https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Machine-learning models can speed up the discovery of new materials by making predictions and suggesting experiments. But most models today only consider a few specific types of data or variables. Compare that with human scientists who work in a collaborative environment and consider experimental results, the broader scientific literature, imaging and structural analysis, personal experience or intuition, and input from colleagues and peer reviewers. https://phys.org/news/2025-09-ai-driven-blends-literature-robotics.html Analytical Chemistry Thu, 25 Sep 2025 14:34:05 EDT news678029641 The thyroid, a vital endocrine organ in vertebrates, plays a key role in regulating metabolism and supporting growth. The first gland of both the nervous system and endocrine system to mature during an embryo's development, it initially evolved more than 500 million years ago out of a "primitive" precursor organ in chordates known as the endostyle. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-jawless-parasite-uncovers-neural-crest.html Evolution Thu, 07 Aug 2025 12:37:53 EDT news673789068 Zebrafish have the remarkable and rare ability to regrow and repair their hearts after damage. New research from Caltech and UC Berkeley has identified the circuit of genes controlling this ability and offers clues about how a human heart might someday be repaired after damage, such as a heart attack or in cases of congenital heart defects. https://phys.org/news/2025-06-genetic-code-enables-zebrafish.html Cell & Microbiology Tue, 24 Jun 2025 09:41:25 EDT news669976877 In vertebrates, the skeleton of different regions of the body arises from different precursor cells. Researchers at the University of Basel have now discovered that these skeletal cells do not just differ in their developmental origin, but also in their gene regulation—which may be a key to the vertebrates' evolutionary success story. https://phys.org/news/2025-03-cartilage-bone-paths-skeleton-formation.html Evolution Thu, 27 Mar 2025 12:45:06 EDT news662298301 As an embryo grows, there is a continuous stream of communication between cells to form tissues and organs. Cells need to read numerous cues from their environment, and these may be chemical or mechanical in nature. However, these alone cannot explain collective cell migration, and a large body of evidence suggests that movement may also happen in response to embryonic electrical fields. How and where these fields are established within embryos was unclear until now. https://phys.org/news/2025-01-cues-cells-harness-electric-fields.html Cell & Microbiology Fri, 17 Jan 2025 12:16:05 EST news656338561 Fossils might give a good image of what dinosaurs looked like, but they can also teach scientists what they sounded like. The Parasaurolophus is a duck-billed dinosaur with a unique crest that lived 70 million to 80 million years ago. It stood around 16 feet tall and is estimated to have weighed 6,000 to 8,000 pounds. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-parasaurolophus-pipes-dinosaur-crest.html Paleontology & Fossils Fri, 22 Nov 2024 09:37:18 EST news651490634 A team led by researchers at the University of Toronto has discovered that a group of cells located in the skin and other areas of the body, called neural crest stem cells, are the source of reprogrammed neurons found by other researchers. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-longstanding-theories-cellular-reprogramming.html Cell & Microbiology Fri, 01 Nov 2024 12:36:04 EDT news649683362 The giant fossil skull of an extinct elephant, discovered in northern India's Kashmir Valley in 2000, sheds light on a poorly known episode in elephant evolutionary history. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-giant-prehistoric-elephant-skull-india.html Evolution Mon, 14 Oct 2024 12:28:38 EDT news648127713 One of just two vertebrates without a jaw, sea lampreys that are wreaking havoc in Midwestern fisheries are simultaneously helping scientists understand the origins of two important stem cells that drove the evolution of vertebrates. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-invasive-blood-fish-key-biologists.html Plants & Animals Fri, 26 Jul 2024 09:14:03 EDT news641204041 Body shape, color and behavior often evolve together as species adapt to their environment. Researchers from Lund University in Sweden have studied this phenomenon in a specific type of large, bright green and aggressive common wall lizard found near the Mediterranean. They discovered that a unique cell type might have played a key role in this joint evolution. https://phys.org/news/2024-04-aggressive-wall-lizard-clues-evolution.html Plants & Animals Mon, 29 Apr 2024 09:59:03 EDT news633603541 Physical cues in the womb, and not just genetics, influence the normal development of neural crest cells, the embryonic stem cells that form facial features, finds a new study led by UCL