increased dose...

FBI unveils science of anthrax investigation

Bacillus anthracis spores as viewed in SEM (left) and TEM (right).They have worked for almost seven years in secret.

Elephant legs are much bendier than Shakespeare thought

Throughout history, elephants have been thought of as 'different'. Shakespeare, and even Aristotle, described them as walking on inflexible column-like legs. And this myth persists even today. Which made John...

The eyes of some mammals have evolved to point in the same direction. While animals with forward facing eyes lose the ability to see what's behind them, they gain X-ray vision, which makes it possible for them to see through the clutter in the world.

Protein misprediction uncovered by new technique

A new bioinformatics tool is capable of identifying and correcting abnormal, incomplete and mispredicted protein annotations in public databases. The MisPred tool, described today in the open access journal BMC...

Study of islands reveals surprising extinction results

Steve Gaines.It's no secret that humans are having a huge impact on the life cycles of plants and animals. UC Santa Barbara's Steven D. Gaines and fellow researcher Dov Sax decided...

How does bluetongue virus survive through the winter?

In 2006, Bluetongue virus – which infects livestock – reached Northern Europe for the first time. Some people thought that the outbreak would be limited to that particular year, as...

Century-old rule of chemistry overturned -- major implications for drug delivery

A new study by research chemists at the University of Warwick has challenged a century old rule of pharmacology that defined how quickly key chemicals can pass across cell walls....

How 'secondary' sex characters can drive the origin of species

Shown are males of four of the 10 Onthophagus species examined in the study. From top to bottom: O.
watanabei (North Borneo), O. taurus (Mediterranean), O. gazella (South Africa), and O. sagittarius (Indonesia).The ostentatious, sometimes bizarre qualities that improve a creature's chances of finding a mate may also drive the reproductive separation of populations and the evolution of new species, say two...

Yale undergrads' Amazon trip yields a treasure trove of diversity

A group of Yale undergraduates have discovered dozens of potentially beneficial bioactive microorganisms within plants they collected in the Amazon rain forest, including several so genetically distinct that they may...

Genome of simplest animal reveals ancient lineage, confounding array of complex capabilities

<i>Trichoplax adhaerens</i>.As Aesop said, appearances are deceiving—even in life's tiniest critters. From first detection in the 1880s, clinging to the sides of an aquarium, to its recent characterization by the...

Malaria researchers identify new mosquito virus

<i>Anopheles gambiae</i> mosquito infected with GFP-expressing AgDNV.Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health's Malaria Research Institute have identified a previously unknown virus that is infectious to Anopheles gambiae—the mosquito primarily responsible for transmitting...

Rapid test for pathogens developed by K-State researchers

Dangerous disease often spreads faster than it takes to diagnose it in the lab. To remedy that, researchers at Kansas State University have developed a test to bring that time...

More news about Biology & Nature

Breaking science news from the newsfeed about Biology & Nature