researchers. https://phys.org/news/2024-04-pressure-womb-facial.html Cell & Microbiology Mon, 22 Apr 2024 10:34:39 EDT news633000877 Evidence in lampreys for the presence of a rudimentary sympathetic nervous system, previously thought to be unique to jawed vertebrates, has been presented in Nature. The finding may prompt a rethink of the origins of the sympathetic nervous system, which operates without conscious thought and controls the fight or flight reaction. https://phys.org/news/2024-04-instinct-flight-older-thought.html Evolution Thu, 18 Apr 2024 09:51:02 EDT news632652661 An international scientific team including more than 40 authors from seven different countries, led by a researcher at the University of Malaga Juan Pascual Anaya, has managed to sequence the first genome of the myxini, also known as hagfish, the only large group of vertebrates for which there has been no reference genome of any of its species yet. https://phys.org/news/2024-01-sequence-genome-myxini-vertebrate-lineage.html Evolution Fri, 12 Jan 2024 05:00:01 EST news624211934 A new discovery by researchers challenges our current understanding of gastrulation, the most important stage of early embryonic development. https://phys.org/news/2023-09-important-early-stage-embryonic.html Cell & Microbiology Wed, 27 Sep 2023 09:53:03 EDT news615027181 About 350 million years ago, your evolutionary ancestors—and the ancestors of all modern vertebrates—were merely soft-bodied animals living in the oceans. In order to survive and evolve to become what we are today, these animals needed to gain some protection and advantage over the ocean's predators, which were then dominated by crustaceans. https://phys.org/news/2023-07-fish-evolved-bony-scaly-armor.html Evolution Mon, 17 Jul 2023 16:55:04 EDT news608831701 A neural crest cell (a type of stem cell) begins with the ability to differentiate into any number of specialist cell types, but it also appears to retain the capacity to "change its mind" and differentiate anew when the circumstances are right, according to new research from the University of Bath. As a result of this hyper-flexibility, the possibilities for these cells in replacing damaged human tissue is likely to be even greater than previously thought. https://phys.org/news/2023-04-cells-mind-destiny.html Cell & Microbiology Mon, 24 Apr 2023 09:17:25 EDT news601546641 In the 19th century, Charles Darwin was one of the first to notice something interesting about domesticated animals: different species often developed similar changes when compared to their ancient wild ancestors. https://phys.org/news/2023-03-animals-humans-evolve-similar-features.html Evolution Wed, 22 Mar 2023 12:47:04 EDT news598708021 A USC-led team of scientists has made a drool-worthy discovery about how tendons and salivary glands develop in the jaw. Their results are published in a new study in Developmental Cell. https://phys.org/news/2023-03-jaw.html Cell & Microbiology Fri, 10 Mar 2023 12:40:03 EST news597674401 Craniofacial birth defects, including cleft lip and palate, are among the most common human congenital malformations. These craniofacial anomalies occur because of defects in neural crest cells, whose role is to give rise to the complex craniofacial region by generating multiple cell types, including bone, cartilage and the peripheral nervous system. https://phys.org/news/2023-02-craniofacial-birth-defects-roads-regenerative.html Cell & Microbiology Thu, 16 Feb 2023 12:46:43 EST news595774000 A combined team of researchers from the University of Vienna and National Museums Scotland, has found that the brain size of domestic cats is smaller than their African ancestors. In their paper published in the journal Royal Society Open Science, the group describes how they measured and compared cranial capacity in multiple types of cats and what they found by doing so. https://phys.org/news/2022-01-brain-size-decreased-domesticated-cats.html Plants & Animals Thu, 27 Jan 2022 11:20:02 EST news562502730 Cells in the developing embryo can sense the stiffness of other cells around them, which is key to them moving together to form the face and skull, finds a new study by UCL researchers. https://phys.org/news/2021-12-embryonic-cells-stiffness.html Molecular & Computational biology Wed, 08 Dec 2021 11:00:02 EST news558177169 If you've ever wondered how your beloved pet pooch came to look so different from its wild relatives, biologists now have another piece of the puzzle. https://phys.org/news/2021-06-dogs-dont-wolves-uncovers-genetic.html Plants & Animals Tue, 22 Jun 2021 08:13:11 EDT news543568338 The hypothalamus is involved during the coordination of neuroendocrine functions in vertebrates and their evolutionary origin can be described using integrated transcriptome or connectome brain maps of swimming tadpoles of Ciona intestinalis, also known as sea vase. These organisms serve as an approximation of their ancestral protovertebrate. The map included several cell types relative to different regions of the vertebrate hypothalamus, including the mammillary nucleus, arcuate nucleus and magnocellular neurons. These observations highlighted how the hypothalamus predates the evolution of the vertebrate brain. The neural crest and cranial placodes are key innovations that contributed to the evolution of the vertebrate head. However, less is known about the evolutionary origin of the crown and summit of the vertebrate brain. In a new study now on Science Advances, Laurence A. Lemaire and a research team in molecular biology and integrative genomics at the Princeton University, New Jersey, U.S., used an extensive single-cell transcriptome fate map of the Ciona tadpole to characterize the neural cell types comprising its brain also known as the sensory vehicle. https://phys.org/news/2021-05-hypothalamus-predates-vertebrates.html Evolution Fri, 28 May 2021 09:20:03 EDT news541411990 The first new skull discovered in nearly a century from a rare species of the iconic, tube-crested dinosaur Parasaurolophus was announced today in the journal PeerJ. The exquisite preservation of the skull, especially the bizarre tube-shaped nasal passage, finally revealed the structure of the crest after decades of disagreement. https://phys.org/news/2021-01-skull-tube-crested-dinosaur-reveals-evolution.html Paleontology & Fossils Mon, 25 Jan 2021 07:00:01 EST news530779120 Research by Kai Jiao, M.D., Ph.D., and colleagues at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and in Germany has yielded fundamental insights into the causes of severe birth defects known as CHARGE syndrome cases. These congenital birth defects include severe and life-threatening heart malformations. https://phys.org/news/2020-12-chd7-protein-factor-vital-embryonic.html Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 03 Dec 2020 04:18:14 EST news526191490 The African crested rat (Lophiomys imhausi) is hardly the continent's most fearsome-looking creature—the rabbit-sized rodent resembles a gray puffball crossed with a skunk—yet its fur is packed with a poison so lethal it can fell an elephant and just a few milligrams can kill a human. In a Journal of Mammology paper published today, the University of Utah, Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, and National Museums of Kenya researchers found the African crested rat is the only mammal known to sequester plant toxins for chemical defense and uncovered an unexpected social life—the rats appear to be monogamous and may even form small family units with their offspring. https://phys.org/news/2020-11-secret-social-giant-poisonous-rats.html Plants & Animals Thu, 19 Nov 2020 15:56:32 EST news525023749 Last year, researchers at the University of California, Riverside, identified the early origins of neural crest cells—embryonic cells in vertebrates that travel throughout the body and generate many cell types—in chick embryos. Now the researchers have used a human model to figure out when neural crest cells acquire distinctive molecular and functional attributes. https://phys.org/news/2020-11-unraveling-mystery-embryonic-cells.html Cell & Microbiology Wed, 18 Nov 2020 11:07:25 EST news524920040 "What do you want to be when you grow up?" is a question it seems like every child gets asked. A few precocious ones might answer "a doctor" or "an astronaut," but most will probably smile and shrug their shoulders. But well before a child could comprehend the question or the concept of choosing one's own path in life—while they were an embryo, in fact—the child's own stem cells were asking themselves the same thing. Stem cells are cells that have not yet chosen a specialized fate, such as to become a neuron, or white blood cell. At some point, each stem cell decides what it will be when it "grows up," and these decisions are critical junctures in any organism's development. https://phys.org/news/2020-10-stem-cells-careers.html Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 27 Oct 2020 10:50:02 EDT news523013779 It's not a coincidence that dogs are cuter than wolves, or that goats at a petting zoo have shorter horns and friendlier demeanors than their wild ancestors. Scientists call this "domestication syndrome"—the idea that breeding out aggression inadvertently leads to physical changes, including floppier ears, shorter muzzles and snouts, curlier tails, paler fur, smaller brains, and more. https://phys.org/news/2020-10-monkey-humans-self-domesticated.html Plants & Animals Thu, 15 Oct 2020 15:05:13 EDT news521993108 New University of Colorado Boulder-led research finds that the traits that make vertebrates distinct from invertebrates were made possible by the emergence of a new set of genes 500 million years ago, documenting an important episode in evolution where new genes played a significant role in the evolution of novel traits in vertebrates. https://phys.org/news/2020-09-scientists-gene-family-key-vertebrate.html Evolution Wed, 16 Sep 2020 12:26:06 EDT news519477961